Polo Cinta Frias

SACP GS Dr Blade Nzimande addressed the Stakeholders’ Forum of the Conference of Commonwealth Education Ministers in Cape Town yesterday. His address was a major review of the central place of education within the general struggle against Imperialism, which is the proper way to understand the role of education in the world at this time. Let us hope that it woke up the Commonwealth delegates, so that they were reminded of the historical nature of their task. See the article linked below.

“Polo” Cinta Frias is a name that is little-known to South Africans yet this Cuban military commander played a major role in our history. His is our Marshal Zhukov, the military victor over fascism in our part of the world and the commander who, more than any other, secured our peace. But if you listened to Moeletsi Mbeki talking about that history you might not think so. Mbeki used the occasion of COSATU’s 21st anniversary celebrations in Boksburg last week to argue that the apartheid regime had “hard power”. We as the liberation movement had no more than “soft power” according to Mbeki, and were only saved by the US Black Caucus and the “Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act”.

We learned on the same occasion that comrade Cinta Frias, the commander of the Angola southern front at the time of Cuito Cuanavale, may be coming to the inauguration of the Freedom Park Wall of Remembrance (Sikhumbuto) in Pretoria on Saturday, December 16th, the day that for the last few years has been officially called the Day of Reconciliation, and which was once known as Dingaan’s Day.

See the second link below for some idea of the role played by Comrade Cinta Frias and the Cubans in the direct military defeat of the racist South African Defence Force and the consequent liberation of Southern Africa, including South Africa. The document includes excerpts from Cde Fidel Castro Ruz on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the first Cuban expeditionary force to Angola in 1976 and the 49th anniversary of the landing of the “Granma” in Cuba, on 2 December 2005.

Let us hope that the truth and the whole truth will be told on Saturday when the wall is handed over to Moeletsi Mbeki’s brother Thabo in the latter’s capacity as representative, for the time being, of the nation. The working-class component of the struggle against apartheid must not be forgotten, and that includes the proletarian internationalist contribution of our brothers and sisters, the Cubans. See the last link below for the only small announcement of this event we have seen so far.

Part of the educational struggle over Imperialism that Comrade Blade Nzimande talks about must surely be the restoration of our history to its rightful place in the minds of the people. Since there is very little on the Internet in English about comrade Cinta Frias, and no images that we have been able to discover, let us recall Marshall Zhukov, the Soviet victor over Nazi fascism, and also the recent victors over Israeli colonialist fascism, with an image of Hassan Nasrallah, appropriately displayed at one of the huge demonstrations that have been taking place in Lebanon in recent days.

Click on these links:

Rebuild mass fronts for educational transformation, Blade Nzimande (4216 words)

Excerpts in memory of our Cuban comrades (1212 words)

Freedom Wall to be handed over to Mbeki, SABC (232 words)

COSATU Slams Mbeki

News24 picked up on COSATU’s denunciation of Thabo Mbeki’s Presidential sophistry. The Star has put the story on its front page today, and also carries a sharp Dov Fedler cartoon on its editorial page (page 12), which is unfortunately not available on their web site. See the first two links below. Essop Pahad is the Minister in the Presidency, which is a growth on the head of the state. King Louis XIV of France said: “L’État c’est Moi”, meaning “The State? It’s me!” or “I am the State!”. In South Africa’s case the Presidency thinks it is the State. Essop Pahad thinks that he can ban an individual from any employment with any part of the State. His dispute with Thoko Mkhwanazi-Xaluva, according to him, is: “not merely between the employee and the presidency, but the relationship between the employee and the state as a whole”. See the linked Editorial and report from the City Press, below. It seems that unilateral diktat and inability to negotiate is more that an aberration in the Presidency, but rather that the Presidency seeks to extend its anathemas to the whole state apparatus, (and even as far as the South African High Commission in London). In ancient Greece this kind of prideful, contemptuous arrogance was a crime. It was called “hubris”. The crime of hubris invited the inexorable retribution of “Nemesis”. Nemesis is approaching the US Imperialists. See Robert Fisk’s denunciation of the US continuing assault on Iraq, linked below. Pinochet died. He may have escaped the courts but the verdict of the Chilean people is clear. His name will forever stand for what we must guard against, with the force of an armed people, if necessary. In his “photo-opportunity” remarks with President Bush last week, President Mbeki said: “The President also mentioned, I discussed with the President the impact of the situation in Darfur on the neighboring countries, particularly Chad and the Central African Republic. But also the difficult situation in Somalia—“ (Bush interjected: “Yes, sir!”) “-- and the President, together, we are very keen that, indeed, something must move there. This was a failed state. It's necessary to support the transitional government, to restoring a government and to reunify the country, and so on. It's an important thing because the problem, one of the big problems is that as it is, it provides a base for terrorists, find safe haven there and then can spread out to the rest of the continent. It's something that is of shared concern.” When Bush visited South Africa and called Mbeki “my point man” it was not entirely clear what was meant. The above exchange of words concerning North-East African countries may provide a very specific example of what Bush meant. In Sudan “the West”, or the “international community”, or in other words Imperialism, acting on the promptings of the USA, is busy undermining a sovereign government. In Somalia, the question of what “restoring a government” amounts to will be decided selectively according to the point of view of the speaker. Such decisions, if taken in Washington, are likely to result in rumours of wars, and then actual wars, which South Africans do not want to be getting involved in on the side of Imperialism. The blog “Lenin’s Tomb” has opened the question of Somalia up very nicely in the last linked article, below. Our President owes us a full explanation of his remarks in Washington. Click on these links: Cosatu slams Mbeki over racism, News24 (353 words) Cosatu slams Mbeki on ministers with business interests, Star (352 words) Pahad finger-wagging, abuse of power, City Press (456 words) Enemy of the state, Mpumelelo Mkhabela, City Press (826 words) Penny drops on futile war, Robert Fisk, Sunday Independent (724 words) Government forces vs Islamic militiamen, Lenin’s Tomb (859 words)

Point Man Missing The Point

The Saturday Star carried a story headlined “Mixed news after Mbeki, Bush meet – Follow-up meeting fails to yield substance”. Their story is not on the Internet. The South African president flew to Washington and back for a 50-minute meeting with US President George W Bush and a half-hour meeting with Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi. President Bush can’t quite cope with the difference between Darfur and Dohar, as you can see from the mercilessly verbatim White House transcript of the remarks made at the subsequent photo-opportunity, linked below and worth reading. While he was in Washington, or perhaps while he was flying around in his personal Boeing, Thabo Mbeki despatched his (ANC) President’s Letter to the online ANC Today publication. This was an attempted (but fatally flawed) defence of the Ministers and other government functionaries who have been caught owning shares in the Bombela Consortium, successful BEE boondoggle bidder for the R23 billion elitist Gautrain project. Sunday Times editor Mondli Makhanya has today brutally taken apart the hypocrisy of this document, and set his sharp columnist Hogarth on to it, as well. See the linked document below. Amy Musgrave covered the story in Saturday’s Weekender. Her story is also linked below, as is the President’s Letter itself. Meanwhile Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka blew another R4.55 million of taxpayers’ money on a shopping trip to England. This is a new record. Last year’s notorious Phumzile “crane trip” to the United Arab Emirates only squandered R700,000. Minister of Excuses (formerly “Terror”) Lekota says it’s a shocking bad thing but there’s nobody to blame. See the linked story below. It would not even cost a fraction of this sort of money to recognise the Transport and General Workers Union’s right to organise the locally-employed workers at the South African High Commission in London. Rights that are guaranteed to South Africans are denied to their overseas employees. Comrades who fought in solidarity so that South Africans could have those rights are now treated with contempt. What a scandal and embarrassment! See COSATU’s Press Release and the IOL article linked below. Click on these links: Remarks by Bush and Mbeki at Photo Opportunity, White House (787 words) Lonely at the top, Mondli Makhanya and Hogarth, Sunday Times (1084 words) Racism behind Gautrain saga says Mbeki, Amy Musgrave, Weekender (518 words) The ANC, ANC leaders, BEE, and corruption, T Mbeki, ANC Today (2611 words) Mlambo-Ngcuka UK trip costs taxpayers R4,55m, IOL (218 words) COSATU Statement re T and G dispute with SA House London (398 words) SA High Commission embarrassing, IOL (149 words)

COSATU responds to President's Letter

COSATU Media Release


COSATU response to the President’s Letter published in ANC Today on 8th December, 2006


COSATU regrets that once again we are obliged to contradict our country’s President, Comrade Thabo Mbeki, who has written about us and our allies in the SACP in his capacity as President of our ally the ANC, in ANC Today on 8 December 2006.

COSATU is angered but not in anyway intimidated by the use of the race card against a mainly black workers’ organisation whose members are the very victims on a daily basis of the racism that the President is theorising about. We find it particularly offensive that President Mbeki has seen fit to play the race card in a manner that suggests that the people with business interests - whom he is defending - are somehow blacker than the working class components of the alliance.

Moreover the President’s style of engagement leaves much to be desired. He never debates on the strength of his arguments or correctness of the points he is raising. He always seeks to misrepresent people’s genuine concerns in order to ridicule those he disagrees with and question their integrity. He throws the race card even against organisations whose membership is constituted mainly by the very ANC members he is leading. In the process of doing so he has antagonised countless organisations and left the ANC and the Alliance fractious and deeply divided.

COSATU takes exception that it is lumped together with the Democratic Alliance. This is extremely offensive! As part of the style of misrepresenting opponents’ arguments the President sought to lump all the arguments we made with those made by the DA and newspapers in an unprincipled attempt to show us as one. Regrettably this has been the hallmark of his leadership style. COSATU and many others have been the victims of this in the past.

For the record we must state that there is absolutely nothing in common between COSATU and the DA. Instead there is more in common between the DA and President, at least in terms of economic policies.

COSATU does not withdraw even one word of what it has said in the matter of Gautrain and the involvement of some Ministers. We reiterate that it is wrong for political leaders who have been tasked to lead transformation to get involved in business deals that compromise their roles as government administrators. We believe it is immoral for anyone to seek to be both a people’s representative and be a businessman or women at the same time. This is more so for the ANC which has a stated bias towards the working class. COSATU is extremely concerned that a growing number of ANC and government leaders have all manner of business interests, directly or through their spouses. This is no racism; it is a moral question and it does not matter whether it is blacks or whites involved - it remains COSATU’s concern.

In his letter the President does not deny that government ministers and other prominent leaders are shareholders in companies that are profiting from government contracts, and specifically from the Gautrain Bombela contract. On the contrary, the President seeks to justify this situation and to portray it as normal and even admirable.

Yet the same President Mbeki, on other occasions, has made a point of denouncing the crass materialism that is so evident in the country under his leadership. If it suits the President, he is happy to steal COSATU’s clothes for the occasion (as he did in his Nelson Mandela Lecture of July 29 this year) and to condemn the pursuit of riches. We do not mind at all if he does that, so long as he means what he says, and acts accordingly.

COSATU represents straightforward people who do not make the spurious distinction that the President now appears to make between good greed and bad greed. Many of our members work for companies and they are aware that all companies pursue profit. They are not impressed when they are told by the President that Minister Pandor’s interest in a particular company is too small to be of any consequence.

So long as a minister has her hands muddied with business, the line has been crossed. She cannot be a little bit capitalist, any more than a schoolgirl in one of our schools can be a little bit pregnant, as she knows. The President’s letter is special pleading of an obvious kind, made more odious by the reference to “a month's supply of brown bread”, a dividend which would be very welcome to the majority of South Africans who are classified as poor.


National Spokesperson:

Patrick Craven
Congress of South African Trade Unions
1-5 Leyds Cnr Biccard Streets
Braamfontein, 2017

P.O. Box 1019
Johannesburg, 2000
SOUTH AFRICA

Tel: +27 11 339-4911/24
Fax: +27 11 339-5080/6940/ 086 603 9667
Cell: 0828217456
E-Mail: patrick@cosatu.org.za

813 words

History Of The Struggle

The Communist University meets this evening for the last time this year at COSATU House, first floor, 1 Leyds Street, Braamfontein. The topic is Lenin’s 1916 “Nascent Trend of Imperialist Economism”. The opening contribution to discussion will be made by Cde Ben Stevenson, General Secretary of the Young Communist League of Great Britain. Ron Press is an SACP member, Treason Trialist, and SACTU veteran who lives in Bristol, England near where his children grew up in exile. If you have been a reader of these Communist University despatches for a while you will be familiar with Cde Ron’s occasional brief, wise and pointed interventions, as well as his unforgettable poems. Yesterday he wrote: “I understand from the Morning Star that the S.A. embassy refuses to recognize the British T & G at their offices in London. This is ridiculous considering the support we got from them during the struggle. Please what can be done? Could COSATU protest?” The Morning Star report is linked below, and also a report on this matter that was run yesterday in the COSATU Daily Labour News. The essence of it is that the South African Embassy in London (that is to say South Africa House in Trafalgar Square) is refusing to recognise union representation of its British employees by the Transport and General Workers’ Union (the “T&G”). Ron Press rightly calls this situation ridiculous. It is a shame that it has come to the point where South Africa House had to be picketed by one of the unions that was most consistent in its support for the struggle. The T&G is a big union, and was a big, strong friend to the ANC and to the solidarity movement (the AAM) for decades prior to our liberation. We used to picket the same South Africa House with them when it was occupied by the old regime. Let us record that the then T&G office-bearer Ron Todd was one of the few who helped the AAM to raise the profile of Steven Lee when the comrade was condemned to 8 years in prison in the late 1970s, together with Tim Jenkin, who got 12 years. We know that the comrades later escaped from Pretoria Prison together with Alex Moumbaris and made their way out of the country with the help of Prema Naidoo and others; but at the time of their arrest and conviction there was precious little international support for them, and the T&G’s intervention, three decades ago, is still fresh in the mind for that reason (for people who know about it). The T&G did it on the basis that Steven Lee had been a T&G member while working in London prior to going back into the country. What a shame that the South African Embassy does not know these things, and take them into account. Steven Lee’s son Brendan Lee will be attending next week’s Young Communist League (SA) Congress as a representative of the British YCL, in a delegation of three, including the above-named Ben Stevenson (who is also a member of the T&G) and James Tweedie. Viva! Viva International Solidarity, Viva! Viva the History of the Struggle, Viva! The next document was delivered by Zwelinzima Vavi yesterday at the well-attended and lively commemoration of the COSATU’s 21 years of history since it was established as the right and proper successor to the SACTU that Cde Ron Press served for so many years together with Zola Zembe and others. See the link for this full and remarkable account. COSATU’s statement on yet another rise in interest rates bears witness to the continuing nature of the struggle. See the link. The SACP Yusuf Dadoo District (Secretary: Nkosiphendule Kolisile) is marching tomorrow in Randfontein for safe, affordable, accessible public transport and for an end to evictions. See the link. Click on these links: Union steps up fight for SA embassy recognition, Morning Star (250 words) T and G presses SA House for recognition Politics-co-uk (411 words) Zwelinzima Vavi, 061207, Tracing the Footsteps of COSATU (2328 words) COSATU condemns rise in lending rates (339 words) SACP Yusuf Dadoo District march for transport, against evictions (292 words)

All Down To Boksburg

The 21st Anniversary all-day event for COSATU is at Boksburg Civic Centre from 10h00 today. Directions to the venue are as per the linked sheet below.

On Friday the Communist University meets at 17h00 in COSATU House for the last time this year. On Saturday there is an SACP Johannesburg Central Branch party at Cde Martin Rall’s place from 18h00 until late, which is also a farewell to Cde Martin, who is going to Argentina in March.

Concerning the Zim event (previously scheduled for Saturday from 12h00 to 19h00 at Xarra Books) the organisers have sent the following message: “Please note that we have changed the date of this weekend’s Freedom In Our Lifetime Festival. It will now take place on Sunday the 10th as opposed to Saturday 9th. Also please note that this freedom festival is free entrance.”

Announcing a date and then later changing it is not good organising, comrades.

Umsebenzi Online came out yesterday. It is the last one before the YCL National Congress, which takes place between 13th and 17th December, in other words between Wednesday and Sunday next week. SACP GS Dr Blade Nzimande calls on the YCL to build itself as “South Africa’s Political School for Communism”. See the link below. The rest of the issue is taken up with the SACP statement on the occasion of the reburial of the remains of the late Cde Moses Mabhida, former General Secretary of the SACP, which has been posted here before.

RW Johnson and Khehla Shubane are two liberals who have a space in the Business Day each week called “Face Off”, where they try out their pet theories against each other (see the link below). Sometimes these are wacky and sometimes they are spiteful, but sometimes they hit the nail square on the head, as Johnson did yesterday, when he wrote (concerning Jacob Zuma):

“It doesn’t matter much what case is brought against him now: the ANC rank and file will see it as yet another unfair attempt to use the courts as an instrument of factional struggle. Even a guilty verdict won’t hold water with them now. Indeed, even the verdict against Schabir Shaik looks very unsafe: the court found no evidence of a straightforward bribe, just a symbiotic relationship it didn’t like. You could have said all the same things about Mbeki’s relationship with Sol Kerzner. Things could unravel a whole lot more in 2007.”

The ANCYL responded yesterday in characteristic style to the new threats of the Scorpions/NPA against Comrade Zuma. See the linked statement.

The Saturday Star’s blustering News Editor Willem Steenkamp has written to the CU asking for private talks. This is the editor who published the article by Michael Schmidt that set PUDEMO up for a new round of police brutality and repression. Like the Scorpion Vusi Pikoli, Steenkamp would like to have the power to turn his own public exposure on and off when it pleases him. See the attached link. We have nothing to say to him in private. If you wish to write to him (his e-mail address is on his message), please send a “CC” to the Swaziland Solidarity Network Forum at sa-swaziland-solidarity-eom-forum@googlegroups.com . In any case, join that group here. One of our researchers has turned up a document called “A history of anarchist mass organisational theory and practice” – By Michael Schmidt. As Marx and Engels were to Proudhon and Bakunin, so we are to Michael Schmidt.

Click on these links:

Umsebenzi Online, Vol 5, No. 69, 6 Dec 2006, YCL, Mabhida (4160 words)

How will this year be remembered, Shubane, Johnson, B Day (1605 words)

ANCYL response to reports of fresh Zuma probe (380 words)

Email from S Star News Editor Willem Steenkamp, 6 Dec 06 (263 words)

Directions to Boksburg Civic Centre Hall (directions)

Prick Up Your Ears

The Communist University has received an e-mail that is both pompous and incontinent from one Willem Steenkamp, claiming to be News Editor of the Saturday Star (see the link below). From an educational point of view it behoves us to ask: What is the underlying nature of this odorous document? Is it the work of a fool, or a liar? Steenkamp the News Editor must be one or the other, or both. Is he being a fool when he calls the anonymous “source” who had a day out in Mpumalanga with Michael Schmidt a “dissident”? Is it foolishness to call people who act in favour of the Swazi autocracy “dissidents”, or is it a “big lie’, Goebbels-style? Steenkamp and Schmidt want to say that PUDEMO is not “dissident”, but the impimpi is a “dissident”. Surely this News Editor must have contempt for his readers if he thinks they will swallow such hogwash? Let’s not hesitate to point out that these two (Schmidt and Steenkamp) are cowardly popping their pea-shooters from under the skirts of Irish capitalist Tony O’Reilly, the former rugby player and Heinz beans executive who owns the Independent Group of newspapers. Maybe they think Uncle Tony is going to pay Wim Trengove or Billy Downer a pile of dosh to crush a Communist blog? Somebody in the firm should tell these lily-livered little anti-Communists that pigs will fly before Tony O’Reilly will waste his cash on such a fool’s errand. We had never heard of Steenkamp until we received his puny e-mail, but now that he has broken cover there is an outstanding matter that could not be directly laid at Schmidt’s door, but is definitely Steenkamp’s responsibility. That is the little pictures of AK47s on the map that was printed next to Schmidt’s original article in the Saturday Star. Steenkamp somehow thinks we didn’t read it properly. Unfortunately for him, we did. Schmidt made no reference to AK47s. Now, ten days or so later, the Swazi police “discover” ten AK47s somewhere in the bundus of Swaziland. What did Steenkamp know, that made him order up pictures of AK47s with no basis in the report? Or is he clairvoyant? While we are on questions of fact, why is it that neither Steenkamp nor Schmidt will give us the URL of the alleged interview with Mario Masuku that they keep saying is on the IOL web site? Because neither “Mario Masuku” nor “PUDEMO” nor “Schmidt” in the site search finds any such thing. Maybe they just think it’s there, or in other words they haven’t checked their facts. That would “figure”. Or maybe they are just bluffing. Maybe they are just not used to having their bluff called. Maybe editors forget how to write. Steenkamp doesn’t realise that when he accuses Schmidt’s readers of not knowing “even the slightest bit about him” that he is calling his friend a liar. He is saying the Schmidt we read every week is a false persona. He is suggesting that the Schmidt who tried to lie about Karl Marx when he worked for ThisDay newspaper was a bogus Schmidt. And the Schmidt who insulted the Cuban people not once but twice in the Saturday Star was a phoney Schmidt. And the Schmidt who set up the Swazi liberation movement for violent persecution, and gave comfort to those who want to revive the kangaroo “arson” trial of the PUDEMO cadres was not the real decent Schmidt that his pals and drinking mates know him to be. What nonsense! Steenkamp is an embarrassment. In the end this comedian comes up with a classic which we can’t help hoping will be laughed out of some court one day: “We have ears in all sorts of places!” In the dustbin, maybe, or down the toilet? What the hell is the man trying to say? This bloke really thinks he’s frightening. It might be nice to humour him and at least pretend to be scared, but our rules don’t allow that. It says in the Communist Manifesto: “The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims.” So prick up your ears and listen to this, Mr Steenkamp: (expletive deleted). We can’t allow the whole day’s business to be taken up with these boikies. See the link below for our friend the admirable Professor Tilley’s article written in Johannesburg for Counterpunch on Palestine. And don’t forget to head out to Boksburg tomorrow for the COSATU 21st Anniversary seminar. Click on this link: Who's afraid of Virginia Schmidt, Willem Steenkamp, The Star (e-mail) Apartheid Israel, Virginia Tilley, Counterpunch (2888 words)

Take The Initiative

Hugo Chavez was elected President of Venezuela. Viva!

John Bolton resigned from the United Nations. Good!

COSATU is having its 21st Anniversary all-day event on December 7th starting at 10h00 at Boksburg Civic Centre. We expect ANC SG Kgalema Motlanthe, SACP GS Dr Blade Nzimande, COSATU GS Zwelinzima Vavi, and Dr Ashwin Desai among many others. See the linked programme below, and some pictures to the right-hand side.

Now some news that’s not so good.

In Swaziland, Mphandlana Shongwe was beaten unconscious by police. See the linked report from the Times of Swaziland.

This is because, thanks to Michael Schmidt and his phantasmagoria “secret army” story, the “Swazi debate is fired up”. Schmidt is proud of firing it up with his lying false report. What does he care if the Swazi “majesties” and their police are “debating” with truncheons and rubber bullets? Schmidt only cares about his portfolio, his CV, his fame, and his salary. His is the worst kind of “you furnish the pictures, I’ll furnish the war” Hearst-style so-called journalism. What a skunk! See his vainglorious self-congratulatory “follow-up”, linked below. It appeared in the useless Saturday Star on the same day that Mphandlana Shongwe was beaten unconscious and hospitalised. None of the other South African papers picked up Schmidt’s stupid made-up “story”, we are happy to say.

The Communist University has mastered Blogger Beta. We are back to normal, but now with pictures! Our blog has a much better look and a new URL: http://domza.blogspot.com/

Click on these links:

COSATU 21st Anniversary programme, Boksburg, Dec 7 (programme)

Mphandlana needed five stitches, Makhosi Magongo, Times of Swaziland (271 words)

Swazi debate is fired up, Michael Schmidt, Saturday Star (853 words)

Disclaimer

On May 14th 2006 the Communist University blog wrote:

“The rump of the PEC is arguing (for the second time) for postponement of elections, in favour of discussing other items...

“Putting (other) matters before the question of leadership, in circumstances when the Provincial leadership are by their own admission no better than unwilling caretakers, is putting the cart before the horse. Decisions taken will have no effect at Provincial level so long as there is no effective leadership at that level to execute those decisions, as has been the case for a long time now. The Provincial leadership should be replaced immediately and in its entirety, and a Congress held as soon as possible, and not in the dog-days of November as has been proposed. This is only a critical-pedagogic view. The PC, and not the CU, will decide. See links, for SACP Constitution and Hannington’s Rules and Procedure.”

The following day the CU wrote:

“Yesterday’s SACP Gauteng Provincial Council ground on for six hours or more of mainly monologue. The Secretary set the comrades an endurance test once again. It’s as if he thinks he is no longer Vishwas Satgar but has become Fidel Castro or Hugo Chavez. He was finally obliged to concede in a few short minutes what was clear from the start (and at the previous PC). The delegates want an election as soon as possible to replace the six missing PEC members. All the platform’s manoeuvres failed, and were bound to fail.”

On July 18th the CU recorded that Cde Zico Tamela, formerly Chairperson of Johannesburg Central Branch, elected in March 2006 as a PR Councillor in Johannesburg, had been elected as Chairperson of the Provincial Executive Committee.

Today the CU can record the Cdes Makhi Ndabeni and Bigboy Kekana, together with four other comrades, were finally elected to the PEC. The names of the other four could not properly be recalled by Cde Ndabeni when he yesterday gave, from the chair of the Johannesburg Central Branch at its BGM, a report of the Provincial Council meeting of 19th November; hence we cannot announce those names today. Thus the saga of the dysfunctional SACP Gauteng Provincial Executive Committee grinds on.

Cde Ndabeni then proceeded to read out the document below, called “Public Statement on Conduct of Dominic Tweedie” (by which is meant the Communist University) signed by Vishwas Satgar, who is still the Gauteng Provincial Secretary, although he has been threatening to leave that position for the greater part of a year. Following strong objections, Cde Tamela (present as a member of the branch) clarified the position, which is that Satgar’s document was not an official statement of the Province, but that the Communist University must at the branch’s insistence now carry a disclaimer.

This disclaimer is no burden. The CU does not hold itself out as a representative of the SACP, and has never done so. The CU has always stood for open-ended political education. What this means is fully elaborated on its web site in the section on Critical Pedagogy. It is not, never has been, and never could be, a deliberative or executive or representative constitutional organ of the SACP.

As such, and within the constraints of time and space, the CU does not pretend not to notice the absurdities and the machinations of the political life going on around it.

It proved not to be possible yesterday, for example, in the face of a barrage of “points of order”, for the SACP Johannesburg Central Branch to take cognisance of material which is in the public realm, and which branch members will no doubt discuss energetically over the holiday period (the branch meets again on February 7th). This material is linked below in the form of reports in the Sunday Times and the Mail and Guardian. These reports are based on the leaked e-mails of Cde Vishwas Satgar, the very same Satgar who so strongly disapproves of the CU.

Satgar complains of what he calls “re-Stalinisation of the SACP”. The CU, happily released from obligations by its disclaimer, will nevertheless refrain from comparing Satgar himself with Stalin, in spite of Satgar’s fondness for denunciations and anathemas. In any case, the relevant comparison for Satgar’s public agony of self-pity is not Stalin, but Kerensky.

The Party is very tolerant of oddballs like Satgar, and somewhat unbearably tolerant of the functional chaos that surrounds such people. The main problem with the Gauteng Province of the SACP is not its continued obsession with sundry currents of sectarian infighting, as such, but rather the consequence of that obsession - which is that it still does not do its job, and still shows no sign of being able to do its job, up to today.

It would be sad if the SACP as a whole was in any way typified by the shenanigans of Gauteng Province. Luckily today we have a reminder of what the SACP is and what it stands for, under the leadership of its successful and thoroughly educational General Secretary Dr Blade Nzimande, in the form of the Party’s tribute to its late former GS, Moses Mabhida. See the fourth link below.

The “Blogger Beta” has flattered us with promises, only to deceive in the performance, not unlike some other politicians we know. Blogger Beta is the new version of the original Blogger, and we have made the (irreversible) switch. The CU has as a rule routed its messages through Blogger, into the Group. Today and for the time being we will have to re-order the system. Let’s hope it works. If you did not get the link yesterday for Zwelinzima Vavi’s speech on the occasion of Cde Mabhida’s reburial, it is here.

The wysiwug is working again, and this time it looks like we can do pictures. See the bottom for one of Dr Blade Nzimande, the General Secretary of the SACP.

Click on these links:

Vishwas Satgar, Public Statement on Conduct of Dominic Tweedie (152 words)

SACP provincial leader slams Nzimande, Moipone Malefane, S Times (566 words)

Daggers drawn in SACP, Rapule Tabane, Mail and Guardian (950 words)

SACP Tribute on reburial of the body Cde Moses Mabhida (2793 words)

Amafela Ndawonye

The input given by COSATU GS Zwelinzima Vavi in Pietermaritzburg yesterday on the occasion of the return of the remains of the late SACP, ANC and SACTU leader Moses Mabhida to South Africa is a significant milestone. It is a concise summing up of the concrete situation that we are in as we approach the Christmas break and a new year to follow. It is also a summing up of the whole revolutionary process from the point of view of the organised working class. It goes out as an extra so as to give comrades who have Sunday access to e-mail and Internet the chance to read it today. This post is made with Blogger Beta and Internet Explorer 7. It seems that the two are not yet synchronised, so that features we have previously used (wysiwyg editing) are not available. The CU will look for a solution. (Solution found, blog re-edited). Click on this link: Zwelinzima Vavi, COSATU Tribute to Moses Mabhida (1901 words)

Freedom Season

Today (Sunday December 3rd) is the last BGM of 2006 for the SACP Johannesburg Central Branch, to be held at 10h00 at the 13th floor, Old Mutual Building, 29 Kerk Street, (between Loveday and Harrison), Johannesburg. The Branch has to elect a new Chairperson and a new Treasurer. Cde Makhi Ndabeni is now a member of the Gauteng Provincial Executive Committee, and under the SACP Constitution cannot continue to hold office in a lower structure. Cde Martin Rall is leaving for Argentina in the New Year. Next Thursday, December 7th is the celebration of the 21st Anniversary of COSATU. Not to be missed! On Saturday December 9th there will be a Zimbabwe Freedom Festival in the Quad behind the Xarra bookshop in Jeppe Street on Mary Fitzgerald Square from midday up to 19h00. See the linked invitation below, and the map, here. Vukani Mde’s great “political diary” continues to provide good reading in the Weekender. Yesterday he wrote about the demise of the DA and the nature of “opposition”, with interesting input from SACP GS Dr Blade Nzimande. See the linked document below. It’s long since we have had a poem from our SACP comrade and ANC and SACTU veteran in Bristol, England, Ron Press. But here is one at last, in time for the festive season. Click the link below. ANC Today has finally published the report that was an exclusive for S’thembiso Msomi in the City Press two weeks ago. See the link below. While on the subject of ANC publications, the latest Umrabulo (No. 27) can be read here. The festive season will be less festive for teachers thanks to the Department of Education’s inexcusable failure to pay them the money that is due to them. See SADTU’s statement linked below. And a reminder that the festive season is also a building season, with all the risks that employers take with workers’ lives, comes from a News24 report linked below. Trenches are supposed to be shored, that is to say made safe, but shoring costs money and takes time. This time the worker did not lose his life. We have to hope that he has fully recovered and that he will not lose earnings. Notice that the employer’s spokesperson’s name is given, but not the worker’s. This is typical of the bourgeois media. The CU is happy to report that the Swaziland Solidarity Network Forum has pulled out ahead of the others in our family of international solidarity fora. It now has 241 members and a greater number of contributions than the others, too. Second place goes to Zimbabwe Fight On Don’t Mourn, with 186 members. But these latter comrades have pulled off a great feat by organising an event collectively on-line. Look well and learn! The SA Friends of Cuba’s membership stands at 98. The SA-Palestine Solidarity Forum’s membership is zilch, which just goes to show that meeting an obvious need is not a guarantee of success. The members still have to be got in, by an effort. Please help if you can. The new Western Sahara Solidarity Forum, only begun yesterday, also needs a big effort. Click on these links: Zim Freedom Festival, Xarra Quad, 12h00-19h00, Sat 9 Dec (Invitation) Political Diary, extracts, Vukani Mde, Business Day Weekender (1235 words) A Fruitful New year to you all, From Ron Press (Poem) Who are ANC members, What do they think, ANC Today (916 words) SADTU slams DoE for inefficiency and failure to pay teachers (372 words) Construction worker buried alive, News24 (134 words)

Pikoli! The Musical!

We know that Judge Hillary Squires, when he put Schabir Shaik away for 15 years, invented a new kind of corruption law. It was not necessary any more to show that a payment had been made “in consideration” (as the law used to say) for a particular thing. Because Judge Squires could see, as clear as can be, just as clear as he knows that the moon is a moon and not a balloon, that this was a “symbiosis”, and that was bad. Very bad. Fifteen years bad! What we didn’t know then was that the old-fashioned kind of corruption was now quite o.k! When Squires brought the new kind of law in, the old one was no longer a crime. In fact it seems that anybody who is anybody is doing it. One minute Gwen Gill is reporting you in her gossip column, and the next you are wheeling and dealing like a good ‘un, and it’s quite all right! Almost de rigeur, in fact. Only a few days ago we saw how jolly it was to be in on the Gautrain boondoggle. So the Communist University is today conducting an exercise of the imagination. The idea is to see what it would look like if Squires had not turned the law upside down. We will suppose that the people who were reported on in the linked articles from Beeld, the IOL and the Moneyweb yesterday were still liable for the good old-fashioned crime of corruption as we used to know it, where there is a simple, direct exchange of one thing for another, and not a “symbiosis”. Just imagine these sentences: Titus Mafolo – 15 years Ronnie Mamoepa – 15 years Gavin Watson – 15 years Linda Mti – 15 years Seth Phalatse – 15 years Patrick Gillingham – 15 years Carol Mkele – 15 years and Nozuko Pikoli, the wife of Vusi Pikoli, national director of the National Prosecuting Authority – 15 years. Ag, shame! What about Speaker Baleka Mbete, Home Affairs Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa- Nqakula, Education Minister Naledi Pandor and Deputy Health Minister Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge, all in the Bombela Consortium, and standing to benefit from the Gautrain project? How could you even think of such people being locked up! The very idea! Here is a headline from today’s Star: “Top Scorpion sees red at 'harmful media probes and sensation seeking'”. The top scorp is Vusi Pikoli. People are singing, and he doesn’t like it. Ha, ha, ha! The Communist University meets this evening at the first floor, COSATU House, 1 Leyds Street, Braamfontein, at 17h00 to discuss Lenin’s two pamphlets on Adventurism and Insurrection. Next week’s session will be on the topic carried yesterday. Next Thursday is going to feature one of the events of the year. Even Gwen Gill ought to be there. It is the 21st Anniversary of South Africa’s favourite democracy, the Congress of South African Trade Unions. Everyone who is anyone is going to be at Boksburg Civic Centre for the whole day. Don’t miss it! You’ll regret it if you do! See the linked invitation, below. Click on these links: New twist in prisons scandal, Basson and du Plessis, Beeld (512 words) Mbeki man named in irregular tender report, IOL (327 words) DCS scandal has Simmers links, Julius Cobbett, Moneyweb (504 words) COSATU 21st Anniversary all-day seminar 09h30 7 Dec 2006 (Invitation)