On the Farlam Commission report and the Marikana massacre

The leadership of the SACP, NUM, Cosatu and the ANC would have us believe that the striking mineworkers at Marikana were ‘violent’, that they were thugs. The Farlam Commission report, limited as it is, shows the contrary.

Despite the political manipulation of the conclusions of the Farlam Commission by imperialism and the ruling party, the evidence is very clear that the ANC leaders, the NUM leaders and the Lonmin bosses worked together to massacre the striking mineworkers’ leaders.  

A central point made by the Commission was:

‘ It is clear from the evidence that either none, or very few, of the strikers who were killed had been shooting at the police.’ [page 375, paragraph 1083 of the Farlam final, published report]

If you consider that none of the police suffered a single gunshot wound, nor even a scratch and that not a single bullet was found from the supposed shots fired by workers, we can only conclude that not a single worker, who was killed by the police, had shot at the police.  

The police claim that the original plan was to roll out the barb wire all at once, early in the morning and then surround and disperse the few strikers who had come to the koppie.  

The police claimed the one set of barbed wire was to protect the residential area. We know now this was not true. It seems that the real aim of rolling out the barbed wire in 2 directions was to create a channel to direct the strikers to the police with R5 rifles, where they were to be machine-gunned down. The barbed wire was rolled out bit by bit so that the rank and file striker were allowed out. The police knew the leaders would remain behind until the mass of strikers had dispersed safely. The police knew that if they rolled it all out at the same time, there would be a mass of strikers and the leaders would be mixed with the rank and file and there would be no chance to execute them.

After Mthunjwa spoke the miners on the 16th Aug 2012 they were already dispersing. Yet, the police still carried out their attack. Teargas was shot into the leadership group, splitting it, driving the front group with Mambush towards the TRT(Tactical Response Team) team who cut them down in a fusillade (firing squad).

The NUM officials were well aware the RDO’s at Lonmin were underpaid but signed a two year agreement with Lonmin, where they were the sole bargaining union, which excluded addressing the wage demands of the RDO’s. This agreement was due to last until late in 2013. The NUM leaders were thus an instrument of the bosses, holding back the wage demands of the workers.

The Farlam report debates whether NUM could have prevented the strike. The NUM leaders admit they could have raised the demands of the demands of the Rock drillers with the management. They refused to do so. Right up to a few minutes before the massacre took place the Lonmin bosses refused to come to the Koppie to meet with the workers. At stake was not just a meeting of a group of workers, but the entire labour relations system which is based on cheap labour and has the unions in a subjugated role of being the policemen within the workers’ movement to hold back workers demands. If management agreed to negotiate with the workers directly, the next day at Amplats and every other mine and every other workplace, the workers would brush their unions aside and negotiate directly with the bosses using mass action methods. This is further evidence that Anglo American was indeed behind the massacre as they had the most to lose (Anglo controls the SA economy).

The Farlam Commission is part of the capitalist instruments of violence against the masses

The Farlam Commission lists as a central theme:

‘The Commission is of the view that the first „game changer‟ was another

decision by the strikers, to enforce the unprotected strike by violence and

Intimidation.’ (p512).

In other words, they argue that the strikers were violent and thus the heavy militarisation of the police was justified. If the strikers were really intent on killing then there would have been many deaths. The vast majority of the 44 deaths were strikers, killed by the state. 34 workers were gunned down on by the state on the 16th Aug; 2 workers were gunned down by NUM officials on the 11th Aug and a further 2 workers were gunned down by the police on the 13th August.

Despite the claims that strikers were heavily armed on the 16th Aug, not a single police suffered even a scratch. No bullet from any weapon of the strikers was found. The workers were unarmed.

The Commission also blames the workers for refusing to disarm. But the workers had no guns. The only ones who had guns were the police. The workers had sticks and spears. The police could easily have allowed the strikers to leave but their insistence on them putting down the only defensive weapons they had was a pretext for the state to carry out its plan of massacre.

On the #Totalshutdown 1 Aug 2018

Gender-based violence is an international scourge and it is sustained by the world capitalist system. It is a task of the workers' movement to spearhead the total eradication of it. We support a general strike against all forms of gender-based violence (ie violence against women and all gender non-conforming groups).

On the fall of Zuma

The revolutionary period of 1980 to 1993 was partially defeated by the negotiated settlement whose cornerstone was the maintenance of capitalist relations. The negotiated settlement was based on the protection of private property. By 1994 Anglo American directly controlled more than 50% of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange shares. Imperialism maintained its control over SA through the settlement.

By 2007 there was the beginning of large scale revolts against the failure of the ANC-SACP-Cosatu regime to meet the democratic aspirations of the masses. The SACP and Cosatu leadership were able to turn the revolt into a parliamentary dead-end through a change in leadership of the ANC presidency. Vavi and Nzimande toured the imperialist capitals to win support for a Zuma presidency.

Since 2007 the world economic crisis has deepened and there has been a period of sustained attacks on the gains of the working class. This has gone hand in hand with the loss of support for the ANC within the workers’ movement. This loss of support was increasing since 1994, with each class battle that occurred.. In the 2016 local government elections, not only had the ANC lost majority support in a number of key cities but overall, its support is now less than 50% of those who voted. This means that by the 2019 national elections, if the trend continues, that the ANC would only be able to rule with alliance parties outside of the ANC-SACP-Cosatu. There is the prospect of a right wing alliance taking power, in the form of DA-EFF. However both DA and EFF have been losing support. All parliamentary parties are losing support.

Renewed appeal for Solidarity with the Boiketlong 4

On the 21st April 2015 the Magistrates Court in Sebokeng sentenced 4 community activists from Boiketlong, to a total of 16 years in prison. The activists are: Dinah Makhetha, Sipho Mangane, Dan Molefe and Pulane Mahlangu. Key witnesses could not even identify the 4 but the courts sought to use the apartheid law of ‘doctrine of common purpose’ to jail them. They were found not guilty of ‘public violence’ but guilty of ‘assault, arson and malicious damage to property’.

Pulane Mahlangu has run away and no one knows where she is or if she is in good health. Either way, she cannot come home.

Dan Molefe died of stress-related illness in December 2017.

Although released for a short period while the appeal process was underway, both Dinah and Sipho are back in prison as they lost the first level of Appeal. The magistrate is prepared to consider shortening the sentence but not the sentence itself. The appeal process remains underway.

There is now an opportunity for a mediated process that may assist in a process of early release. There is an urgent need to cover the costs of mediation which we estimate could come to about R40 000. Appeals have been made to the community to raise funds as well to the broader movement.

What is at stake?

The state has used an apartheid law, the ‘doctrine of common purpose’, to attempt to crush the resistance of the masses. The law of common purpose is deliberately broad so as to be used to target leaders in the community and working class movement. If left unchallenged it extends the attack on the democratic right to protest.  

The road to Kiev- 26 May 2018

On the 2nd May 2014 socialist Andrew Brazhevsky, was killed by a band of fascists in the House of trade unions in Odessa, Ukraine. The police strategically withdrew and allowed the fascists to enter and burn the building, killing a total of 38 activists. Earlier that year, on the 20th February, a band of fascists overthrew the puppet of Russia, Yanukovitch. The regime of Poroshenko came to power, in alliance with the Svoboda group, that used the swastika as its emblem. The core of the fascists who had gathered in the Maidan square in Kiev, were mainly football fans. They used hotel Dnipro as their base from which to carry out their attacks. At the time, the country was heavily in debt to the IMF.

The workers’ movement had resisted the Yanukovitch regime as well as the fascist regime that came to power. One of their slogans had been for the return of the ex- USSR. If the workers had taken power in Ukraine, that would have posed an immediate threat to the mafia regime of Putin in Russia. On the other hand, through their control of Poland and Georgia, US imperialism has been steadily working to extend its influence in the region. US imperialism was behind the fascist coup that brought Poroshenko to power.

WIVL statement on Africa Day 25 May 2018

Bheki Cele, police minister is at it again, showcasing a raid on a building and portraying an image as if Mozambicans, Zimbabweans and Nigerians are criminals. This is an old capitalist strategy of divide and rule. It is a diversion to make worker fight worker, while imperialism continues to plunder the continent. The wealth in every country in the world has always been a product of multi-cultural primary and secondary labour. Borders have been constructed for spheres of influence for the various ruling classes.

Africa is still under neo-colonial control, plundered by imperialism. The African Union, the AU, and the PAP, Pan African Parliament, are instruments of ensuring that imperialist control of the continent continues.

The biggest slaughter since the second world imperialist war took place in the DRC, where between 1996 and 2003 over 6 million people were killed. The 1994 Rwanda genocide replaced a regime controlled by French imperialism with a regime controlled by US imperialism. It was the Rwandan army backed by the US military that marched across Zaire and  overthrew the dictator Mobutu. In this way, US imperialism ensured they remained in control of the DRC/Zaire. Today Rwanda exports more minerals than is mined there.

The great march to return- Palestine- rejecting the 2-state bantustan ‘option’

Since the 30th March 2018 there have been daily marches by tens of thousands of ordinary Palestinians towards the border fence in Gaza. These marches of return , up to and beyond the 15th May 2018 mark 70 years since the Nakba, the day the mass expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes by imperialist-backed zionist forces began. Hundreds of Palestinian villages were destroyed. Today’ the biggest refugee group is that of the Palestinians, over 7 million, scattered mostly across the Middle East, across the world and yes, even in Gaza. In fact most of the 2 million people in the Gaza are refugees. All they want is to go home.

Ironically, in the wake of the rise of Nazism, very few countries were willing to take in the thousands of Jewish refugees; in the 1940’s, even the USA was reluctant. Palestine was one of the few countries that welcomed the Jewish refugees, with open arms, sharing the little they had with them. The zionist forces were propped up and funded by imperialism. They hijacked the sympathy of the masses for those butchered by Nazism to promote their own nationalist agenda, which involved the suppression of the Palestinian masses. From the start, imperialism funded and armed the zionist forces to create a permanent division in the Middle East and to create a huge area of reaction, from which to discipline and suppress the masses in the region.

We reject the proposed water levy; we need a rational use of available water

We agree with the Outa (Organization Undoing Tax Abuse) position rejecting the proposed water levy. However the critique does not go far enough. At the heart of the water crisis in Cape Town is a drive by the various levels of government to create business opportunities for big capital. The amounts at stake will make the billions pilfered by the Guptas look like a garden picnic. Under the guise of water conferences the division of the spoils is being hammered out between the representatives of the big capitalists. Privatization is being promoted by Water Institutes that have been set up overnight. Yet there is enough water and the drought conditions are being used to bulldoze ‘get rich quick’ schemes for the elite.

On the military coup in Zimbabwe

On Wed 15th Nov 2017 the Zimbabwe military launched a coup against the leadership of Mugabe. This takes place against a background of an attempt by imperialism to use greater force, fascistic methods and militarism on a global scale, to maintain its control over the masses. The traditional leaders have lost their hold over the masses.

In Zimbabwe, the ruling party had split and faced with the prospect of the masses and the soldiers rising against the Mugabe regime, imperialism decided to assist the military to take over. They hoped and still hope that the military will remain in control and prevent the masses from taking power into their own hands. The aim of imperialism is to maintain the regime while changing leadership. With the powerstructure intact, imperialism hopes to keep the masses in total starvation, as they have done, for years up to now.

Vlakfontein massacre 22 Sept 2017

The Workers International Vanguard League/Party condemns the state for massacring 9 people in Vlakfontein on Friday 22nd Sept 2017. If the state had provided adequate housing for all there would have been no need to occupy land. This land has been lying vacant for many years. The capitalist state has failed to provide the basic democratic demand for adequate housing for all. The little housing that has been built, has been in the apartheid group areas, that still exist today. The state used fascist band Wozani Security to massacre and clear the land.

On the crisis at CPUT

A necessary background

Before discussing any aspect of the current situation at CPUT it should be remembered that it is the absence of radical economic transformation is at the root of the crisis facing the masses.

The economy is controlled by imperialism. Every year hundreds of billions of Rands worth of wealth is stolen by the mines and banks. This plunder is well documented in the Journal of Southern African Studies [Ashman, Fine, Newman: Amnesty International: Capital Flight from Southern Africa ]. The theft reached its peak in 2007 when 23% of GDP was stolen by Anglo American and other monopolies. This amounts to R600 bn just in one year. This theft is besides the actual profits of the monopolies which runs into over R1000 bn every year. Most of the profits are taken offshore. The ANC leaders turn a blind eye to this. Both ANC and SACP have investment companies that operate on the mines. All banks and mines have ANC and/or SACP leaders on their boards.  

On the massacres in Myanmar- imperialism is responsible

The massacres in Myanmar/Burma are echoes of the years of slaughter in the DRC. There are haunting parallels too. More than 6 million people died in the DRC, over a number of years since 1996. In the end, hundreds of thousands of poor peasants were cleared off the land and in their place imperialist controlled mines appeared. There were dozens of different militia groups clashing with one another, supposedly in inter-ethnic fighting. Each group sustained themselves by selling minerals, gathered through primitive accumulation (child labour scooping the minerals from the soil), and selling these into the world capitalist market, to imperialist companies. Most of the world’s cassiterite comes from the DRC and thus through open plunder. The working class is precarious and minimal. There is no development; just asset-stripping from the earth. The world’s cellphones, laptops, playstations are all based on the cassiterite stolen from the DRC, over the dead bodies of millions. This is the barbarism of modern capitalism. Jonathan Oppenheimer is director of Umicore, that is listed by the UN as a smuggler of cassiterite. Yet the company acts with impunity. Anglo American openly lists Umicore as one of their supplier companies. This barbarism and impunity has to stop. It requires the working class of the world to organise and defeat imperialism-capitalism. Turning now to the current crisis in Myanmar.

On the attacks on freedom of the press in South Africa

We condemn the long ongoing attacks against journalists by the capitalist editors, we condemn the attacks on progressive journalists, such as Suna Venter, by organised thugs and by Motswaneng and co,  we also condemn the attacks by the fascistic BLF on their hit list of journalists who range  from reactionary to bourgeois democrat. All of these attacks narrow down and attempt to roll back the gains won by the working class through revolutionary mass action in the late 1980’s. Two states of emergency could not put out the flame of revolution. The masses unbanned their organizations through mass resistance and won the space of freedom of expression. Marches and protests were a daily occurrence.The formal unbanning of the liberation organizations by the apartheid state and the negotiated settlement that followed in its wake, placed a limit on freedom of expression. This is fundamentally because freedom of expression was tied to private property. The masses have won the formal right to freedom of expression but as the masses do not have access to stocks of paper, printing presses, radio and television broadcasting, the negotiated settlement has limited the right of freedom of expression from the beginning. There are a few community radio and television stations but they are limited in scope and are dependent on capitalist sponsors or donor funding.

Imperialism prepares a palace coup against Zuma

When Zuma had a mass reshuffle of his Cabinet in the middle of the night (evening of the 30th March) the Rand dropped in value from R12, 84 to the dollar to R13,42. A drop of about 60 cents. Yet when imperialist rating agency, Standard and Poore, downgraded the SA credit rating to junk status, the Rand only weakened to R13,60, a drop of less than 20 cents. How do we explain such changes?

Disband parliament - set up action committees

We condemn the wholesale removal of 20 Cabinet Ministers in the same vein as we condemn the policies of the ANC government. Parliament has shown itself incapable of holding Cabinet or the Presidency to account. Parliament approved of a false report on Nkandla; Parliament approved of cuts in pensions, they refused to raise the tax on company profits and refused to stop the imperialists from stealing trillions. As a result millions are dying early deaths due to poverty and exploitation. Free, decent housing for all is possible; free education, health care for all is possible. But the old and new Cabinet stand for the safeguarding of international monopoly capital. The World Bank is stealing the bread from our pensioners mouths; they are making illegal deductions from the 17 million grantholders; the government is supporting the World Bank’s efforts to steal from the impoverished throughout Africa.

Response to John Pilger on Syria

[This is a response to the article by Pilger: ‘This time it’s Syria, last time it was Iraq’, which appeared on the Stopthewar.uk.org website]

In this article by Pilger, he discusses everything else except what is really happening on the ground in Syria. He makes sweeping generalizations which are out of context. We attempt to deal with his main arguments:

1. He compares Syria today to Iraq 2003. In 2003 the US military invaded Iraq with over 50 000 troops and toppled the Saddam regime. In Syria, the US has sent 500 troops to assist the Kurdish YPG and KDF (Kurdish Democratic Forces). In Syria, the US troops have concentrated on supposedly fighting Isis, NOT the Assad regime. It is true that US proxies, the Saudi and Turkish regimes have been supplying weapons to the forces fighting against the Assad regime. However these weapons have been pea shooters and the supply of these arms have been with conditions, namely that the fight be waged against Isis.

The government has handed Sassa grants over to American loan sharks and is robbing the poorest of the poor

For years the government has claimed it has been helping the poorest of the poor. Now, research by ILRIG (International Labour Research and Information Group), has shown that the government has given over control of the Sassa grants to the hands of an American loan shark called Net1. This company was set up in Florida, USA, in 1997. This American loan shark is parasiting on workers in Iraq , South Korea, UK, Namibia, Nigeria, Malawi, Cameroon, the Phillipines, India and Columbia. Net 1 has partnered with Grindrod to set up Grindrod retail bank, a loan shark. Your Sassa grant is paid into a Grindrod account. Grindrod also owns Moneyline lenders. They offer loans to Sassa grantholders at 68% per annum interest.