Building on last year’s PPE-corruption scandal, the ANC government has made a complete fiasco of vaccine procurement and roll-out. In general, South African capitalism is proving itself incapable of dealing with the second-wave of the pandemic.
Every political party takes it for granted that the debt must be paid. To those parties that posture as ‘radical’, ‘left’, or even ‘socialist’ the question must be put to them: should the debt be paid? The same question must be posed to the leaders of the trade unions. This one question can expose which side of the class barricades anyone they will stand upon in the class struggles that lie ahead.
In Part I of our Open Letter we put forward our views on what we believe must begin to emerge from Saftu’s 25 August NEC in order to take forward working class struggle against the unprecedented health, economic and political crisis. But the fact that the NEC meeting is taking place almost a full five months into this crisis cannot be passed-over in silence. Why has there been such a delay in convening the leadership?
To honour the memory of the martyrs of Marikana…. Build a mass workers party on a socialist programme by Weizmann Hamilton It is eight years […]
The symbolic protests by left activists taking place on 1 August have been called because of a growing feeling that something must be done. If the ANC government is left in charge of managing the pandemic, if capitalism and the profit motive continue to determine what is, and what is not, ‘possible’, the working class is heading for disaster. The working class needs to take charge. But how can the mass of the working class be mobilised to do this? Because that is what it will take to switch tracks and avoid the oncoming train-smash.
The very system of tenders, whether they are technically corrupt or not, involves a massive diversion of wealth away from the working class and poor.
The decision of when to open and close schools should be under the control of local communities based primarily on health consideration. The SGBs have shown their willingness to toe the government line. We call for the creation of School Safety Committees made up of democratically elected representatives of teachers, parents and learners from grades 7 and up.
The current anti-racist protest movement lacks organization, leadership, and democratic decision-making structures. Without these, it is vulnerable to fizzling out without achieving lasting change, as people succumb to protest fatigue.
Although there are important differences, the main historical point of reference for the current crisis is the Great Depression in the 1930s. This crisis is developing against an entirely different historical background to that which existed in the 1930s and post 1945 capitalist boom.
Democratic community structures need to be built. The working class needs to take control of the battle against Covid-19. The tradition of community self-organisation remains alive and should be relied upon.
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