{"id":748,"date":"2019-09-18T15:12:07","date_gmt":"2019-09-18T13:12:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/marxistworkersparty.org.za\/?page_id=748"},"modified":"2019-09-18T15:25:39","modified_gmt":"2019-09-18T13:25:39","slug":"chapter-seven","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/?page_id=748","title":{"rendered":"Chapter Seven"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Southern Africa<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Over the past decade the mighty struggles in Southern\nAfrica\u2014in Mozambique, Angola, Zimbabwe, Namibia and South Africa itself\u2014have\nbeen a flame of inspiration for the whole of the African continent, and for oppressed\npeople everywhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like the war of liberation in Vietnam, and like the\nstruggles in Central America today, the unfolding revolution in Southern Africa\nrivets the attention of the world because of the entrenched and murderous\nforces of imperialism which the people confront. Every advance shows the weakening\nof those forces internationally, and confirms that the tide of the colonial\nrevolution cannot be reversed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Within Southern Africa, despite the diversity of circumstances,\nall the national revolutions interlink. The guerilla wars in Zimbabwe and\nNamibia drew strength from the victories in Mozambique and Angola. Within South\nAfrica, the political conditions for the outbreak of mass revolt in 1976 were\nto an important extent prepared by the collapse of Portuguese colonial rule,\nthe coming to power of Frelimo in Mozambique, the victory of the MPLA in the\nAngolan civil war, and the rolling back of the South African invasion of\nAngola.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In turn, the advancing movement of the black workers and\nyouth in South Africa has helped to deter the regime from full-scale invasions\nagainst the revolutions to the north. It has helped to weaken the forces of\nreaction within each country, and to raise the confidence and consciousness of\nthe working people throughout the region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless the South African capitalist regime continues\nto menace the entire sub-continent with its military forces; with bombings,\ncross-border raids, and limited invasions; with military and economic sabotage,\nblackmail and manipulation. Only the victory of the revolution in South Africa\nitself will free Southern Africa from these evils.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All the countries of the region are bound together by\neconomic ties which have arisen from the whole development of capitalism, and\nwhich are strengthened year by year. Especially the rise of South Africa as an\nindustrial power has fused Southern Africa together in a single economic entity\nwithin the framework of the world economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

South African capitalism is the colossus of the\nsub-continent. It dominates production, employment, trade, finance and\ntransport in the region as a whole. The value of a year’s production in South\nAfrica is more than three times that of Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mozambique, Angola,\nMalawi, Lesotho, Swaziland and Botswana put together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The tentacles of the South African monopolies, led by the\nAnglo-American Corporation, have spread across the region, sucking profit from\nthe workers’ labour. The Witwatersrand is not only the industrial and financial\ncapital of the whole of Southern Africa\u2014it is also the centre of the migrant\nlabour system which links the working class of almost all the Southern African\ncountries together in a single web of exploitation and oppression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus South Africa is able to exert its continued economic\ndomination over the region, even while its political grip is weakened. While\nimmense strides forward have been taken in Southern Africa in the struggle\nagainst colonial and white minority regimes, even the greatest victories have\ndemonstrated that only partial and limited advances can be made within the\nconfines of one country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To solve the problems\nof poverty and under-development\u2014to ensure real self-determination and freedom\nfrom domination\u2014means to go beyond the national boundaries. The solution to\nthese problems can be found only on a regional and, ultimately, an international\nbasis. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

SADCC<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The formation of the Southern African Development and\nCoordination Conference by nine independent states in the region is conceived\nof as a means of drawing their economies more closely together for mutual\nprotection against the pressures of South African capitalist power. They hope\nin this way to be able to develop industry and an infrastructure of roads,\nrailways and ports, sufficient to free them from dependence on the white-ruled\nsouth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But these states lack the means of financing the necessary\ninvestment. Nor, with the crisis of the economies of the industrialised world,\nis there any prospect of obtaining sufficient aid. (The bulk of the money\n“allocated” to SADCC consists of existing aid promised to the\nparticipating governments, and merely re-allocated<\/strong>\non paper to SADCC.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However genuine the intentions of its proponents, SADCC\ncannot overcome the barriers of under-development and the nation-state. It does\nnot provide a real means of escape from the predatory clutches of international\nand South African monopoly capital, seeking to expand their own markets and\npreserve their established spheres of influence and exploitation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is therefore no alternative but a struggle to smash\nthe power of the bourgeoisie and overthrow capitalism in South Africa itself.\nThis is the central task facing the working people of the whole sub-continent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Releasing the grip of imperialism and neo-colonial\ndomination on Southern Africa, it would open the way to the social transformation\nof the whole region. Together with the progress of the world revolution, it\nwould complete the liberation of Southern Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is within the framework of this understanding that the\nadvances in the revolution in Southern Africa thus far can best be judged. In\narticles in Inqaba ya Basebenzi<\/em> we\nwill cover in more detail the situation in each of the countries of the region.\nHere we outline the processes in some of the key countries, before passing on\nto South Africa itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Angola and Mozambique<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

No people in Africa suffered more from colonial enslavement\nthan the peasants and workers of Angola and Mozambique. The character of the\nPortuguese colonial regime was the main factor determining the course of the\nrevolution in these countries, which resulted\nin both cases in the overthrow of capitalism itself.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Portugal had been the first of the colonial powers, having\npossessions in Africa as early as the 15th century. But later, with the rise of\nthe great capitalist powers of Europe and the transition to imperialism,\nPortugal fell further and further behind. It became the weakest capitalist\ncountry in Europe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The weakness of the Portuguese bourgeoisie\u2014their inability\nto afford reforms\u2014gave rise to the ruthless dictatorship of Salazar and Caetano\nwhich, by the time of its overthrow in 1974, had lasted more than forty years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was on account of this weakness also that the Portuguese\nruling class clung to its colonial possessions to the bitter end against the\nrevolt of the masses, even while, in the period after the Second World War, the\ngreater imperialist powers were obliged to retreat. Portuguese colonialism\ncould not have maintained neo-colonial domination, and could only rule through\ndirect occupation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Within its colonies, its weakness was expressed in its\ninability to develop a market. Its policy was plunder by the most direct and\nbrutal methods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have shown how imperialism in general has been able to\nimpose super-exploitation on the colonial peoples by means of unequal terms of\ntrade. But even this could not suffice for the Portuguese ruling class. Their\nown weak competitive position in world capitalism meant that they needed their\ncolonies to supply raw materials at less\nthan world prices.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Settlers were used to carry out the plunder of the colonies.\nAgricultural concessions were granted largely to European colonial companies to\nestablish vast plantations producing coffee, sisal, cotton, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The indigenous people were driven off their land by armed\nforce to clear it for the settlers and the plantations. Subsistence\nagriculture, was systematically broken down in order to produce a labour force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The colonial administration imposed savage taxes on the\npeople; required the men to work on the plantations for half of every year\nvirtually without pay; extracted fixed quotas of crops from the villages, and\nenforced all this by beatings, executions and other savage penalties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This atrocious system, in many ways worse than slavery, had\na terrible destructive effect on the African population. Huge areas became\ndepopulated of able-bodied people. By the 1940s, about two million Africans\nwere absent from Mozambique and Angola at any one time, trying to find a living\nacross the border in other countries. The infant mortality rate rose to 60%. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In both Mozambique and Angola, medical care was practically\nnon-existent in rural areas. Educational facilities were so lacking that, by\nthe end of Portuguese colonial rule, 90% of the population in both countries\nstill could not read or write.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In such conditions there was scarcely any room for the\nemergence of an African middle class. Even the tiny intellectual elite was\noppressed and degraded by the whole colonial machinery. The salaries of black\npublic officials, clerks and office-workers fell constantly behind the cost of\nliving. There was a suffocating lack of educational, economic and cultural\nopportunities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After the Second World War renewed struggles of resistance\nagainst Portuguese colonialism began to mount. In both Angola and Mozambique\nthese were spearheaded by the small, but highly combative working class.\nStruggles also broke out in the rural areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The regime countered resistance with torture by the security\npolice and outright slaughter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus in Angola in 1961 uprisings by plantation workers and\npeasants, and mass assaults on the Luanda jail, were defeated in a frenzy of\nbloody massacre by the regime and settler mobs. As villages were napalm-bombed,\nand Africans torn limb from limb even in the streets of Luanda, the death-toll\nmounted to well over 20 000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The barbarism of the regime, and the sheer impossibility of\nan advance to independence by constitutional means, had driven many of the\noppressed middle class to support and involve themselves actively in the\nstruggles of the worker and peasant masses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Aims<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Militant intellectuals played the leading role in the\nformation of both the MPLA and Frelimo, in both cases closely linked to the\nworking class. Their aims were the national liberation of their countries from\nPortuguese colonial rule, and the economic development and upliftment of the\npeople. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The crippling backwardness inflicted on these colonies by\nPortugal, the low level of education, the scattered population struggling to\nsubsist, the lingering divisions of languages and tribes, the lack of a\ndeveloped internal market and domestic trade\u2014all these meant that a sense of\nnational cohesion and national consciousness among the people was relatively\nlittle developed. The cement of national unity of the oppressed could come into\nexistence only as the people began to join together in common struggle against\nthe foreign oppressor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the Frelimo and MPLA leaders realised, the small working\nclass could not alone overthrow the colonial regime. The mobilisation of the\npeasant masses would be essential for victory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, as repeated repressions had shown, an\nunarmed movement of the workers and peasants would be insufficient. To\noverthrow the regime in both countries, a war of national liberation would have\nto be fought.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, in taking up these tasks, the Frelimo and MPLA\nleaders abandoned the working class. Lacking a clear internationalist\nperspective and class standpoint, they did not try to organise the workers as\nthe conscious leading force in the struggle. Instead they centred their\npolicies exclusively on building guerilla forces based among the peasantry, not\nas an auxiliary to the revolutionary organisation of the working class, but as\na substitute for it. The leaders took as their model the guerilla wars in China\nand Cuba.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Isolated<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Linked to a movement of the powerful black working class in\nSouth Africa, the struggle of the workers and peasants of Angola and Mozambique\ncould have become part of a concerted offensive against national oppression and\ncapitalist exploitation throughout the region\u2014against the “Unholy\nAlliance” of the South African, Portuguese, and Rhodesian regimes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But, given the weakness of the forces of Marxism internationally\nand the lag of the proletarian revolution both in South Africa and the\nindustrialised West, the Mozambican and Angolan working class, isolated and\ncrushingly oppressed, were unable to develop and sustain independent political\norganisation and leadership of the emerging national liberation movement. With\nthe focus of the struggle shifting increasingly to the war in the countryside,\nthe working-class movement passed into a period of relative inactivity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The guerilla fighters in the countryside stood at the head\nof the struggling masses with selfless sacrifice and heroism for more than ten\nyears, without a conscious Marxist leadership or programme. The role of the\nworking class was less and less referred to by the guerilla leaders. Appeals to\nthe idea of the ‘nation’ without class distinction, the lauding of\n‘patriotism’, etc., became more prominent in their speeches and writings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time the social issues inevitably stood at the\ncentre of the struggle. The peasants themselves demanded liberation from the\nmonstrous exploitation and oppression of the colonial capitalist state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The success of the guerilla war depended upon the ability of\nFrelimo and the MPLA to introduce into the \u2018liberated\u2019 rural areas basic\nmedical services, elementary education, technical assistance in agriculture, improvements\nin production through communal methods, and defence of the population against\nthe tax collections and other pillages of the Portuguese military-police\nregime. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The guerilla forces were themselves drawn increasingly from\nthe poor peasant youth, and lived close to the most downtrodden and deprived of\nthe rural population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In literacy and political education classes, the youth were\nawakened to developments in the outside world. Armed and equipped by the Soviet\nand Chinese regimes, they looked naturally to these countries as models of\n\u2018socialism\u2019, grasping at once the immense advances achieved by the peoples in\nthe ex-colonial countries where capitalism had been overthrown. Their\nunderstanding was reinforced by the hostility of the imperialist powers to\ntheir struggle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under the pressures of the struggle, Frelimo moved to a\nposition of denouncing all “exploitation of man by man”. Nevertheless\nit developed no explicit programme for the overthrow of capitalism in the event\nof the movement achieving power in the towns. The question central to the\nrevolution was thus left open.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the case of Angola, with a greater development of the\neconomy, there was a more developed class stratification of the population.\nWhile the MPLA leadership also denounced “exploitation”, there was a\nfar greater stress on maintaining the “unity of all classes” of the\nnation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus, in neither Angola nor Mozambique did the revolutionary\nleadership base itself either on the working class or on a programme for the\noverthrow of capitalism. The fact that once in power both proceeded to the\noverthrow of capitalism must therefore be explained not by their subjective\nintentions, but by the objective forces and circumstances which they\nencountered once in power. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Portuguese ruling class, in order to hold on to its\nAfrican colonies, was forced to pour in huge contingents of troops which\ndrained away its already feeble resources. Thus the liberation wars in Angola\nand Mozambique, as well as Guinea-Bissau, led to a rotting of the strength of\nthe regime in Portugal itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In April 1974 the Portuguese revolution broke out, sparked\noff by a military coup which overthrew the Caetano dictatorship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the basis of guerilla war alone it would have required\nmany more years of struggle and sacrifice before the colonial regimes in Angola\nand Mozambique could have been defeated. In Mozambique, for example (where the\nwar in the countryside was furthest advanced), the Portuguese had been planning\nto introduce a million white settlers into the area round Cabora Bassa to\nprovide a social bastion for their regime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Collapse<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, the Portuguese revolution instantly transformed the\nsituation in the colonies. With capitalist rule in Portugal near to collapse\nunder the pressure of the masses, the colonial state machinery disintegrated.\nThis opened the way to power for both Frelimo and the MPLA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There could hardly be\na more vivid example of the interaction of the forces and processes of the\nworld revolution<\/strong>\u2014African liberation wars precipitate revolution in a\nEuropean country; the movement of the proletariat there rebounds on Africa,\nshattering the colonial regimes, and the path is cleared for revolutionary\ngovernments to come to power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Mozambique, with the collapse of the colonial administration\nthere was no force in existence which could inherit power except Frelimo. The very\nbackwardness and rottenness of Portuguese capitalism\u2014shown in its inability to\ndevelop Mozambique and its brutal, parasitic methods\u2014meant that there was no\nsocial basis in the country on which to secure a neo-colonial, capitalist\nregime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nor could other imperialist powers step in. The possibility\nof a South African invasion was ruled out by the sudden disintegration of the\nforces of reaction within Mozambique itself, on which South Africa would have\nhad to rely in order to sustain and consolidate a capitalist puppet regime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They would have faced the impossible task of policing a vast\ncountry and holding down a population already in revolt. At the same time, an\noccupation of Mozambique would almost certainly have sparked off furious\nstruggles among the black people in South Africa itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Afraid of reaping a whirlwind, the SA regime was forced to\nlook on in helpless rage as the balance of class forces in Mozambique shifted\nrapidly in favour of Frelimo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Consolidate<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finding itself unexpectedly in command of state power,\nwithout any real rival or challenge, the Frelimo leadership nevertheless moved\ncautiously to consolidate its position and feel out the direction which its\neconomic and social policies should take.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the one hand, there were the aroused expectations of the\nworkers, peasants and youth for a complete transformation of society. On the\nother hand, with independence looming, the Portuguese settler-exploiters took\nto flight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By 1975, the 250 000 Portuguese in Mozambique had been\nreduced to 20 000. The 7 000 Portuguese running cash-crop agriculture were all\ngone. Together, these had represented the sum total of landlordism-capitalism\nand of centuries-old Portuguese rule\u2014the administration of the state,\nhospitals, education, agriculture and industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus, as in China and Cuba, the disintegration of the old\nstate and the capitalist class in Mozambique, and the surging pressure of the\nmasses, thrust Frelimo in the direction of nationalising production and enabled\nit to build a new state machine<\/strong> on\nthe basis of the guerilla army.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Angola, there was a similar outcome, although by a\nsomewhat different route. With the collapse of the Portuguese colonial\nadministration, there were three armed contenders to fill the vacuum\u2014MPLA, FNLA\nand UNITA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At first, under pressure from both East and West, there was\nan attempt at a coalition government of all three.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The MPLA programme in 1975 clearly showed the readiness of\nthe leadership to compromise on the social issues, in the interests of\nmaintaining a coalition. Thus the MPLA’s “minimum programme”, while\ncalling for the “defence of the interests of the peasants and\nworkers”, proclaimed a “broad union” of all political parties,\n“all social strata, and all Angolans irrespective of political tendencies,\neconomic circumstances”, etc. MPLA’s “main programme” proposed a\n“republican-democratic system” in which sovereignty of the people\nwould be “irrespective of class.” There was no programme to overthrow\ncapitalism\u2014merely a call for a “socially just system.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the economic field, the MPLA proposed “a policy\nwhich takes the interests of both employed and employers into\nconsideration.” At the same time the state would control foreign trade\nwhile expanding its undertakings, particularly in the exploitation of energy\nresources. While there would be an end to “privileges” for foreign\nundertakings, private industry and commerce was to be protected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On agrarian reform, the programme proclaimed limits on\nprivate holdings and the distribution of land to peasants. Nationalisation of\nthe land would be limited to those landowners “opposed to the People’s\nMovement”, the traitors and enemies of independence and democracy for\nAngola.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Had matters depended only on programme and the subjective\nintentions of leaders, the Angolan revolution would not have broken the chains\nof capitalism. At this time there was an intense struggle within the MPLA between\nthe majority of the leadership, who insisted that the class struggle must be\nde-emphasised in the interests of an “anti-imperialist united front”,\nand those who echoed the desire of the working people for pressing forward with\nthe struggle against exploitation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, as in Mozambique, any remaining social base\nfor capitalism evaporated quickly once the Portuguese colonial system was\nshattered. Here too there was a mass exodus of the Portuguese settlers, landowners,\nmerchants, professionals and businessmen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reflecting the lack of a social base for capitalism, the\nunstable coalition of the rival guerilla armies quickly fell apart. It was\nquickly shown that the leadership of FNLA and UNITA were operating as direct\nagents of imperialism. At the same time, the imperialists sought to hamstring\nthe MPLA and obstruct its exercise of power, fearing the established links of\nthe MPLA with the Soviet bureaucracy, and the fact that it had a strong,\nindependent popular base in both town and country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Invasion<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The breakdown of the coalition government opened up civil\nwar, in which the tide turned increasingly in favour of the MPLA, which enjoyed\nthe support of the proletariat, and had a powerful base in Luanda and other\nvital towns. It was in these circumstances that US imperialism organised with\nthe South African government a military invasion to install the FNLA and UNITA\nin power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was clearly the plan for the SA army to advance swiftly\nand capture Luanda\u2014whereupon US forces would be sent in to sustain and\nconsolidate a pro-imperialist puppet government. This in turn would allow the\nSA army to withdraw. But the whole plan went hopelessly off course.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the one hand, as the SA generals soon realised, they were\nfighting a revolution and thus faced the danger of becoming bogged down against\nthe furious resistance of the population. On the other hand, for the Soviet\nbureaucracy to have allowed the MPLA to be defeated by such an invasion would\nhave meant a humiliating blow to its international standing and affected all\nits alliances in the colonial world. Under these circumstances Cuban troops\nwere sent to the assistance of the MPLA and the Angolan people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

US imperialism was at this time still licking its wounds\nfrom its defeat in Vietnam. The fear of becoming embroiled in another\nunwinnable colonial war, coupled with the risk of a serious rupture of\nrelations with the Russians, persuaded Nixon and Kissinger at the last minute\nto hold back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the South African invasion of Angola turned into a\ndebacle for the SA regime. With the whole conspiracy shipwrecked, and with its\nforces under heavy pressure from Cuban and FAPLA (MPLA) troops, it was forced\nto roll back hastily to the Namibian border.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The now unchallenged power of the MPLA thus became\nconsolidated through the processes of revolution and civil war. The\nimpossibility of reconstructing the country on a capitalist basis impelled the\nregime to essentially the same policies as were being followed in Mozambique by\nFrelimo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The exodus of nearly half a million Portuguese\u2014leaving only\nsome 30 000 in Angola\u2014had resulted in the complete collapse of the country’s\ncommercial network and distribution system. There was now a vacuum of skills,\ncommercial agriculture broke down, and the transport network was paralysed.\nWhereas there were 28 000 heavy lorries in Angola in 1974, only 4 000 were left\nafter independence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As in Mozambique, the peasants, now freed from the merciless\ncompulsion of forced labour, reverted as far as possible to subsistence\nagriculture. What little domestic market there had been was now dead, and supplies\nto the towns dried up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Without any social basis for capitalism, the task of\nreconstructing the country and developing the economy fell to the state. A sequence\nof nationalisations, essentially similar to those in Mozambique, followed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the revolutionary transformation of both the economy\nand the state in Mozambique and Angola came about. Both countries have emerged,\nin the last analysis, as workers’ states<\/strong>\u2014but\nstates unavoidably deformed on proletarian\nbonapartist<\/strong> lines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Problems of Bureaucracy and Under-development<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Every revolutionary enthusiastically supports\u2014and would work\nto defend and consolidate\u2014the gains of the Angolan and Mozambican revolutions.\nBut it is at the same time essential to make a sober assessment of the\nprocesses taking place in these countries in order to understand the\nperspectives for their future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even the basically healthy workers’ state in Russia in 1917\nto 1923 was described by Lenin as “a workers’ state with bureaucratic\ndeformations”. There the working class itself had directly taken power and\nestablished its own democratic organs of rule.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, the crippling burdens of backwardness,\ninherited from Tsarism, the low level of education of the working population,\nthe small size of the working class and the weight of the peasantry in society,\nthe exhaustion of the workers in war and civil war\u2014all these circumstances made\nit more and more difficult for the working people to directly command the\nstate. From the outset there was a tendency for a permanent layer of officials\nto form. There was a heavy dependence on skilled administrators inherited from\nthe old state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even where officials are elected, there is always a tendency\nfor an established state administration to entrench itself and seek ways of\nescaping the democratic control of the working people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We outlined in previous chapters the measures and methods of\nworkers’ democracy worked out by Lenin in order to prevent the process of\nbureaucratisation, and enable the working class to constantly cleanse the state\nmachinery and subordinate it to democratic control. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Legacy<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lenin pointed out that the state itself\u2014even a workers’\nstate\u2014is a legacy from class society. Under workers’ democracy, the state (as\nLenin put it) should be no more than a “semi-state” which is made to\ndissolve into society and wither away in the process of the transition to\nsocialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To maintain workers’ democracy and strengthen it, to move\ntowards the dissolution of class divisions and the ending of all inequalities\nand privileges, requires a high level of the productive forces and conditions\nof material abundance. Workers’ democracy cannot be sustained if a revolution\nremains isolated indefinitely in a backward country. It requires the spreading\nof the revolution to the advanced centres of industrial production in order to\ncreate a basis for the transition to socialist society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In conditions of backwardness, shortages and generalised\npoverty, not only does workers’ democracy weaken and give way to bureaucratic\nrule\u2014at the same time the elite stratum gaining command of the state uses its\ncontrol of the economic surplus to systematically entrench its privileges and\nself-enrichment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such a development became inevitable in Russia for the\nreasons explained in Chapter 2.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If a workers’ state in which the working class had itself\ndirectly taken and held power underwent, in such conditions, a deformation and\ndegeneration, then what is the prospect in a country where, not the working\nclass, but a guerilla army based on the peasantry takes over state power?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The popularity of the\nregime is not the issue. Nor is the selfless dedication, especially in the\nfirst period, of the cadres of the army and the new state machine in working to\ndevelop the national economy and uplift the condition of the masses. There may\nalso be, for an extended period, a significant degree of mass participation in\ndecision-making at local levels.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the key question\nis the direct, collective and democratic control of the apparatus of the state\nby the working masses.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For reasons explained previously, the peasantry as a class\nis incapable of exercising such control. Nor, in the conditions of Mozambique\nand Angola, has the working class been sufficiently developed to control and\nmanage all aspects of the economy and society. If we consider the matter within\nthe framework of these countries in isolation, then it is clear that no basis\nfor regimes of workers’ democracy exists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Economic under-development submerges the toilers in\nilliteracy and preoccupies them with the desperate day-to-day struggle for\nsurvival. It deprives them of the possibility of taking in their own hands the\ngeneral management of the economy and the state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the educated layer of society develops for itself the\nmonopoly of these functions. At the same time generalised poverty and a low\nlevel of production makes it impossible to satisfy the pressing needs of\neverybody, and impels the ruling elite towards establishing authoritarian\ncontrol over the masses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Permanent<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This in turn lays the foundation for the consolidation of\nthe state bureaucracy as a permanent caste, for the growing contradiction\nbetween its interests and those of the masses, and for its ultimate\ntransformation from a relatively progressive force into a reactionary barrier\nto the advancement of society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By understanding these general processes and their material\nfoundation, it is easier to understand the developments taking place in the state\nin Angola and Mozambique.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While working to reorganise and reconstruct the devastated\neconomy, Frelimo and the MPLA have at the same time both moved to reconstruct\nthe state apparatus under their own absolute control. On the one hand, this has\ninvolved clearing out of official positions many of the unreliable opportunists\nand middle-class careerists who had stepped into the bureaus and organisations\nof the state during the turmoil of transition. On the other hand, however, it\nhas also involved subordinating all organisations of the masses to strict\ncontrol by the ruling party apparatus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus, for example, in October 1977 the MPLA\n“Restructuring Committee” ordered the suspension of all existing\ntrade union committees in workplaces. They were to be replaced by two trade\nunion delegates, one of whom had to be a member of the MPLA structure in the\nenterprise, while the other also had to enjoy the confidence of the MPLA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both Frelimo and the MPLA, in changing from guerilla organisations\ninto the core of the new state apparatus, have announced their own\ntransformation into “vanguard parties” on supposedly\n“Marxist-Leninist” lines. This however has nothing in common with the\nidea of a revolutionary party developed by Lenin, as an instrument in leading\nthe struggle for workers’ democracy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead, both Frelimo and the MPLA have taken upon\nthemselves the role of exercising power on\nbehalf of<\/strong> the masses. The “Party” therefore becomes in fact the\ncentral apparatus of the new bureaucracy of state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The 1977 programme of Frelimo bears out the analysis we have\nmade. The task of “strengthening and consolidating” the power of the state<\/strong> is proclaimed to be central. The\nParty is defined as supreme in directing and guiding “all state activities”.\nThe state itself merely “reflects” the “interests of the broad\nlabouring masses.” The “Democratic Mass Organisations” support\nthe State in “its” work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus state power is\nexpressly declared to be separate from and elevated above the power of the working\npeople\u2014as having the semi-autonomy characteristic of bonapartism.<\/strong> That is\nthe opposite of the approach of Lenin, and is completely opposed to workers’\ndemocracy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It indicates that power is not directly in the hands of the\n“broad labouring masses” but in the hands of a bonapartist elite\nwhich rests on the support of the\nworkers and peasants<\/strong> in exercising power. Even the involvement of many\nworkers in the party structure and leadership does not alter the underlying\nprocess, which is towards the inevitable entrenchment of an elite.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless these\nregimes represent an immense stride forward, economically and politically,\ncompared with the horrors of the past, and represent a severe defeat and\nsetback for the forces of imperialism internationally.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, even with the advantages of state ownership and\neconomic planning, Mozambique and Angola come up against severe obstacles to\ndevelopment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The economic and other related problems facing Mozambique\nwere outlined in Inqaba<\/em> No. 4\n(October 1981).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Angola, despite having rich mineral resources and\nagricultural potential, the initial problems have been even more serious\u2014and\nare aggravated by South African incursions and the SA-backed activities of\nUNITA in the south.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The exodus of the Portuguese brought not only a collapse of\nthe economic infrastructure, but has left the country with a paralysing\nshortage of skills. This has been only partially overcome with the assistance\nof thousands of trainers and technicians from Cuba, East Germany and the Soviet\nUnion. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Nose-dived<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Agricultural production nose-dived with the departure of the\nPortuguese. Cotton production, which was approximately 80 000 tons in 1973, was\nonly 1 000 tons in 1978. Coffee fell from 110 000 tons to 26 000 tons; sisal\nfrom 60 000 tons to 15 000 tons; rice from 30 000 tons to 3 000 tons; and sugar\nfrom 80 000 tons to 40 000 tons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the production of maize and potatoes there were also\ndramatic falls. In 1981 a disastrous drought added to the general problems of\ndislocation, and virtually all maize growing was destroyed in the main\nproducing areas. Only an estimated 18 000 tonnes were produced, compared with\n700 000 in 1973.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In manufacturing, although the state was able to move in and\ntake over enterprises, much machinery and equipment had been removed,\nsabotaged, or left to rust. Angola is heavily dependent on the import of\nWestern technology and equipment in order to revive and develop industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

90% of the country’s foreign exchange is provided by\ndiamonds and oil. These resources have enabled Angola, by way of exception in\nAfrica, to maintain a small surplus in its foreign trade. But to maintain the\nproduction and export of oil, the government still relies on the multi-national\noil companies of the West, which thus continue to exploit the country’s\nresources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the case of diamonds, the Diamang company is 77%\nstate-owned but is run by the Diamond Trading Company, a part of the South\nAfrican Anglo American-De Beers empire. While maintaining essential control of\nthe economy in state hands, the MPLA government has found no alternative but to\nencourage foreign capitalists to invest in the country, and to call for more\nprivate initiative in the economic field. This is the result of the\ndisabilities, lack of education and shortage of skills inherited from Portuguese\ncolonialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Private enterprise<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even in an industrialised country, a workers’ state would\nhave to allow and encourage a certain amount of private enterprise on a small\nscale in subsidiary areas of production and distribution which, for an extended\nperiod of transition, could not easily be controlled and managed collectively\nby the working class. This would not represent any significant\ncounter-revolutionary threat. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, in a country as economically weak and\nunder-developed as Angola, the degree of reliance on capitalist enterprise and\ninvestment\u2014unavoidable as it may be\u2014obviously involves substantial dangers of\nreactionary pressures on the domestic and foreign policies of a regime which\nitself is not controlled by the workers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The military threat from South Africa, and from South Africa’s\nagent, Savimbi, and his UNITA forces in southern Angola, obliges the government\nin Luanda to devote a huge slice of the country’s economic resources to\nspending on defence. This now consumes more than 50% of the state budget.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The cost of arms, and of maintaining the estimated 18 000\nCuban soldiers and other technicians to train and maintain the armed forces, is\nbelieved to consume more than half of Angola’s total foreign exchange.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because of the collapse of agriculture, it has also become\nnecessary to import food\u2014absorbing roughly half of the foreign exchange left\nover after paying for defence. Thus the amount available to buy industrial\ngoods is very limited.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Without the advantages of oil and diamonds the economy would\nbe in a state of collapse. As it is, the world price of diamonds dropped\nsharply last year, while there is also now a decline in the world oil price.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Plaguing the whole economy has been the breakdown of the\ntransport and distribution system, and the clogging up of the port of Luanda,\nmainly as a result of lack of expertise and managerial skills. According to\nrecent reports, some fifty ships lie at anchor off Luanda at any one time,\nwaiting to load or unload. These can take up to two months to turn round. The\ncost of this is astronomical. The Angolan government is paying up to $10 000 a\nday in demurrage charges (penalties) on each ship lying idle\u2014which has meant up\nto $500 000 a day in total.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This amounts to more\nthan Angola’s entire income from aid donors.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shortages of supplies in the towns mean that the shops\nfrequently have empty shelves, and long queues for basic supplies are an\neveryday part of life. These conditions have also produced a flourishing ‘black\nmarket’. Prices here have rocketed, so that a fish can cost a month’s wages, and\na kilo of potatoes the equivalent of about R20.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, there has been slow but steady improvement in\nliteracy, health and the organisation of public transport and electricity\nsupplies. Improvements in agricultural production have taken place, but they\nhave been uneven and they have not approached pre-independence levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As in Mozambique, the development of agriculture is bound up\nwith whether or not the government can supply the peasants with implements and\nvarious manufactured goods, which in turn depends on the revival of industry.\nIn the case of Angola, the continuing war situation in the south is the most\nserious drain and obstacle to development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Angola has greater resources and economic potential\nthan Mozambique within the framework of one country, in neither case will it be\npossible to develop at more than a snail’s pace without the extension of the\nrevolution against capitalism throughout the whole of Southern Africa. The centre\nof this revolution is obviously South Africa itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the workers and peasants of Angola and Mozambique, for\nthe rank and file of the MPLA and Frelimo, it is the South African and\ninternational revolution which ultimately provides the only way out of economic\nisolation, poverty, bureaucratic deformation and the unending expenditure of\nprecious resources on military defence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the way forward is to link up with the working class of\nSouth Africa and the whole of Southern Africa in the struggle to carry through\nto completion a social revolution in the entire subcontinent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Zimbabwe<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

In Zimbabwe, the Southern African revolution has taken a\nhuge stride forward with the downfall of the old regime of Smith and of the\npuppet Muzorewa. The attainment of political independence under the popularly\nelected government of ZANU(PF) and ZAPU has roused the confidence of the\noppressed throughout Southern Africa and represents a reversal both for\nimperialism and for the white-minority capitalist regime in South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, what is increasingly striking to the workers and\npeasants of Zimbabwe is the limited character of the changes which the new\ngovernment has been able to bring about. While the face of government has\nchanged, the black workers still suffer under the yoke of bosses in the factory\nand on the farms, and the vast majority of peasants remain starved of land.\nBlack working people still endure the indignity and oppression of white\nprivilege, and still bear the burdens of capitalist and imperialist\nexploitation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is despite the fact that the country is now governed by\nleaders who previously described themselves as \u2018Marxists\u2019 and were carried to\npower on the expectations of the masses that a revolutionary transformation of\nsociety would take place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How is this to be explained? How did it come about that the\nenormous heroism and persistence of the guerilla struggle in Zimbabwe gave way\neventually to compromise\u2014to a ‘settlement’ with imperialism and with the white\nRhodesian and South African ruling class?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a question confronted daily by the workers and\npeasants; by the 15 000 maimed and disabled former guerillas, and by all the\nsurviving fighters of the revolutionary war in which 30 000 sacrificed their\nlives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is a question of great importance also for our movement\nin South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have shown in the analysis of the colonial revolutions\nhow, for example in China, Cuba, Mozambique and Angola, peasant-based guerilla\nwars have led to the overthrow of capitalism in circumstances where the basis of\nbourgeois rule has been extremely weak.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the collapse of the old state apparatus and the\ncreation of new states founded on the guerilla army, there has been an\nirresistible pressure towards the elimination of private ownership of\nproduction and towards the organisation of a state-owned and planned economy.\nThis happened regardless of the intentions, programme and political labels of\nthe leadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In all these cases the overthrow of capitalism has been\npossible without the working class leading the struggle or even playing any\ndecisive role.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The liberation struggle in Zimbabwe was fought with\nessentially the same strategy, method, and programme as in Mozambique and\nAngola. Yet, in Zimbabwe, far from capitalism being overthrown, it has been\nable to survive and, at least temporarily, consolidate its grip.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Entrenched<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here, because the old state was not shattered by the force\nof the guerilla war, and because the power of the capitalist class, backed by\nSouth Africa, remained relatively entrenched, the lack of mass action by the\nworking class became the decisive factor in determining the outcome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In every country\nwhere the capitalist class is relatively strong and the obstacles to the social\nrevolution are formidable, the power of the working class\u2014its class-conscious\norganisation, mobilisation and ability to lead all the oppressed against the\nclass enemy\u2014remains the decisive question.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Zimbabwe is the most industrialised country in Africa after\nSouth. Africa, Nigeria and Egypt. It is second only to South Africa in the\namount of industry per head of population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under colonial rule, Rhodesian capitalism developed as an\noffshoot and extension of South African capitalism. Though the bulk of the\nAfrican population has lived by small peasant production, there was a\nsubstantial development of capitalist agriculture together with the growth of a\nblack agricultural proletariat on the land seized by white settlers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the working class in the towns remained\u2014and still\nremains\u2014a minority of the black population, its numerical weight became at\nleast as great, in relative terms, as the Russian proletariat of 1917. There\nwas a growth of African trade unions on a small, yet significant scale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The small African middle class, itself oppressed under the\ncolonial white-minority regime, was drawn towards the working-class movement,\nwhich provided a seed-bed for the emergence of ZAPU and later ZANU. Nevertheless,\nbecause of the weakness of Marxism and the passivity of the working class in\nthe industrialised world in the 1950s and 1960s, the liberation movement in Zimbabwe\u2014and\nthroughout the colonial world\u2014developed under the influence of nationalist\nideas, without a revolutionary class<\/strong>\nprogramme or perspective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Middle-class<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Remaining under middle-class political leadership, the black\nworking class in Rhodesia did not assert its full social and political weight,\nor establish itself as the leading force of the struggle for national\nliberation at the head of the peasant masses. The trade unions remained under\ncautious, conservative leadership, heavily influenced by right-wing reformist\nbureaucrats of the trade unions in the West, who pressurised them to submit to\nthe state’s controls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the repeated outbursts of mass struggle in town and\ncountry against the white racist regime, it was middle-class nationalist\nleaders who continued to ride at the head of the movement. As long as it seemed\npossible to secure their own interests through concessions from the whites,\nthese leaders clung essentially to policies of compromise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

British imperialism in the early 1960s, forced to retreat in\nWest and East Africa and faced with the collapse of the Central African\nFederation, would have preferred a transition to some form of black government\nin Rhodesia. This view was shared by the big capitalists and financiers in\nRhodesia, who would have been prepared to sacrifice the elite of white workers\nand farmers if they could get a Kenyan-type outcome, i.e. a black\npro-imperialist regime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this way they hoped to prevent a revolutionary movement\nof the masses from developing, while securing their own economic domination in\na new way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, the existing superstructure of white rule in\nRhodesia imposed its own influence on the course of events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The state, while defending the economic basis and interests of\nthe ruling class, at the same time rests on wider social layers and can develop\na degree of autonomy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The white Rhodesians, having a privileged position, were not\nprepared to sacrifice it. Even though flying in the face of history, they could\nnot reconcile themselves to the idea of a black government. The resistance to\nchange of the white farmers, small capitalists and workers provided the basis\nfor the rapid rise of the Rhodesian Front, which gained control of the\ngovernment and declared UDI in 1965.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Rhodesian bourgeoisie, although mostly opposed to this\nturn of events, would not and could not take any decisive action against it.\nNor was the British ruling class prepared (as it could have done) to bring the\nUDI government to its knees. That would have precipitated a revolutionary\nsituation, and posed a threat to the continued rule of capitalism itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Scandalously, it was a Labour government, of Harold Wilson,\nthat carried out the capitalists’ policy and permitted Smith’s regime to\nstabilise itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the sanctions imposed with the ‘consent’ of imperialism\nwere used to throw dust in people’s eyes, while an underhand conspiracy was\nmounted to ensure that oil and other essential supplies got through to\nRhodesia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bulk of Rhodesian exports went to South Africa, or were\nre-exported through it in disguise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When, from the mid 1960s, it became clear to the masses that\nthe Smith government would not give way, there was a turn to armed struggle.\nThe upheavals and splits in the nationalist movement at this time were a\nreflection of the uncertainties and division, especially among the middle-class\nleaders, over what course to take. Bound up in the process and confusing it\nsuperficially were personal rivalries, tussles for position, intrigues and the\nmanipulation of ‘tribal’ issues among the nationalist leaders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Initially, the ZAPU leadership organised only a token\nguerilla force. However, the advance of the guerilla wars in Mozambique and\nAngola encouraged the most radical section of the nationalists in ZANU (which\nhad earlier split from ZAPU), to embark upon an all-out strategy of guerilla\nwarfare. By 1975 Mugabe, having been released from prison, had established his\nauthority over the fighting forces of ZANU, which was rebuilt under his\nleadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The main influence on the radical nationalists were the\nmodels of China, Cuba and, on their immediate border, Mozambique. Their\npolitical outlook was a blend of the radical reformism of \u2018Nkrumahism\u2019, Christian\nidealism, and (in a distorted way) some of the ideas of Marx.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, contrary to the fundamental teachings of Marxism,\nthey turned their backs on the working class and sought what seemed a shorter\nroute to revolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Youth<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thousands of the youth\u2014especially the unemployed and\nhigh-school youth from the towns and villages\u2014crossed the borders for guerilla\ntraining, and returned to organise and fight with the peasants in the\ncountryside. To win recruits and maintain morale in the fighting forces, it was\nobvious that the leadership had to put forward a programme of both national and\nsocial liberation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although lagging behind ZANU, the ZAPU leadership was also\nobliged to mount guerilla offensives from Zambia in order to maintain its\ntraditional basis of support in the western part of the country. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The ZANU and ZAPU guerillas fought with tremendous\ndetermination. Peasants willingly sustained huge sacrifices, and endured\nappalling atrocities at the hands of the Rhodesian state, in order to support\nthe war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To prevent them from assisting the guerillas, the regime herded\none-third of the population into concentration camps (\u2018protected villages\u2019).\nPeasant agriculture was devastated, and the national herd dropped by one-third.\nIn the last five to ten years of the war, the standards of living of the black\npopulation fell by about 50%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although the effect of sanctions as such was limited, the\nsituation changed when the world recession of the mid-1970s set in. Coupled\nwith the downswing of the South African economy, the combined effect on\nRhodesia was severe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gross National Product (measured in constant 1965 prices)\nfell from R$1,36 billion in 1974 to R$1,18 billion in 1978. Manufacturing\ndropped by over 14% during the same period. By the end of the war there were as\nmany Zimbabweans unemployed as the total number in employment. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

‘Marxist’<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The longer the war continued, the more the ZANU and ZAPU\nleaders adopted a ‘Marxist’ stand. After the collapse of capitalism in Angola\nand Mozambique, even Nkomo (a millionaire) began to manoeuvre more openly\nbetween the Western powers and the Soviet bureaucracy. The ZANU, leadership on\nthe other hand leaned towards China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile the Rhodesian army was forced to rely on black\ntroops, to the point where eventually half its forces were black.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After the debacle for imperialism in Angola, and with the\ndeveloping mass revolt in South Africa, Kissinger and Nixon reappraised US\npolicy towards Rhodesia. They decided that the Smith government could not be\nsustained in the long term. Its defeat, they feared, could lead to the\noverthrow of capitalism in this strategically important country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus Kissinger travelled to South Africa in 1976 and, with\nSmith on the carpet in Vorster’s office, read him the ‘riot act’. Within hours,\nSmith and his cabinet had agreed to a change of course, which led to Muzorewa\nbecoming Prime Minister.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The election of Muzorewa under the guns of the regime was a\nfarce. The whole structure of the state, of land and industry remained in the\nhands of the whites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The white regime wore Muzorewa like a mask, but the people\ncould see through it. They got nothing significant from the ‘change’. The war\ncontinued and intensified.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The imperialist powers were in a quandary. In Britain, the\nLabour government could not recognise the \u2018Muzorewa\u2019 regime. After the election\nof the Tories, however, Thatcher prepared to recognise it, as did the Carter\nadministration in the USA. The inevitable consequence would have been to\nprotract the guerilla war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Had the war continued for an extended period of years it\nwould almost certainly have led to the overthrow of capitalism on lines similar\nto Angola and Mozambique. The difference would have been that the conflict,\ninstead of being limited to Zimbabwe, would have embroiled the whole of\nSouthern Africa, as it was already beginning to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The state in Rhodesia was relatively firmly based. This was\na result of the development of industry and infrastructure; of the local\nbourgeois, petty bourgeois, white farmers and white workers; and the powerful\nbacking of South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Botha’s renewed commitment of SA troops to Rhodesia during\n1979, and crippling bombing raids on the economic infrastructure of Mozambique\nand Zambia, showed that the South African regime was unwilling to accept the\nmilitary defeat of capitalism in Zimbabwe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, much as in Vietnam, in the longer run it would\nhave been impossible by these means to prevent the disintegration and collapse\nof the Rhodesian state. The rising revolt of the oppressed in South Africa\nitself, combined with the steady exodus of whites from Rhodesia and the undermining\nof the social base of the regime, meant that, with appalling bloodshed and\nsacrifice, a proletarian bonapartist regime would eventually have arisen in\nZimbabwe. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Backlash<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A development of the revolution on these lines would have\nbeen the most likely perspective had the imperialist powers recognised, and\ncontinued to prop up, the Muzorewa puppet government. What finally deterred\nthem, however, was the backlash from black Africa and the rest of the\nex-colonial world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nigeria\u2014Britain’s biggest trading partner apart from the EEC\nand the USA\u2014seized the assets of British Petroleum as a warning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both British and US imperialism changed tack, and accepted\nthat the guerilla leaders could not be excluded from government. This provided\nthe setting for the Lancaster House negotiations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The negotiations were conducted directly between British\nimperialism and the guerilla commanders, with the US and South African\nimperialists hovering in the background. Smith and Muzorewa were entirely secondary\nfigures at the conference table.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The aim of the imperialists in these negotiations was to\nsecure a bourgeois coalition, in which the power of ZANU and ZAPU in government\ncould be checked by the continued inclusion of Muzorewa and the whites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The ‘front-line states’ (both capitalist and deformed\nworkers’ states), fearing the repercussions of a protracted war, pressurised\nthe ZAPU and ZANU leadership into the settlement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The main sticking point at Lancaster House was the question\nof land. With their support depending on the peasants, the ZANU and ZAPU\nleadership could not abandon their promise of a redistribution of land.\nTherefore Britain would have to agree to provide some money to enable land\nreform to take place by means of purchases from white farmers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On almost every other demand of the people the ZANU and ZAPU\nleaders made big concessions to the capitalists. They agreed to a clause in the\nconstitution guaranteeing the property of the capitalist class. They even\nagreed to give the tiny white minority one-fifth of the seats in Parliament\u2014and\nwith it the power to veto any constitutional change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the national-democratic, as well as the social, aims of\nthe struggle were frustrated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many of the revolutionary youth and guerillas, shocked by\nthe unexpected turnabout by the leadership at Lancaster House, debated the idea\nof defying the ‘settlement’ and continuing the guerilla war. But that was quite\nunrealistic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All the rear bases in Zambia and Mozambique would\nimmediately have been closed down. The peasants, wearying of a protracted war,\nwould have been divided and would soon have withdrawn support from the\nguerillas. As a result their forces would have been speedily mopped up and\nannihilated. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The only revolutionary alternative to the Lancaster House\nagreement was a strategy moving beyond guerilla warfare. The capitalists could\nhave been defeated only through the mobilisation and arming of the working\nclass to seize power in Salisbury and Bulawayo, to rally the peasant masses\nbehind them, and to call on their South African brothers and sisters to help\nstop a military invasion by the apartheid regime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This would have required systematic organisation and\npolitical training of leadership in the working class, using also the links and\nchannels of the migrant labour system to prepare the united action of the South\nAfrican workers. But the ZANU and ZAPU leaders were completely opposed to such\na course (as were their ‘socialist’ backers in Moscow and Peking).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the 35 000 dedicated young fighters of ZANU and ZAPU\nfound themselves trapped politically by the Lancaster House settlement\u2014as a\nprelude to being physically bottled-up in the ‘assembly points’ and finally\ndisarmed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The election which followed was ‘fair’ only in its result\u2014an\noutright majority for ZANU(PF). In all other respects it was completely unfair.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Resources<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

At least R25 million was poured by SA, British, and world\nimperialism into the hands of their candidate, Muzorewa. Enormous propaganda\nresources were put at his disposal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ZANU(PF) and ZAPU, coming out of illegality, had little time\nto organise in the urban areas. Their offices were even denied telephones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

20-30 000 ‘auxiliary’ thugs of Muzorewa were financed and\norganised by the capitalists and the state to intimidate the voters. There was\na heavy pressure of employers upon the urban and agricultural workers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But all these measures boomeranged against the ruling class.\nAll the more because of these efforts, the masses could see clearly who their\nreal enemies were. There was overwhelming support for the guerillas, and\nparticularly for ZANU(PF) who, in the eyes of the workers and peasants, had\nborne the brunt of the fighting and had no history of compromise with the\nwhites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The imperialists had calculated on tying Mugabe down in an\nunfavourable coalition, in which Muzorewa would have the upper hand, and in\nwhich there would be endless opportunities to manoeuvre and manipulate the\nrival forces. But the landslide vote for ZANU(PF) dashed these plans. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile the strategy of Nkomo and the ZAPU leadership had\nalso boomeranged.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Previously, when it had seemed likely that the guerilla war\nwould continue as a fight to the finish, ZAPU’s Soviet and East European\nadvisers had encouraged a strategy which they thought would give ZAPU the eventual\nvictory. While most of the guerilla fighting was left to ZANU forces, ZAPU was\nbeing reorganised as a conventional army, equipped with aircraft, tanks and artillery.\nThe intention was to advance rapidly on the towns once the old state apparatus\nwas at the point of collapse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This, they calculated, would have put them in control of the\nvital centres of the country. They could then have distributed land to the\npeasants and thus undercut ZANU’s rural support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the whole strategy was confounded by the retreat of\nimperialism and the Lancaster House settlement. The election left Nkomo and the\nother ZAPU leaders as junior partners in a coalition controlled by Mugabe. (The\nconsequences of this upset are still felt in the diplomatic field by the Soviet\nbureaucracy in its relations with the Mugabe government.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Precarious<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite the Lancaster House agreement, the imperialists and\nthe Rhodesian capitalist class thus found themselves in a precarious position.\nEven before the election, when it became plain that Mugabe would gain a\nlandslide, the bourgeois camp began seething with counter-revolutionary\nconspiracies. Contingency plans and ‘pretexts’ were assembled for cancelling\nthe election and tearing up the Lancaster House agreement, if this course\nappeared to be in the imperialist interest. At the same time, reactionary\nmilitary measures were prepared.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The teaching of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky that the\nstate is fundamentally armed bodies of men organised to defend the property and\npower of the ruling class, was amply illustrated in Zimbabwe during this\nperiod. Only the smashing of the bourgeois state machinery could have ensured a\nshift of power from the capitalists to the workers and removed the threat of\ncounter-revolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

General Walls, professional butcher of the Zimbabwean people\nunder Smith and Muzorewa, later publicly admitted making detailed preparations\nat the time of the election for a counter-revolutionary coup.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His attempt to get the British Tory Prime Minister,\nThatcher, to ‘invalidate’ the election result was part of a plan to provide the\npolitical smokescreen for a military takeover. It was not simply Thatcher’s\nrefusal which deterred him. Rather, the whole imperialist camp\u2014including\nThatcher\u2014were held back by the fear that the whip of counter-revolution, if\nprematurely used, would drive the\nrevolution forward.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The intensity of mass revolutionary fervour at the time of\nZANU(PF)’s election victory, combined with the disarray in the bourgeois camp,\ncreated a favourable objective situation for the smashing of the capitalist\nstate and the transfer of power to the hands of the working people. But this\nopportunity could only have been seized had there been a revolutionary leadership<\/strong> rooted in the working class to organise in\ntown and country a decisive movement against the oppressors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Any resulting South African invasion\u2014if indeed the SA\ngenerals considered it feasible in such circumstances\u2014would then have faced an\narmed and conscious people, millions strong, defending their revolution and\ntheir country every inch, and calling upon the working class of South Africa to\nparalyse the enemy with a general strike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But such a course was in no way entertained by the\nleadership of ZANU(PF) and ZAPU. As was clearly demonstrated throughout the\nelection campaign, they saw no role for the working class but to provide them\nwith electoral support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus, again, the workers’ lack of independent organisation,\nrevolutionary leadership, and Marxist programme paralysed the working class\npolitically. This proved decisive in the outcome of events. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just before the election, Mugabe went to Mozambique to meet\nthe South African Foreign Minister and generals of the SA army. In return for\nassurances that South Africa would not invade, he undertook to defend\ncapitalist property, agreed not to provide bases for the ANC, and even promised\nto pay the debts of the Smith regime to South Africa (although subsequently he repudiated\nthe arms debt).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the ‘Marxist’ leadership of the guerilla war, who had\nproclaimed the task of ‘socialism’, showed their willingness to abide by the\nclass compromise which they had entered into at Lancaster House. If anything\nsummed this up, it was the initial appointment of General Walls to head all the\narmed forces under the new government of Mugabe. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Bonapartist<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For genuine Marxism, the course of events was not difficult\nto explain. Marxism has always pointed out that a guerilla army is entirely\ndifferent from a movement of the proletariat. The leadership which arises on\nthat basis is bonapartist, and not under mass democratic control. Thus always\nlatent in a guerilla war is the possibility of sudden and bewildering zig-zags\nand about-turns by the leadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A revolution fought on that basis can result only in a\nbonapartist regime\u2014either bourgeois or proletarian in character. In Zimbabwe,\nunlike Mozambique and Angola, because the state machine remained largely intact,\nthe leadership of the guerillas came to terms with it and entered into compromise\nwith the capitalist class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Compromise with capitalism develops a logic of its own. Once\nit is accepted that private ownership and production for profit is to remain\nthe basis of the economy and the foundation of the state, then it follows that\nthe government is obliged to make the defence and promotion of capitalism a\nparamount concern.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because of the key role of the whites in commercial\nagriculture, industry, trade and administration, Mugabe’s government was\nobliged to provide copious assurances to the white minority, in order to avoid\na massive exodus which would have brought the capitalist economy to the point\nof collapse. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Had that occurred, the Mugabe regime would have had no\nalternative but to launch on a course of wholesale nationalisations and\nexpropriations of capitalist property, mobilise and arm the workers against\nreaction, reconstitute power on proletarian bonapartist lines, and re-organise\nproduction on the basis of state ownership and planning. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Impossible<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead, setting out to secure capitalism, the government\nfound it impossible to move decisively even to carry out a land reform. To\nsatisfy the needs of the poor peasants for land, up to three-quarters of the\nwhite-owned land would have had to be taken over for redistribution. Not only\nwere the aid provisions agreed at Lancaster House totally inadequate for this.\nEven more important was the fear of the regime that expropriation of the white\nfarmers would precipitate the departure in droves of white skilled workers and\nbusinessmen also.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At first the capitalist class, in Zimbabwe and internationally,\ncould not believe that the ‘Marxist’ Mugabe and his government could really\nbecome the defender of their interests. Perhaps he was really preparing some\ndiabolically cunning revolutionary plot? But in time, when they saw the success\nof the government in restraining the movement of the masses, they came to\nregard Mugabe as the “best Prime Minister” that Zimbabwe could\npossibly have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless it would be false to conclude that the Mugabe\ngovernment has become merely a willing agent of the capitalist class. This is a bonapartist government, which\nleans on the support of the masses.<\/strong> While defending capitalism, it balances\nand manoeuvres unsteadily between the conflicting class forces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Its first aim has been to consolidate power by reorganising\nthe capitalist state, Africanising the civil service as rapidly as possible,\nand restructuring the army by integrating the bulk of the former guerillas into\nit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is because the Zimbabwean government is not the tame\nservant of imperialism, and is still capable of striking blows against the\ninterests of the capitalists, that the SA government has continued to seek to\ndestabilise it\u2014a really crazy policy as far as the long-term interests of SA\ncapitalism are concerned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because the new regime in Zimbabwe was able to consolidate\nits position without damaging capitalism, there was a very rapid growth of the\neconomy during the first year of independence. In 1980 the growth rate reached\n13,9% in real terms. With the ending of sanctions, there was a big increase of\nproduction and trade affecting every sector, with the exception of mining. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, even after this dramatic rate of growth, the Gross\nNational Product was still lower in real\nterms<\/strong> than in 1974. Essentially what has taken place is the healing of the\neconomic war-wounds, rather than any substantial further advance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In moving beyond this, as we pointed out in Inqaba<\/em> No. 2 (April 1981), the government\nhas found itself increasingly against a wall of limitations, both political and\neconomic. The impossibility of reconciling the interests of the workers and\npeasants with those of the capitalists has become more and more obvious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To sustain the development of the economy requires massively\nincreased investment; hence increased imports of machinery, etc.; hence\nincreasing foreign exchange earnings derived from expanding exports, and so on.\nZimbabwe is the prisoner of the same general constraints of capitalism in the\nunder-developed countries explained in previous chapters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To secure private investment, the government must provide\nconditions for the profitability of that investment, as well as guarantees\nagainst its future nationalisation. But profitability for capitalism in Zimbabwe\nremains absolutely dependent on cheap labour. The demand of the working class\nfor a living wage\u2014the least they could expect from the revolution\u2014comes into\nimmediate conflict with the needs of capitalism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since independence there has been the biggest wave of\nstrikes and wage struggles in Zimbabwe since the Second World War. Under this\nintense pressure the government has moved in stages to implement and increase\nminimum wages. Recently the minimum wage for industry and commerce has been set\nat Z$125 (R151) per month\u2014itself an abysmally low level. Minimum wages for\nminers are substantially lower, while agricultural and domestic workers receive\nonly Z$50 per month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But even these increases have begun to drive growing numbers\nof capitalists to the conclusion that their enterprises will be unable to\nsurvive. Employers have begun to dismiss workers (31 000 in just the second\nhalf of 1980), saying they cannot afford to continue employing them. Total\nemployment in the country remains almost static, while the problem of\nunemployment rises month by month. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Exports<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Depressed world prices of metals constrain the growth of\nexports, while the railway system has proved unable to move larger tonnages of\nminerals to the ports. (In the first ten months of 1981 there was a 7% fall in\nthe total value of mineral production.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even the bumper maize crop in 1981 could not keep Zimbabwe’s\ntrade balance in surplus. Maize exports were similarly restricted by transport\nbottlenecks, made critical by the SA government’s deliberate sabotage in\nwithdrawing loaned locomotives and restricting access through the rail network\nto the ports.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

75-80% of Zimbabwe’s imports and exports pass through South\nAfrica. There is also still a heavy dependence on the SA capitalist economy,\nwhich buys 18% of Zimbabwe’s exports (40% of its manufactured exports) and\nsupplies 32% of its imports.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although the economy grew by 8% in 1981, it is expected to\nfall well below that in this and subsequent years. Production growth, according\nto the September 1981 Economic Review<\/em>\nof the Zimbabwe Bank, “is already being inhibited by inadequate foreign\nexchange allocations and skilled labour and transport bottlenecks”. Thus\nit is accepted that the recent rates of growth of industrial production cannot\nlong be maintained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The effect is similarly felt in agriculture, where the\nforeign exchange allocation for the import of tractors has been cut by\nfour-fifths, while the allocation for large tractors and combines has been\nscrapped altogether. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Reforms<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even limited reforms in education and welfare\u2014for example,\nfree universal primary education, and free medical treatment for those earning\nless than Z$150 per month\u2014contributed to a 37% increase in planned government\nspending in the 1981\/82 budget. International aid financed less than 6% of\ntotal spending. Taxation had to be increased sharply (itself a deterrent to\ncapitalist investment), while the budget deficit increased to almost 11% of\nestimated GDP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The result of all this has been steeply rising\nprices\u2014officially 12% to 15% in 1981. But rents, for example, rose much faster\nthan this, while the cost of traditional beer and tobacco has gone up more than\n50%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The government’s price ‘freeze’ can only temporarily offset\ninflationary pressures. Even that measure has perturbed the capitalists\u2014while\nthe workers are now expected to put up with an indefinite wage freeze.\nParticularly in the urban areas, the working people complain that they are finding\nthemselves worse off in reality than two or three years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is confirmed by the recent report of the Riddell\nCommission, which said that its dominant impression was “the degree of dissatisfaction,\nthe depth of bitterness … and the frustration expressed by the work force in\nZimbabwe”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While balancing and manoeuvring between the contending\npressures, the government has more and more come into conflict with the demands\nand struggles of the working class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strikes now lead to ever harsher measures of repression. In\nOctober 1981 more than 1 000 black teachers and nurses were arrested during\n‘unofficial’ disputes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Exploiting the frustration of the former guerillas, the\ngovernment has tried to play them off against the urban workers who did not\ntake part in the war. Thus Mugabe threatened to throw the nurses ‘into the\nbush’ to give them a taste of what it was like to sacrifice during the war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When a delegation representing striking teachers went to see\nthe ZANU Minister of Education, he sacked them on the spot. In January 1982,\n243 railway firemen who had gone on strike were arrested.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In March, 553 Salisbury bus drivers were convicted under the\nIndustrial Conciliation Act inherited from the days of white rule, and were\ngiven fines and suspended jail sentences for striking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to workers in government and local authority\nservices, there have been repeated outbreaks of strike action by workers in\nmining, industry, commerce and even agriculture\u2014against tyrannical employers\nand for improved wages and conditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ZANU officials, particularly, are regularly called in by\nmanagement to pacify the workers and direct them to return to work. At the same\ntime, the government has been obliged to act to stop dismissals of workers\ntaking place without its permission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The working class overwhelmingly supports and wishes to\nstrengthen the new government and the ruling parties against the white racists,\nagainst the threat from South Africa and against\nall dangers of reaction. <\/strong>But, simultaneously, the working class is\nrealising the need to organise itself to defend\nits own interests <\/strong>against the state, the capitalist class, and the power of\nthe ZANU and ZAPU hierarchies themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus there is a re-awakening of trade union organisation and\nactivity involving wider and wider layers of black workers in every sector.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In an attempt to control this development, the Mugabe\ngovernment has maintained the old Industrial Conciliation laws while preparing\na new law on similar lines. Efforts are also being made to bring trade union\norganisation under the control of the ruling party machine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, the black middle-class elite has begun to\nmerge with the bourgeoisie. Black company directors now abound in Zimbabwe.\nThere is a rapacious scramble for self-enrichment, for positions and perks, and\nfor luxury homes with the aid of building society loans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One former ZAPU leader, for example, who became a company\ndirector in a big concern, is also the holder of the ‘Order of Lenin’ awarded in\nMoscow! Nor can many ZANU leaders resist the temptations of personal greed.\nRecently Mugabe was obliged to publicly denounce the “capitalists” in\nhis party hierarchy and cabinet who were busy acquiring farms. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Zig-zagging<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bonapartist zig-zagging, striking blows to left and right,\nwill increasingly characterise Mugabe’s government. The attempt to develop\ntowards a one-party state is inevitable for this regime, in its efforts to curb\nand contain the growing contradictions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the major factors threatening the stability of the\nregime is the unresolved national division between the Ndebele-speaking\nminority and the Shona-speaking majority.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fundamentally, all sections of the oppressed are united in\nwanting to gain the land, jobs and an end to the twin evils of black poverty\nand white privilege. A policy of mass mobilisation in carrying the revolution\nthrough would have consolidated this unity in action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But with the revolution stalling within the limits of\ncapitalism, landlessness, unemployment, deprivation and discrimination of all\nkinds have continued to burden the masses. This has left fertile ground for the\nre-opening of old divisions, which are played upon by rival middle-class\npoliticians, through the rival party machines, in their struggle for status and\nposition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mugabe has been obliged to be cautious in his moves towards\none-party rule. To avoid an explosive rupture he needs to maintain ZAPU’s\nparticipation in the government, and eventually to incorporate it into his own\nparty. One of the problems he faced has been the frustrated ambition of Nkomo. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Arms<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Through his intelligence service, Mugabe had probably been\naware for months of the build-up of arms on farms purchased by Nkomo and other\nZAPU leaders, in preparation for a possible future coup. No doubt he had also\nlong been aware of their communications with South African capitalists, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, Mugabe initially hoped to persuade Nkomo to\nabandon his independent ambitions and enter into a merger of the two parties.\nIt was only when this proposal was firmly rebuffed that he moved to raid the\nfarms, expose Nkomo, and expel him and his closest aides from the government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The result has been the disarray of the ZAPU leadership,\nwith an important section favouring a merger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time Smith’s RF has begun to disintegrate, with\na number of white MPs deciding to side with the ZANU government. For more than\na year, even white capitalists and former Special Branch policemen under Smith\nhave been taking out ZANU party cards, in the hope of guaranteeing their\nfutures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although there will be new twists and turns in the\nsituation, Mugabe will probably succeed eventually in establishing a one-party\nsystem. But instead of ending the\ncontradictions, this will merely compress them into a single vessel. In the\nlong run this will lead to increased tensions, class conflicts and ultimate\nsplits within ZANU itself.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Side by side with the national, class, and inter-party\ndivisions and tensions, there has been the acute frustration among the\npeasantry over their unsatisfied need for land.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

675 000 African families live on the former ‘Tribal Trust\nLand’\u2014which is able to support only an estimated 200 000 families. At the same\ntime, some 60% of the white-owned land is either lying fallow or under-utilised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the past few months, some 50 000 peasants, refusing to\ntolerate any longer the procrastination of the government, have taken matters\ninto their own hands and occupied vacant white-owned lands. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The initial response of the government was to treat them as\nsquatters and threaten them with stern police measures. But it was politically\nimpossible for the government to face a confrontation with the peasants when it\nwas simultaneously entering more and more into conflict with the working class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fearing for its long-term survival, the government has been\nobliged to threaten expropriation of white-owned land, even without\ncompensation if increased aid from the West is not forthcoming. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The alternative, as\nthe new Minister of Lands put it, was to face the danger of a “second\nrevolution”. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

At first only vacant land, and then land of the smaller\nwhite farmers, is likely to be taken over. In this way a flight of the bigger commercial\nfarmers from the country will initially be avoided. Likewise in finance, industry\nand trade the government has so far followed an extremely cautious policy of\nlimited or partial nationalisations, leaving the essential framework of\ncapitalism untouched.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But, as the contradictions in society intensify, the\ngovernment could be placed under intolerable pressures. On the one hand it\nwould be confronted with the mounting demands of the people for radical\nreforms. On the other hand it would be faced with the stubborn resistance to\nchange by the capitalists, provoking still more furious struggles by the\nworking masses. Its only way out would be to try and gain control of the key\nresources of the economy in order to meet some of the demands. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Further and more extensive nationalisations within the\nframework of capitalism\u2014not only of land, but also in finance, industry and\nmining\u2014will thus become unavoidable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is likely that a slow but steady departure of the whites\nwill continue. Already their number is down from a peak of 275 000 in 1975, to\nbelow 190 000 at the beginning of 1982. The first to go are, in the main, the\nunskilled workers, clerks, and small farmers. The managers and many skilled\ntechnicians stay on, together with the owners of large farms and industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the government consolidates its position in the short\nterm, the impasse of capitalism will increasingly undermine its stability.\nThough this may take a number of years to reach crisis proportions, the regime\nwill be obliged to develop more and more oppressive powers in order to control\nthe developing struggles of the working class, and, eventually, of the peasants\nas well. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Unions<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The building and defence of independent unions in Zimbabwe\nwill form a major focus of the working-class movement in the coming period.\nThis could combine with a struggle of rank-and-file youth of ZANU and ZAPU to\ncarry forward the demands for complete national liberation, democracy, and\nsocialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The revolution in Zimbabwe is not finished; in a sense it\nhas only begun.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is possible that, in the longer term, severe economic\ncrisis, combining with mass discontent against the capitalists and their\nsupporters in the regime, could provoke splits in the ruling apparatus. This\ncould leave Mugabe (or his successors) with no alternative but to move towards\nthe overthrow of capitalism and the constitution of a proletarian bonapartist\nstate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The most likely context for such a process would be the\ndevelopment of a revolutionary situation in South Africa itself, with upheavals\nthroughout Southern Africa. But this would open the way also to the achievement\nof power by the working class and the carrying through of the socialist\nrevolution in the entire sub-continent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To this end the task of revolutionaries in Zimbabwe is to\nbring into being links of common organisation between the Zimbabwean working\nclass and the workers of South Africa and the region as a whole. On that road\nalone can all the unresolved problems of the people finally be overcome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Namibia<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The fight to free Namibia from South African colonial rule\nis of the greatest importance to the oppressed and exploited people of South\nAfrica itself. It will lead to a further weakening of the SA regime and ruling\nclass, and bring forward the day when the whole of Southern Africa will be\nfreed from imperialist domination. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, the struggle in Namibia highlights very\nclearly how the revolution in Southern Africa is bound together as a single\nprocess, and how each national struggle is forcefully influenced\u2014and at times\neven determined\u2014by international forces and circumstances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Namibia, a country the size of France, West Germany and\nBelgium put together, but with a population of only one million, the economic\nand military stranglehold of South Africa is enormous. The SA economy produces\n40 times the total production of Namibia. The turnover of just the top ten SA\ncompanies is seven times Namibia’s Gross Domestic Product!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both under German colonial rule in the past, and under\ndirect South African rule subsequently, the economy of Namibia has been grossly\nunder-developed, while its rich resources have been plundered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Diamond and uranium mining alone account for about 50% of\nthe GDP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Commercial agriculture, which makes up the second most\nimportant part of the economy, is in the hands of a mere 5 000 (mainly white)\nfarmers. The overwhelming, majority of the indigenous population are forced to\nsurvive by subsistence production and by the abysmal wages of migrant labour on\nthe mines and the white-owned farms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under the ruthless state machine directed and financed by\nPretoria, and the baasskap of a white settler population of 100 000, black\nNamibians have been subjected to a system of oppression essentially similar to\nthat in South Africa. SA colonisation of Namibia has drawn the working class of\nboth countries particularly close together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As in South Africa, Namibian workers have a militant\ntradition of industrial and political struggles against exploitation and\noppression. The political consciousness of the workers was shown as early as\n1938 in the refusal by dock-workers at Walvis Bay to offload an Italian ship in\nprotest against Mussolini’s invasion of Ethiopia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There were big strikes by contract workers in the 1950s and\n1960s. The 1971-72 strike by Namibian workers\u2014the biggest in their history\u2014played\nan important part in the re-awakening of the SA workers’ movement as well. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The workers were in the forefront of the national liberation\nstruggle. SWAPO itself was originally founded as an organisation of migrant\nworkers. One of its first aims was to fight against the migrant labour system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, with the delay of the workers’ revolution\ninternationally and the weakness of the forces of Marxism, SWAPO developed\nunder the influence of nationalist ideas, while its leadership passed\nincreasingly into the hands of the tiny educated black elite.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From the outset, the liberation struggle in Namibia has\nconfronted a very difficult strategic problem: the disparity between (on the\none hand) the power of the repressive colonial state, founded on the might of\nSouth Africa, and (on the other hand) the small population, forces, and\nresources of the oppressed Namibian people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Without a revolution imminent in South Africa, how could the\ncolonial regime in Windhoek be successfully fought and overthrown?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In South Africa, after the tide of mass resistance of the\n1950s and early 1960s was suppressed, there was a lengthy period in which the\nhold of reaction tightened. The decision to launch guerilla struggle was taken\nin this period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As already pointed out, in the colonial world generally the\npeasants, workers and youth, facing unbearable conditions, could not wait for\nthe proletarian revolution in the West to overthrow imperialism. Similarly the\nNamibian masses could not wait for the South African revolution to smash their\noppressor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But while seeking every means of direct resistance to SA\nrule, they have at the same time been hampered by the lack of the clear\ninternationalist leadership and perspective necessary to forge the vital links\nof organisation and common struggle with the rising South Africa working class.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Guerillaism<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The ideas of guerillaism gained enormous popularity among\nthe youth, particularly with the advances in the guerilla wars in Angola,\nMozambique, and later Zimbabwe. The victory of the MPLA, opening up the\npossibility of rear bases in Angola, increased the scope for SWAPO to wage\nguerilla war. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Retaining its traditional mass following in the working\nclass and in the rural areas of the north, SWAPO has won the support of the\ngreat majority of oppressed Namibians through the heroism, commitment and\nsacrifice of its fighters. Its own popularity has risen precisely as other,\nrival organisations have exposed before the people the readiness of their\nleaders to compromise. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, as the war in Namibia has shown, guerilla struggle\nitself provides no sure route to a revolutionary victory against a powerfully\nentrenched enemy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have explained why, in Zimbabwe, the guerilla war\u2014while\nit advanced the country towards political independence\u2014proved incapable of\ncarrying through the national and democratic, let alone the social, emancipation\nof the people. The obstacles to a\nguerilla victory are multiplied ten-fold in the conditions of Namibia.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The South African state, with its massive economic\nresources, air-power and heavy weaponry, has been able to confine the guerilla\nconflict largely to the northern border area of Namibia, the Caprivi strip, and\nsouthern Angola. Using at least 50 000 and up to a 100 000 troops at times, the\nSA forces have been able to maintain a firm grip on the towns, the transport\nand communications network, the commercial farming areas, and the bulk of the\ncountryside where the small indigenous population is widely scattered. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Intimidation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

About 30% of black Namibians are concentrated in an area\nwithin 40-50 km of the Angolan border. Here, the South African occupying forces\nrule by vicious intimidation and bloody reprisals against the people, who\nsuffer appallingly in their efforts to support and sustain the guerilla war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By repeatedly bombing, raiding and carrying out massacres in\nsouthern Angola\u2014including the invasion of the region by heavy ground and air\nforces in September 1981\u2014the South African regime has been able to impede the\nprogress of the SWAPO forces and repeatedly disrupt their lines of\nreinforcement and supply.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In its military policy against SWAPO, SA enjoys the scarcely\nveiled support of the imperialist powers, particularly the USA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Partly, this is for the obvious reason that the imperialists\nwant to defend their economic interests in Namibia, and preserve the access of\nthe multi-national corporations to the country’s mineral wealth. Nevertheless,\nthey have seen in Angola that continuing economic dependence on the West, with\nincreasing trade and aid, has allowed their continued exploitation of Angolan\noil.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now that the MPLA government has consolidated itself, and\nimperialism has failed to dislodge it by supporting UNITA, the US\nadministration has quietly swung over towards accepting the need to recognise\nand have diplomatic relations with the Angolan regime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This pragmatism was well expressed by Rockefeller, the\nAmerican banker, who said recently during an African tour that he did not think\n“African Marxism” threatened American interests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But while imperialism may, with reluctance, be able to come\nto terms with the collapse of capitalism in subordinate<\/strong> countries of Southern Africa, it must strive ruthlessly\nto bolster the power of capitalism over\nthe region as a whole.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The developing revolutionary crisis in South Africa is a\nspectre haunting imperialism, because the South African capitalist state is the\nkey to imperialist domination of the entire region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because of South Africa’s industrial strength, and the\nstrength of its working class, a victorious revolution there, leading to the\noverthrow of capitalism, would reverberate throughout Africa and dramatically\nchange the world balance of forces against imperialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Neither the South African state nor the main imperialist\npowers are prepared to accept a military victory by the guerilla forces of\nSWAPO in Namibia. This is because of the effect that would have in driving\nforward the movement of the masses in South Africa, weakening the state and\nhastening the development of a revolutionary situation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If only the contending forces within Namibia itself<\/strong> were involved, the military predominance of\nSouth Africa would enable it to hold power, sustain the colonial state\napparatus, and contain the guerilla war for many years. Even so, it would not\nbe able to defeat the guerillas decisively or halt the resistance of the\nmasses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the past 40 years, struggle after struggle of the\ncolonial people has proved that the colonial revolution is irreversible. South\nAfrican imperialism cannot crush the Namibians, any more than American imperialism\ncould crush the Vietnamese. The claim by the South African military commanders\nthat they would “win the hearts and minds” of the Namibian people has\nbeen shown to be a hollow boast. The cost of the war (R400 million in 1981)\nmounts year by year, while their military presence is more and more detested by\nthe population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, if it was a question of Namibia alone, the\nSouth African regime would undoubtedly attempt to hold on indefinitely against\nSWAPO. But the main element in the calculations of both South African and\nWestern imperialism is the developing\ncrisis within South Africa itself. Their fear is that the South African and Namibian\nrevolutions may combine.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the war in Namibia drags on for a further five or ten\nyears, there is an increasing likelihood that the South African regime will\nhave to face massive confrontation with the black people at home while the bulk\nof its army is tied down in Namibia\u2014with the danger of each situation inflaming\nthe other and drawing the working masses of both countries together into a\ncombined insurrectionary movement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is above all this frightening perspective for the ruling\nclass which has induced the South African regime to move cautiously towards\naccepting the proposals of the Western ‘contact group’ (USA, Britain, France,\nWest Germany and Canada) for a Namibian settlement. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Settlement proposals<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although the settlement proposals have changed in detail, in\nessence they are an attempt to bring SWAPO leaders into government while tying\nthem down with economic, constitutional and other guarantees intended to keep\nNamibia within the framework of capitalism. The outcome of the Lancaster House\nconference, and the survival of capitalism in Zimbabwe, has given the ruling\nclass confidence that a regime on a similar basis can be sustained in Namibia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The SWAPO leadership, for its part, has found itself under\nsevere pressures to accept in principle a settlement of the Namibian conflict\non such lines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the basis of the guerilla strategy, the alternative to a settlement\nwould be the continuation of a difficult and bloody war, with no end in sight.\nAs happened with Zimbabwe, the governments of the ‘front-line’ states\u2014not least\nAngola\u2014are anxious to bring the fighting to an end as soon as possible. The\nweight of the Soviet bureaucracy is added to theirs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ever since Zimbabwe’s independence, the conditions for a\nsettlement in Namibia have been falling into place. Nevertheless, there are\ndifferences over important details which have drawn out, and repeatedly\ninterrupt, the conclusion of an agreement. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

“Classless society”<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

During 1975-76, when the belief in the possibility of an\noutright guerilla victory was at its height, SWAPO had declared itself a\n“vanguard party” and committed itself to the aim of a “classless\nnon-exploitative society”. The programme adopted in August 1976 said that\nSWAPO would “ensure that all the major means of production and exchange of\nthe country are owned by the people”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1977 the SWAPO leader, Sam Nujoma, said: “We are\nfighting for the mass of the workers to have direct control over the means of\nproduction”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such statements reflected the pressure of the Namibian\nmasses upon their leaders, at a time when the latter did not feel acutely the\ncountervailing class pressures exerted on them through international diplomacy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Subsequently the leadership, faced with the pressures\ntowards settlement, have abandoned all elements of their programme which imply\nthe overthrow of capitalism, and are now prepared to guarantee the preservation\nof private ownership in Namibia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In January 1981, during the period leading up to the Geneva\nconference on Namibia, the Economist disclosed details of negotiations taking\nplace between SWAPO and the owners of the Namibian mines:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A SWAPO government would want a stake in new ventures, as does Botswana…but it would not bring about immediate changes in the rules covering existing mines… <\/p>

SWAPO has told De Beers it would look for an increase in the taxation rate (currently a total of 60% lower than in Botswana) and a say in the marketing of rough diamonds overseas.<\/p>17\/1\/81<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

In return, it was reported, the De Beers management agreed\nto allow SWAPO to operate freely among the 6 000 migrant workers at Oranjemund,\nand also agreed to finance a country-wide mineral survey to show its commitment\nto future national development. At the same time, Nujoma told the Financial\nMail that SWAPO only wanted “state participation” in industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An essential component of the settlement proposals at\nGeneva, which SWAPO was prepared to accept, was a guarantee against the\nexpropriation of property.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus, as in Zimbabwe, the absence of working-class control\nover the guerilla leadership, the inability of the working class to maintain\nits own leadership of the struggle, and the weakness of the forces of Marxism\nhave led to the essential basis of a\nrevolutionary transformation in Namibia being abandoned by the SWAPO\nleadership.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nonetheless, as events in Mozambique and Angola showed, the\nquestion of programme is not in itself decisive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the looming problems for capitalism in Namibia is its\nown failure in the past to develop the country, and the extreme weakness of its\nsocial base among the indigenous people. Thus, if SWAPO had unrestrained power\nin a Namibian government, the leadership could be impelled by the pressure of\nthe masses towards the takeover of the economy and the carrying through of the\nrevolution on the lines of Angola and Mozambique.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Realising this, the South African and other imperialist\ngovernments seek to impose, in any settlement, a series of conditions and\nrestraints designed to ham-string SWAPO in its exercise of power and freedom of\nmanoeuvre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The crux of the matter is disclosed in a secret memorandum\nof talks between the South African government and the US State Department’s\nCrocker in April 1981 (which was leaked some months later).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

General Malan “flatly declared…that ‘South Africa\ndoes not rule out an internationally accepted settlement but could not live\nwith a SWAPO victory that left SWAPO unchecked.’ “<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The SA Foreign Minister, Pik Botha, said that in that event\n“we will have to invade Namibia and other countries as well. It would be\nbetter to have a low-level conflict there indefinitely than to escalate it to a\ngeneral conflagration.” (Star 17\/10\/81).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus, any settlement acceptable to South Africa would be\ndesigned to check, not just SWAPO, but\nthe democratic exercise of power and self-determination by the Namibian people.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

While willing to maintain capitalism in Namibia, the SWAPO\nleadership cannot accept a settlement which makes it the mere puppet either of\na white minority in Namibia or of South African imperialism. Therefore, while\nthe general conditions for a ‘settlement’ of the war exist, there is still a\nwide gulf to be bridged before an agreement could be reached or implemented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hence the protracted negotiations, interruptions, the\ncontinuation of the war, the renewed negotiations, etc. At present the sticking\npoint between the parties is a complicated voting system designed to prevent\nSWAPO from gaining an outright majority in the constituent assembly, and so\noblige it to enter into a coalition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Overwhelming<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The collapse of the DTA has plainly exposed that, in any\ngenuinely democratic election, SWAPO would gain an overwhelming majority. To\nprevent the rout of all the other parties (of which there are apparently\nbetween 37 and 42) and to maintain the division of the country into 11 ‘ethnic’\ngroups (long a basis of manipulation by the oppressor) is one of the main\nobjects of imperialism’s settlement proposals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the ruling class knows, at the core of the question of power, is the question of the state.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus in Zimbabwe, a key component of the settlement with\nimperialism was the maintenance of the old state machinery largely intact,\ncombined with the confinement of the guerillas in “assembly points”.\nThis allowed the new government to be constituted on the basis of the old\nstate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Namibia, the approach of the imperialists is similar\u2014but\nthe conditions are different. The existing state machinery rests on the armed power of South African forces.<\/strong> Were they to be\nwithdrawn and the vaccuum filled by SWAPO guerilla forces, there could be a\nrapid disintegration of any coalition government and a development towards a\n(deformed) workers’ state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus South Africa is hastily trying to \u2018Namibianise\u2019 the\nexisting armed forces and the administration of the state. But, having left it\nso late, it could provide at best a precarious basis for capitalist rule.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the settlement talks so far, it is still far from clear\nto what extent the guerilla forces would be integrated into the\npost-independence state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An important part of the settlement proposals is the\nexclusion of all SWAPO guerillas from the country during the transition, and,\nas South African forces are withdrawn, the use of UN troops to ‘keep the peace’\nand curb the class struggle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A major headache for South Africa, however, is the prospect\nof a massive flight of the white population in the event of a settlement, which\nwould remove the linch-pin of capitalism in Namibia. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the process of negotiations is complicated. Although\nthere are strong pressures towards a settlement, this can easily falter.\nMeanwhile, South Africa continues its aggressive invasions of southern Angola,\ndesigned to reinforce Savimbi, and maintain pressure on the Angolan government\nand the SWAPO leadership to submit to South African demands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A SWAPO government arising on the basis of such a settlement\nand adhering to its terms, while it would bring the war to an end and allow the\nformal independence of Namibia, would be unable to solve any of the material\nproblems of the Namibian masses. It would inherit a bankrupt capitalist economy\nwithout the possibility of providing jobs or a decent living for the working\npeople. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Development will be possible only with massive injections of\naid, and then only within severe limits. There is already a crisis in\nagriculture as a result of years of drought. Over the past year the number of\ncattle in Namibia dropped from 2,5 million to 1,7 million while the number of\nsheep declined from 6 million to 435 million. Between 1976 and 1980, Namibia’s\nfarm output slumped by 32% in real terms, and probably dropped further in 1981.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The international recession in diamonds has begun to have a\ngrave effect on exports. Added to that is the plunge in the overseas market for\nkarakul skins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The under-development of industry is shown by the fact that\nnearly half of government revenue comes from taxes on mining. In 1981-82, out\nof budgeted expenditure of R888 million, the revenue account could only find\nR514 million. While South Africa presently pays Namibia’s deficits, an\nindependent Namibia would have to finance them from aid or go to the international\nbankers for loans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the country will be trapped in continuing dependence on\nthe capitalist West, while also dominated economically and threatened\nmilitarily by South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All these circumstances combine to prove how closely the\nfuture of the Namibian people is bound together with the progress of the\nrevolution in South Africa itself. The struggle of the Namibian working class,\nat the head of the mass movement, will be the key factor in the coming period. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whether or not the SWAPO leadership enters into a compromise\nwith imperialism, the outcome of the struggle will depend above all on the\nworking class. Organising and mobilising their forces, in SWAPO and in the\ntrade union struggle, and fighting for the demands of all the oppressed, the\nworkers can drive the revolution forward. That is the only way to defend every\ngain against counter-revolution, and weaken the power of imperialism over the\npeople’s lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In all the capitalist countries of Southern Africa, the\nstruggles of the oppressed are rising, and the conflict in society is\nincreasingly being drawn on class lines. In every country of the region the\nbedrock of our understanding is the same\u2014that the destinies of all the peoples\nof Southern Africa are inextricably bound together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In all the developing local and national struggles it will increasingly be seen that the pivotal point of all the problems of the people is the capitalist system and the power of the bourgeoisie in South Africa itself. To over-throw that monster, the working class of all Southern Africa must unite!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Continue to Chapter Eight<\/a><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Southern Africa Over the past decade the mighty struggles in Southern Africa\u2014in Mozambique, Angola, Zimbabwe, Namibia and South Africa itself\u2014have been a flame of inspiration […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":709,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-748","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"acf":[],"_hostinger_reach_plugin_has_subscription_block":false,"_hostinger_reach_plugin_is_elementor":false,"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=748"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":754,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/748\/revisions\/754"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/709"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}