babble home
rabble.ca - news for the rest of us
today's active topics


Post New Topic  Post A Reply
FAQ | Forum Home
  next oldest topic   next newest topic
» babble   » current events   » international news and politics   » The Struggle Against Apartheid has Begun Again in South Africa - Pilger

Email this thread to someone!    
Author Topic: The Struggle Against Apartheid has Begun Again in South Africa - Pilger
martin dufresne
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 11463

posted 12 April 2008 08:28 AM      Profile for martin dufresne   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
John Pilger commentaries on ZNet about South Africa, Britain, Mugabe and the ANC's 'Unbreakable Promise':

"(...)there was the struggle, without which nothing changes". This sense of struggle is back in South Africa. (...)
Britain's Department for International Development has played a notorious role. Although required by law not to spend money other than on poverty reduction, DfID is, in reality, a privatising agency that greases the way for multinationals to take over public services. In 2004, the department paid the Adam Smith Institute, an extreme right-wing think tank, £6.3m for plans to "reform" the "public sector" in South Africa, promoting "business-to-business" links between British and South African companies whose singular interest is profit.
Once the wretched Robert Mugabe is gone, Zimbabwe will get the same treatment. Offering a billion pounds' worth of "aid", the British government will lead the return of capital, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to restore what was, long before Mugabe's wrecking, one of the most exploited and unequal societies in Africa. The new heist was outlined on 5 April at the amusingly titled Progressive Governance Conference in Britain, one of Tony Blair's legacies, where "left-of-centre" leaders pretend to be crisis managers instead of, as is often the case, the cause of the crisis. (In 1999, Blair flew twice to South Africa to promote the now scandalous arms deal.)

The South African president, Thabo Mbeki, is said to have been recruited to get rid of the obstacle that is Mugabe, but he is cautious, no doubt recalling that Mugabe, on his last visit to South Africa, received an embarrassing ovation from the black crowd. This was not so much an endorsement of his despotism as a reminder that most South Africans had not forgotten one of the ANC's "unbreakable promises" - that almost a third of arable land would be redistributed by 2000. Today the figure is less than 4 per cent.
(...)"

[ 12 April 2008: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]


From: "Words Matter" (Mackinnon) | Registered: Dec 2005  |  IP: Logged
N.Beltov
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 4140

posted 12 April 2008 09:04 AM      Profile for N.Beltov   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
FYI: It looks like an outstanding article but I got this message from your link ...

"We are sorry but you must be a Sustainer to access ZNet Commentaries ... "


From: Vancouver Island | Registered: May 2003  |  IP: Logged
martin dufresne
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 11463

posted 12 April 2008 09:11 AM      Profile for martin dufresne   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Strange. Of course, it's a good idea to become one.
Otherwise, go to http://www.zcommunications.org/, click on ZNet, then, in the "Newest Content" column, scroll down to "South Africa: Pilger" and click on that.
Presto. There is also a column by Barbara Ehrenreich on how US truckers are hitting the brakes to protest the economic meltdown. Here are the opening lines.
quote:
Until the beginning of this month, Americans seemed to have nothing to say about their ongoing economic ruin except, "Hit me! Please, hit me again!" You can take my house, but let me mow the lawn for you one more time before you repossess. Take my job and I'll just slink off somewhere out of sight. Oh, and take my health insurance too; I can always fall back on Advil.

Then, on April 1, in a wave of defiance, truck drivers began taking the strongest form of action they can take: inaction. Faced with $4-per-gallon diesel fuel, they slowed down, shut down and started honking. On the New Jersey Turnpike, a convoy of trucks stretching "as far as the eye can see," according to a turnpike spokesman, drove at a glacial 20 miles per hour.(...)


Definitely worth becoming a sustaining member.

From: "Words Matter" (Mackinnon) | Registered: Dec 2005  |  IP: Logged
unionist
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 11323

posted 12 April 2008 09:30 AM      Profile for unionist     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Excellent article. And it shows IMO where South Africa will be 20 years from now if it refuses to learn from Zimbabwe's catastrophic mistake of postponing land reform and refusing to build at least the elements of a self-reliant economy.
From: Vote QS! | Registered: Dec 2005  |  IP: Logged
N.Beltov
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 4140

posted 12 April 2008 10:07 AM      Profile for N.Beltov   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
... the Freedom Charter remains something to be proud of. Let me remind you how it begins: "We, the people of South Africa, declare that our country belongs to everyone...". And that, as Nelson Mandela once said, was the "unbreakable promise". Isn't it time the promise was kept?

The language of the Freedom Charter, for those of us who memorized it, is still vastly superior to anything the Merricans mustered in their own high-sounding documents that accompanied the slavery of their successful war of independence.

South Africa has a powerful working class and there is no reason why that class cannot achieve further victories on the road to fulfilling that sacred promise made all those years ago in in Kliptown, near Johannesburg, on June 26, 1955.

Let Freedom Reign

from 1955 ...

quote:
"The main task of the Congress will be to draw up a 'Freedom Charter' for all people and groups in South Africa. From such a Congress ought to come a Declaration which will inspire all the peoples of South Africa with fresh hope for the future, which will turn the minds of the people away from the sterile and negative struggles of the past and the present to a positive programme of freedom in our lifetime. Such a Charter properly conceived as a mirror of the future South African society can galvanise the people of South Africa into action and make them go over into the offensive against the reactionary forces at work in this country, instead of being perpetually on the defensive, fighting rearguard actions all the time."

[ 12 April 2008: Message edited by: N.Beltov ]


From: Vancouver Island | Registered: May 2003  |  IP: Logged
unionist
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 11323

posted 12 April 2008 11:01 AM      Profile for unionist     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by N.Beltov:
South Africa has a powerful working class and there is no reason why that class cannot achieve further victories...

I share your optimism, but I see no signs of any victories on the horizon - no more than I do in other countries that have a much more "powerful working class" (U.S., Russia, etc.).

In particular, besides the world financial system which South Africa has embraced unconditionally and which will ultimately destroy it, it has the newly-fashioned economic apartheid to contend with:

Class struggle: South Africa's new, and few, black rich

Formidable foes, no?


From: Vote QS! | Registered: Dec 2005  |  IP: Logged
N.Beltov
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 4140

posted 12 April 2008 11:16 AM      Profile for N.Beltov   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
(from unionist's article) ... Many blacks say they live in a "cappuccino" society, with a lot of black coffee at the bottom, a layer of white foam on top of that, and a sprinkling of cocoa on the very top, for show.

Interesting metaphor.

You're not disputing that apartheid had to be destroyed first, are you? M.Spector seemed to be defending something like that in another thread.

Class struggle is the name of the game now. That's progress at some level. It's just that the South African working class needs some victories, none of which are guaranteed.

It's the same for us.


From: Vancouver Island | Registered: May 2003  |  IP: Logged
unionist
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 11323

posted 12 April 2008 11:33 AM      Profile for unionist     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by N.Beltov:

You're not disputing that apartheid had to be destroyed first, are you?

Not in the slightest. Same for Zimbabwe. It's a huge victory and a necessary condition for any further advance.

But the ANC (like ZANU-PF) doesn't seem to be the vehicle for that advance any more - hope I'm wrong, but I would need concrete indications to that effect. That's why I asked in another thread about Zuma.


From: Vote QS! | Registered: Dec 2005  |  IP: Logged
Fidel
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 5594

posted 12 April 2008 01:13 PM      Profile for Fidel     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
What I don't understand is why Washington and London are disappointed by Zanu-PF's 51 percent controlling interest rule as of last year. Multinationals don't seem to mind or protest a great deal over similar Chinese laws for control of vital industries like steel production, banking, and agriculture.

I can't imagine our stoogecrats in Ottawa demanding 51 percent, or even a large minority interest in American corporations scooping up control of oil and gas and crown corporations in Canada by the thousands since 1985.


From: Viva La Revolución | Registered: Apr 2004  |  IP: Logged

All times are Pacific Time  

Post New Topic  Post A Reply Close Topic    Move Topic    Delete Topic next oldest topic   next newest topic
Hop To:

Contact Us | rabble.ca | Policy Statement

Copyright 2001-2008 rabble.ca