NUMSA wishes Comrade Nelson Mandela a Happy 94th Birthday
The NATIONAL UNION OF METALWORKERS OF SOUTH AFRICA (NUMSA), the solid voice and genuine representative of metalworkers, joins millions of South Africans, and billions around the world to wish our revolutionary icon, servant of our people, former political prisoner, Isithwalandwe, Noble Peace Prize Liteunant and first democratically elected President of our country Comrade Nelson Mandela a blissful 94th birthday today, July, 18, 2012.
This glittery day gives all South Africans, particularly the historically oppressed majority a rare moment to celebrate Comrade Mandela and his generation of principled revolutionaries ever produced by the Congress Movement, such as Oliver Tambo, Walter Sisulu, Joe Slovo, Yusuf Dadoo, Govan Mbeki, Dorothy Nyembe, Albertina Sisulu, Ray Alexandra, Ruth First, which selflessly struggled for a non-racial, non-sexist, democratic and free South Africa.
We will forever remain indebted to Comrade Mandela and his generation for the freedom and democracy we now enjoy. This freedom and democracy you fought for and dedicated your entire life Comrade Mandela is full of riddles. We are faced with the triple crisis of unemployment, poverty and deepening inequalities, mainly affecting poor working class youth and women.
Comrade Mandela's joyful day coincides with the Centenary celebrations of his political organisation, the African National Congress (ANC), which he served selflessly without any material rewards or expectations. He dedicated his entire life to serve the ANC an organisation that personified his political beliefs and values, an organisation that continues to be an omen for a just and better South Africa and world. By doing this he abandoned the cushy or middle-class life he would have enjoyed as a professional Lawyer.
It is within this context that as NUMSA, in order for the ANC-led government to champion a revolutionary programme, the ANC's 1969 Morogoro Conference resolve should serve as a line of march, which said;
"in our country - more than any other part of the oppressed world - it is inconceivable for liberation to have a meaning without a return of the wealth of land to the people as a whole. It is therefore a fundamental feature of our strategy that victory must embrace more formal political democracy. To allow the existing economic forces to retain their interests intact is to feed the root of racial supremacy and does not represent even the shadow of liberation itself".
The political correctness of this Morogoro resolve is further elaborated in the SACP's political programme adopted in 1962, Road to South African Freedom, which said;
"The main aims and lines of the South African democratic revolution have been defined in the Freedom Charter, which has been endorsed by the African National Congress and the other partners in the national liberation alliance. The Freedom Charter is not the programme for socialism. It is a common programme for a free, democratic South Africa, agreed by socialists and non-socialists. At the same time, in order to guarantee the abolition of racial oppression and White minority domination, the Freedom Charter necessarily and realistically calls for profound economic changes; drastic agrarian reform to restore the land to the people; widespread nationalisation of key industries to break the grip of White monopoly capital on the main centres of the country's economy; radical improvements in the conditions and standards of living for the working people....(The Communist Party pledges its unqualified support for the Freedom Charter)".
The best birthday gift the ANC and the entire Liberation movement can give to Comrade Mandela is to nationalise the key strategic and monopoly industries in order to address the pressing needs and basic challenges faced by our people.
Comrade Mandela continues to be a symbol of our people's aspirations as encoded in the Freedom Charter. The neoliberal economic reforms that have been fostered and entrenched on the state over the past 18 years of our nascent democratic dispensation have failed to deliver. What we see is the continuation of accumulation by White monopoly capital, whilst our people are languishing in squalor as evidenced by service delivery protests, factory riots for equal redistribution of wealth at the point of production, students boycotts for free public education and renewed calls by unemployed working class youth for economic freedom in their lifetime.
Comrade Mandela continues to occupy a special place amongst the poor and exploited workers of our country. His long imprisonment at Robben Island by those who had no political authority to rule, remains an inspiration to the many workers who are being chained slaves of profit-diggers, Labour Brokers. His genuine sacrifice for the struggle of our people is being marvelled by many workers at factories on their ongoing struggle for fair and equitable redistribution of wealth at the point of production. His loyalty to the organisation continues to be envied by the new generation of Shop stewards who are dedicated to the cause and service to workers. His love for humanity is what carries our members to march forward to attain the goals of the Freedom Charter.
Comrade Mandela the power of money, back-stabbing, factionalism, power-mongering, corruption, patronage and tenderpreneurship is threatening to rip your organisation, the ANC apart. The words you uttered during the 50th National Conference in Mafikeng are under threat; "here are the reins of the movement - protect and guide its precious legacy; defend its unity and integrity as committed disciples of change; pursue its popular objectives like true revolutionaries who seek only to serve the nation".
As Metalworkers, we commit ourselves to safeguard and defend the ANC. We will never allow your organisation to be auctioned to the highest bidders. The ANC must remain a revolutionary weapon of the working class to pursue an uninterrupted and Socialist orientated National Democratic Revolution (NDR) to achieve the objectives of the Freedom Charter.
Once more Happy Birthday Madiba!
Statement issued by Castro Ngobese, NUMSA National Spokesperson, July 18 2012
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