The SACP brings warm and revolutionary greetings to the 97th anniversary celebrations of our ally, the African National Congress. This celebration takes place at a time when our country is facing a number of challenges, challenges that we believe can and must be successfully addressed by the ANC-led alliance.
As we start 2009, the most immediate challenge that our movement faces is the mobilization of the overwhelming majority of the workers, the poor, and all democratic minded South Africans for an overwhelming ANC electoral victory in this year's elections. The SACP calls upon the working class and the poor of our country, professionals, youth, progressive middle classes, the great majority of South Africans too vote for the ANC, and to vote for the ANC in bigger numbers than ever before.
Let our votes spell out very clearly that an overwhelming majority of South Africans clearly understands that the democratic breakthrough of 15 years ago can be squandered. Our democracy needs now to be dramatically advanced, deepened and defended. This is not a time for complacency, nor divisiveness, nor confusion nor uncertainty. The line of march is clear - Vote ANC!
Why? The SACP has three main reasons:
Firstly, the national liberation struggle in South Africa remains incomplete. Of course, our detractors, old and new, will deny this. But ours was never a struggle solely to attain the vote, important as this is. From the time of the Freedom Charter and before, we have said that a democratic South Africa can only be one in which the socio-economic conditions of the workers and the poor of our country are radically addressed. Gender, class and national relations must be thoroughly transformed. It is only the great majority of our people, inspired and led by the ANC, together with its allies, who are capable of deepening the national liberation struggle to attain its key objectives. It is only the ANC that is best placed to build upon the many achievements towards the attainment of these goals.
Only those who have started the journey on a correct footing are capable of carrying it forward! Those who have been deliberately and conveniently confused by the journey, because they wanted a journey to narrow elite enrichment and not people's power and empowerment, cannot take us forward. They must be swept by the wayside, convincingly and decisively!
Secondly, we wholeheartedly agree with the five priorities contained in the ANC Manifesto:
a) Creation of decent work and sustainable livelihoods, including an industrial policy and the building of a large, progressive co-operative movement, especially in the financial sector
b) The prioritization of education, including free education for the poor up till the first qualification at tertiary level
c) The building of a health care system for all, including the establishment of a National Health Insurance Scheme. We warn the bourgeoisie - dare to oppose this programme and you will face the full might of the organized working class in our country
d) Rural development, including accelerated land and agrarian transformation for food production. Our government and municipalities must prirotise land use not for building golf courses and game reserves, but for food production in order to fight high food prices and for our people to be able to feed themselves
e) Transforming the criminal justice system and building of street committees to take the fight against crime to higher levels. As the SACP we have already, through our current Red October Campaign, thrown our full weight into the building of these street, village and block committees.
Thirdly, only the ANC-led alliance has the revolutionary traditions, the capacity, the will and the determination to change the conditions of our people for the better. Only a united Tripartite Alliance is capable of deepening and consolidating our democracy.
Let us mobilize for the forthcoming elections, but let us not demobilize after the election campaign. We need to consolidate our electoral mobilization towards ensuring:
a) That we strengthen the progressive trade union movement, with COSATU as the centre, in order to realize decent work;
b) That we build a strong, progressive co-operative movement as part of fostering sustainable livelihoods for all
c) That we build people's education committees at the local level to ensure that our educational institutions are safe and functional
d) That we build people's health committees at the local level to ensure access to health for all, including defeating the scourge of HIV/AIDS
e) That we build people's land committees, especially in the rural areas, to ensure release and utilization of land for food production
f) That we intensify the building of street committees in order to strengthen community policing forums and defeat the scourge of crime
Our guide principle should always be that government alone, without a mobilized people in all key sites of power, will never be able to realize the commitments made in our Manifesto. We expect the ANC, together with its allies, to be at the head of this ongoing popular mobilization.
The global capitalist crisis and international solidarity
The ANC gathers, on this 97th anniversary, at a time when the capitalist world is facing its gravest crisis since the early 1930s. This crisis is not an accident, it is a reflection of the inherent nature of the capitalist system. It is dynamic and robust, but it is also profoundly irrational, wasteful and barbaric. As we speak tens of millions of workers globally are being retrenched and trillions of dollars of value destroyed.
One of the major reasons the SACP supports the ANC Manifesto is that amongst other things it commits the ANC government to develop an industrial strategy that focuses on energy and food sovereignty and security, on jobs and not profits as the key priority. It will go a long way towards shielding us from some of the worst of these periodic capitalist crises.
The SACP also calls upon South Africa's working class to intensify mobilization on all fronts in order to ensure that we minimize the effects of this crisis on our people, and prevent the bosses from using this current crisis as an excuse for another round of massive retrenchments.
The SACP also wishes to take this occasion to congratulate the Cuban people on the 50th anniversary of the triumph of the Cuban revolution. Despite close to 5 decades of a criminal and illegal blockade by the United States, the Cuban revolution continues to consolidate itself and provides hope not just for the Cuban people, but for the millions of oppressed and marginalized people in the world, that indeed a different more caring society is possible.
The achievements of the Cuban revolution are an example to be emulated:
- Free health and education
- Two-thirds of all 18 to 25 year olds in Cuba are at university
- Mass mobilization of the Cuban people as the ultimate defence of the revolution
The South African Communist Party also joins millions across the globe, including tens of thousands of Israeli peace activists, in expressing outrage at the genocidal aggression of the Israeli security apparatus against the people of Gaza. This aggression is both futile and absolutely disproportionate to the alleged objective of halting rocket fire from Gaza, an enclave that has been suffering a bitter and illegal siege for months.
The real and entirely cynical objectives of the current military offensive include the boosting of the popularity of Israeli politicians ahead of February elections, and punishing Palestinians for supporting a political party of their choice in democratic elections.
The SACP welcomes the UN Security Council resolution, albeit belated and inadequate, for the immediate cessation of all hostilities in the Gaza Strip, as a step in the right direction. The SACP further condemns the criminal complicity of the US administration, the major backer and arms supplier to the Zionist state, for its abstention from the Security Council resolution. The hypocrisy of all major western governments must also be strongly condemned by all peace loving people of the world.
The SACP also wishes to use this occasion to call upon SADC to intensify efforts towards the urgent resolution of the Zimbabwean political stalemate as well as put in place urgent mechanisms to facilitate the democratization of Swaziland.
In the light of the above challenges and many others the SACP is confident that the ANC will continue to deepen its international solidarity work as part of building a better African continent, a better South and indeed a better world!
Only the ANC-led Alliance can
Yes we agree with the ANC Manifesto that 'WORKING TOGETHER WE CAN DO MORE' and only the ANC-led alliance can lead this process.
As we say, Happy 97th, the SACP wishes to assure the ANC that we remain a dependable ally in this noble cause to free our people from the scourge of poverty, unemployment, disease and illiteracy!
Communist Cadres to the Front.... For an overwhelming ANC electoral victory!
Statement issued by the South African Communist Party January 10 2009
