1 July 2003
As announced earlier, the SACP will convene the first mass picket against US imperialism (in the light of George Bush's visit to South Africa) as follows:
The next picket will be held in Pretoria on 9 July.
In the weeks before the US-led invasion of Iraq, the SACP joined the ANC, COSATU, civic, faith-based, and other progressive formations in a broad coalition under the banner: STOP THE WAR. We were aligning ourselves with millions of people worldwide.
Our demands were three-fold:
In our approach to the impending visit to our country of US President George Bush, we remain guided by the same general principles.
Given our commitment to multi-lateralism and the pursuit of global dialogue, it would be mistaken to call for the cancellation of President Bush’s visit. President Bush should come to South Africa. He should learn how the people and government of our country feel. He should experience at first hand the terrible social deficit suffered by the countries of the South. He should ponder how the billions of dollars consumed by the US on weapons of destruction in Iraq could have been used to the benefit of humankind. Perhaps, the US president is incapable of making such a small leap of empathy? Then, at least, let us use this visit to impact as best as possible on the consciences of the American electorate.
It would, we believe, be a mistake to press for a cancellation of the visit. But it would be equally mistaken to present the invasion of Iraq as a “thing of the past”, as “something we’ve put behind us”, as we now return to bi-national US/SA business as usual.
The SACP has never believed in the benign nature of US-dominated globalisation. During the Clinton administration, the US refused to sign the ban on land mines, it bombed Yugoslavia and engineered regime change there, and it launched, but still on a limited scale, the “preventive” war doctrine with cruise missile strikes on Afghanistan and Sudan. No doubt the neo-conservative circle associated with the Bush administration marks a further, still more dangerous assertion of an unapologetic imperial ambition.
In his preface to the official National Security Strategy of the USA (September 2002), George Bush boasts: “Our world is divided in many ways: rich/poor; North/South; Western/non-Western. But more and more, the division that counts is the one separating America from everyone else.”
The SACP is sure that, during the Bush visit, President Mbeki will use the occasion to candidly convey to his US counterparts the overwhelming condemnation of the Iraq invasion by the great majority of South Africans. We are also sure that our president will use the opportunity to highlight the crisis of under-development in our country and continent; and the importance of reinforcing international multi-lateral forums, especially the UN system.
In raising these concerns, President Mbeki will be speaking for the majority of the world’s inhabitants, including many US citizens. Our demonstrations during Bush’s visit should precisely seek to further strengthen the hand of our President and government in pursuing its goals for a more just, humane and democratic global order.
Mazibuko K. Jara (surname Jara)
Department of Media, Information & Publicity
South African Communist Party
3rd Floor, COSATU House, 1-5 Leyds Street
Braamfontein, 2017, Republic of South Africa
Tel: 27 11 339-3621/2, Fax: 27 11 339-4244,Cell: 083 651 0271
Email - mazibuko@sacp.org.za