The revolution is on trial (8): Build Working Class Power to Defend, Advance and Honour the Memory of the Great October Socialist Revolution in Russia of 1917

Speech by SACP General Secretary at the SACP Rally to mark the closing of the launch of the 2007 Red October Campaign

9 December 2007

1. Introduction

The aim of this rally is two-fold, to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the first workers victory over the bourgeoisie in Russia in 1917, with the victory of the Great October Socialist Revolution over the Tsarist regime and the capitalist classes of Russia at the time. This was the first workers’ state in the world, which defeated the alliance between Tsarism and the capitalist classes. Secondly, in the spirit of this great revolution, to celebrate the launch of our already highly successful 2007 Red October Campaign, which is our 8th annual Red October Campaign, - but not ending the campaign, but taking it to a higher stage.

Indeed our address today would be incomplete if it does not talk about the all-important 52nd Conference of the ANC. This is not merely a conference of the ANC, but a conference for our movement as a whole, including its alliance partners and other Congress-aligned formations, as well as our very revolution, its democracy and the future of our country!

2. The Great October Socialist Revolution

The 1917 socialist revolution in Russia should be celebrated even today because it substantially and fundamentally changed the course of history in the 20th Century, and even today as we have just entered the 21st century. Amongst other things this Russian revolution achieved and taught us the following:

• That it was possible to overthrow and abolish the rule of the rich over the poor, and instead create conditions for the workers and the poor to create a society in their own image
• It gave practical meaning to the struggles of the working class to create a better, more humane world
• It significantly contributed to the revolutionary and militant character of the struggles of colonised and semi-colonised peoples across the world, including the revolutionary struggles of the people of South Africa in their determination to overthrow colonial and apartheid domination, segregation, oppression, patriarchy and exploitation. The Soviet Union, a direct development from this revolution, supported many of the struggles of the oppressed and colonised peoples of the world
• It also influenced the very formation of our own party, the South African Communist Party, in 1921, which contributed greatly to the political organisation and mobilisation of the South African working classof the It motivated and gave meaning to the essence of a Revolutionary Vanguard Communist Party in leading and guiding the working class towards seizure of political and state power.
• We launched our annual Red October Campaign in 1999 in remembrance of this great and heroic day of the international working class, and that indeed socialism and communism is the only best alternative to capitalism; a society based on meeting the needs of the population as a whole, as opposed to a society based on meeting the selfish interests of a small layer of society, the capitalist class
• Our Red October Campaign as part of mobilization of the working class to liberate itself not only from the yoke of colonialism and apartheid, but that this struggle is an integral part of the struggle against the economic foundation of all national oppression, which is capitalist class exploitation
• Capitalism has dug its own grave by creating a mass of exploited (and often nationally oppressed) working people.
• As Comrade Chris Hani said, for as long as there is poverty for the majority, and riches for the small elite, there will always be a case for socialism

As the SACP we remain committed to pursuing the struggle for socialism as the only system best capable of realizing the basic needs of the overwhelming majority of our people.

In the current struggles to deepen the national democratic revolution we are still guided by our belief that “In our country - more than in any other part of the oppressed world - it is inconceivable for liberation to have meaning without a return of the wealth of the land to the people as a whole. It is therefore a fundamental feature of our strategy that victory must embrace more than 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”.

3. Our 2007 Red October Campaign

The SACP is engaged in the Red-October Campaign, which is inseparable from the broader celebration of the Great October Socialist Revolution of 1917 in Russia. We have decided to dedicate our 2007 Campaign to Public Health in recognition of the reality that there are lots of avoidable deaths that happen in our communities, and lots of people who suffer from curable diseases, yet cannot be cured as our Public Healthcare system is incapable of doing such. As the SACP, we have recognised that at the centre of every revolution is the health and sustainability of human beings.

The state our public health requires urgent attention; poor infrastructure and poor conditions under which our workers perform their duties; and the erosion of service delivery and capacities of our health institutions through, amongst other things, outsourcing.

We have already visited scores of hospitals and clinics throughout the country, and have held meetings with communities and workers to discuss the state our public health system and to listen to their views and solutions to the many challenges facing public health.

A key challenge in taking this campaign forward includes that of extending the campaign to the private health care sector, which gobbles billions more rands than the public health system, and yet it is serving a far smaller section of South African society. We will also demand that every critically ill person must be stabilised at the nearest health facility, irrespective of whether this is a public or private institution, and irrespective of whether such person has medical aid or not.

It has also become very clear to us that one of the critical challenge in our public health system is that of lack of community participation in the transformation of this sector, with very few community health forums in existence, and an absence of a dynamic link between hospital boards and communities.

For the SACP it is also important to link our public health campaign to the broader struggle of ensuring that every worker works in a safe workplace and live in a healthy environment. The deaths of mineworkers in mines are a cause for concern, and the regulation and monitoring of workplaces should be monitored. We fully agree with the National Union of Mineworkers that the lives and health of Mineworkers should be protected. It is for this reason for instance that the SACP came out in full support of the NUM strike on health and safety last week.

4. The Limpopo Conference: Build a dynamic and campaigning ANC!

In few days’ time, the 52nd National Conference of the ANC will be convening in Limpopo. As the SACP we have taken un unusual step of writing an open letter to all delegates of the ANC to Conference, in which, amongst other things we say that much as we accept and respect that this is an ANC Conference, but we have a deep interest in the kinds of policies to be adopted that and the kind of collective leadership that will be elected.

As the SACP, we are unapologetically calling for the change of heart or change of leadership, mainly influenced by the reality that “Over the past decade the mass participatory traditions of the ANC have been run-down, consultation with and involvement of communities have been sidelined, and an unceasing offensive against alliance partners unleashed.” This is not the kind of ANC we wish to have after the December Conference of the ANC, and we will be part of the ANC members who will be saying “Enough is Enough”.

Overall, our primary interests lie in the ideological struggle to ensure that the African National Congress remains a fighting liberation movement, committed to radically change the colonial type of economy that we have. We would like to see a much more accelerated implementation of the vision contained in the Freedom Charter.

To remedy the observation we made two years ago, the ANC should retain its responsibility in guiding the transformation of all sectors of society and the State, and not vice versa. The practices of government making key decisions without effectively involvement and guidance by ANC structures and its allies must come to end. No leader of the ANC at any level should be given a blank cheque to be creative over economic policies without effective consultation with all structures of the alliance.

We must also ensure that we defeat the scourge of patronage that is threatening to replace the moral values and revolutionary traditions of our movement.

Most importantly for us we need a dynamic and campaigning ANC that takes up the daily issues facing our people, and not only campaign during election periods.

The SACP also wishes to express its serious concerns and condemnations of some of the practices we are seeing in the run to the Limpopo Conference. These include literal ‘buying’ of delegates to vote in particular ways; the use of state organs and offices to sway delegates’ votes; and promise of government patronage to these delegates.

One key challenge to all the ANC delegates is that they must resist being turned into modern day ‘Judah Iskariots’! They must make it very clear that neither the ANC nor its allied formations are for sale.

We have also seen the most disgusting and opportunistic use of the noble struggle for women’s emancipation and gender equality being vulgarised and reduced into a campaigning tool. Most of the noises being made about this matter of late has got nothing to do with genuine concern to advance the women’s struggle, but a convenient tool for certain leaders to be elected at Conference.

The SACP has also said that the important matter of 50/50 gender parity within our structures must not be used as a tool to advance elite women. The struggle for women’s liberation shall remain empty for as long as it is about securing positions and power for women elites at the exclusion of working class and poor women. In talking about these matters of late we hear very little about the conditions and struggles of casualised and retrenched women, of women workers, of rural women eking a living on white owned farms and former Bantustans.

We are also calling for unity within the ranks of our movement. Let us not behave as if the world is coming to an end come 20 December 2007. There must also be no revenge irrespective of the outcome of Limpopo. Instead the best form of revenge after Limpopo must be the intensification of the struggle to eradicate poverty, create jobs and defeat the scourge of HIV/AIDS. It must be a revenge to transform our economy for the benefit of the overwhelming majority of our people.

Amandla
Viva SACP Viva
Viva COSATU Viva
Viva ANC Viva
Viva YCL Viva
Viva ANC YL Viva!

Contact

Malesela Maleka
SACP Spokesperson - 082 226 1802