Esteemed comrade Blade Nzimande:
The Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas (PKP-1930, the Philippine Communist Party) congratulates the South African Communist Party (SACP) on the 90th Anniversary of its founding, which will be celebrated this July 30, 2011. We pause on this happy occasion to reflect upon the historic ties between our 2 Parties.
Despite the distance between our 2 countries, we shared the same historical problems of domination by imperialism, which orchestrated surrogate regimes everywhere in a united drive at enslaving and exploiting peoples. Thus despite the distance, the former apartheid regime in your country participated in the Manila summit meeting in 1969 which planned the joint escalation of the US war of aggression against Viet Nam.
The need to forge international unity against imperialism spurred our Party to undertake solidarity actions in our country against the abominable system of apartheid, including campaigns for petitions to stay the hands of Pretoria`s hangmen and for the release of political prisoners. Relations between our 2 Parties were nurtured by our London-based comrades, William J. Pomeroy and Celia Mariano-Pomeroy, during the 1960s and up to the 1980s, when offices of the African National Congress (ANC) and the SACP were maintained in London. Earlier, a book by Comrade William Pomeroy on the anti-Japanese guerrilla (HUKBALAHAP) struggle in our country had been used as a study subject by the ANC`s military arm, the Umkhonto We Sizwe (Spear of the Nation), and a captured copy was even used among the evidence at the Rivonia trial.
During the grim years of your anti-apartheid struggle, our Party was regularly informed of developments in the anti-apartheid struggle in Southern Africa through countless articles and several books written by Comrades Pomeroy. Relations between our 2 Parties were further enhanced by the visit of your representative during the holding in Manila of the United Nations` Asian Regional Conference for Action Against Apartheid in May 1982, as well as through contacts with your representatives in Afro-Asian and other progressive international organizations.
With feelings of affinity with your valiant struggle, and with the other valiant struggles in the nearby Front-Line States, our Party rejoiced at Southern Africa`s victory in overthrowing the apartheid regimes. We hailed your campaign to bring to reality the principles of the 1955 People`s Charter. In paying tribute to all the African martyrs of the anti-apartheid struggle, we also paid tribute to the thousands of Cuban internationalists who laid down their lives in defence of the Front-Line States and who contributed in no small measure to the final downfall of the abominable system of apartheid.
Today, the SACP`s loyalty to Marxism-Leninism, trusted role in the ANC-led governance alliance, mobilizing initiative in consolidating and deepening your national democratic revolution, and active contribution to the annual International Meeting of Communist and Workers` Parties, lend inspiration and strength to the struggles of fraternal parties.
It is therefore with great pleasure that we congratulate the SACP, and send you our best wishes for more advances in your continuing struggles for national liberation and socialism. AMANDLA !
With communist greetings,
ANTONIO E. PARIS
General Secretary