December 1996/January 1997

Message
from the Central Committee

Advance the socialist perspective

The final Central Committee meeting for 1996, held on November 29th
and 30th, reviewed the year's activities and discussed strategic perspectives
emerging from the alliance. The key decision was that a working class,
socialist perspective must be consolidated in 1997. This is necessary,
not just for the future of socialism, but for the unfolding national democratic
transformation itself.

On the first morning of the CC, guest speaker, Deputy President Comrade
Thabo Mbeki, presented the ANC discussion document, "The State and
Social Transformation". The CC then engaged critically with the presentation
and document.

CC comrades agreed with the central point made by the ANC discussion
document. The apartheid regime, in its last years, cynically ran up a huge
government deficit. This was used to maintain a white minority "welfare"
state, and to buy some black allies through the dispensing of jobs and
privileges in the bureaucracy. Our new democratic state must take seriously
the challenge of restructuring this legacy, and of bringing down the huge
government deficit.

However, CC members were very critical of other aspects of the ANC document.
Points of criticism centred around its tendency to present the new democratic
state as a technical, and class neutral, entity. The ANC document speaks
of the need to deal "equally" and "equitably" with
"both labour and capital". It even speaks of a "golden triangle"
between the state, labour and capital. This gives the impression that the
ANC-led government sees the working class and the bosses as equal partners.
As the CC saw it whereas our 9th Party Congress in 1995 had spoken of the
need to "advance, deepen and defend the democratic breakthrough",
the ANC document tends to put most emphasis on defending what has already
been achieved. The CC argued that what was missing in the ANC document
was:

• a sense of a democratic state that, while engaging with all forces
  in our society, was fundamentally aligned with the interests, aspirations
  and mass formations of the workers and poor;
• any reference to the need to re-build a mass-based, internally democratic
  ANC and a broader alliance, and mass democratic movement. The impression
  given is of a very state-centred process of change;
• a profound defensivism, and a lack of will to engage with the present
  balance of forces to transform this balance.

In replying to these concerns, the Deputy President agreed that many
formulations in the ANC document were not precise enough. He accepted many
of the criticisms made, and called for ongoing debate within the ANC and
ANC-led alliance on these key issues. The CC went on to draw conclusions
from this debate, and from further discussion of the current strategic

situation. As the Party, we need to engage much more actively with our
socialist outlook. We need to consolidate and popularise the "Build
Socialism Now" perspectives developed at our 9th Congress. Unless
we inject a socialist orientation in to the broader debate, defensivism,
narrow pragmatism and class-neutral illusions are bound to flourish within
our alliance.

The CC also discussed the COSATU strategic document, "A Draft Programme
for the Alliance". The SACP's concerns converge substantially with
those voiced in the COSATU document. In particular, the COSATU document
is critical of the way in which policy-making is increasingly being driven
technocratically, and from within individual ministries. The danger is
that our programmes will become incoherent, and that the political vision
behind our alliance Reconstruction and Development Programme will be lost.

COSATU proposes a clear programme of action for the tripartite alliance.
These issues were taken further in an SACP/COSATU national bilateral held
on December 2.

This bilateral reaffirmed the central role of the ANC and our shared,
ongoing commitment to the ANC-led alliance. However, the two formations
asserted the need for "much greater active involvement in the ANC
by working class and socialist forces". The SACP delegation, for instance,
criticised COSATU's failure in December 1994, the ANC's Bloemfontein Conference,
to make some full-time COSATU leadership available for election to the
ANC NEC.

The SACP and COSATU resolved to plan a series of bilaterals that will
look at a number of issues, including:

• building a powerful progressive women's movement in our country;
• shifting increasing areas of health provision, including medical aid,
  away from the private sector;
• effective public provision of housing and transport.

In the official statement after the bilateral, the two formations said:
"As working class and socialist organisations, we see the struggle
for clean governance without corruption as essential to our cause. Our
class opponents are attempting to hijack the process of change in our country
by encouraging a culture of self-enrichment in the form of black economic
empowerment for a small elite. The struggle for change that benefits the
great majority is linked to the struggle against corruption."

Amnesty
for Hani's murderers?

In our inside pages, we carry a report on ceremonies held tohonour Comrade
Chris Hani, and those still being planned. At the same time, his murderers,
Clive Derby-Lewis and Janusz Waluz, at present in prison, have announced
their intention of applying for amnesty from the Truth and Reconciliation
Commission, on the grounds that their motive for the murder was political.

It is worth noting that the political beliefs which they are pleading
in extenuation are unacceptable anywhere, and particularly in the new South
Africa. Derby-Lewis and Waluz are open, unashamed, racists. Derby-Lewis
and his wife were at the head of an organisation calling itself the World
Apartheid Movement, and had links with notorious racist leaders in other
countries, like Martin Webster in Britain and Le Pen in France. Waluz was
one of their followers.

What is more, Derby-Lewis and Waluz have proved themselves capable of
planning and executing extremely violent acts in support of their beliefs.
There is no sign that their beliefs have changed. We have no guarantee
that, if released, they will not be a threat to society in the future.

The SACP opposes amnesty for them, and is calling for the investigation
into Chris Hani's murder to be re-opened. There is evidence that a conspiracy
was involved, and the other members are still at large.

DEBATE




LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Women's emancipation

Dear Comrade

The SACP needs to study all the questions and issues relating to the
liberation of women, and find lines of action which will lead to their
emancipation.But we might ask: Why trouble ourselves with the liberation
of women? Why should the SACP look at the issue seriously?

There are comrades among us, as the Party is well aware, who feel that
we should devote much of our time and strength to the struggle against
capitalism, and that the issue of women's liberation is therefore secondary,
because it will dissipate our forces.

They say further that our present situation, with a shortage of skilled
women, and with the majority still bound by African traditions, does not
provide any basis for embarking upon consistent action, and that it is
therefore necessary to wait for socialism, to establish the economic, educational
and social foundations for launching the struggle for the emancipation
of women.

Others claim that certain traditions must be respected, because we cannot
oppose them right now for fear of losing the support of the people. They
are asking, "Are we talking about women's emancipation while the vast
majority are indifferent to the matter?" After all, comrades conclude,
the emancipation we are talking about would be artificial - imposed on
women by the Party.

Lizo Nobanda

Western Cape

Editor's note: As a woman, I cannot refrain from commenting on
the arguments quoted by this comrade. I sincerely hope he doesn't believe
them himself. How can anyone know that the vast majority of women are indifferent
to their own emancipation? Has anyone done a survey? It's a fact that many
women, right now, are deeply concerned with the question of their own development
and emancipation. Within the Party, cadre development programmes should
be made available to them equally with men.

Women form more than half the population. Many are potentially powerful
agents for the transformation of South Africa. Women comrades have the
potential to help expand and strengthen the Party, and take part in the
building of socialism. The emancipation of women and the building of socialism
go hand in hand. Each process could strengthen the other. The time for
building both is now.

Women aren't a flock of sheep waiting in a field for a shepherd to find
the time to come and lead them somewhere. Many of them are desperately
searching for a hole in the fence.

'Mainstream'
press gets SACP policy wrong

A letter written to the Cape Times by a Western Cape SACP comrade, in
his private capacity, was quoted in national newspapers as an SACP statement,
and then, later, as a document published in Umsebenzi.

The letter expressed the comrade's personal views on the nature of the
Alliance. The South African Press Association (SAPA) got the text. On November
21st, several papers printed the story, quoting extensively from the letter,
and representing the views in it as SACP policy. The Citizen used the headline:
"Schism starting in tripartite Pact - SACP."

The same day, SACP head office in Johannesburg responded with a press
statement explaining the situation: "The piece in question was a letter,
and therefore a personal opinion, not an official statement, as SAPA mischievously
implies."

The statement remarked on, "how quick hostile elements in the media
are to jump on to any minor error," and said: "There is a real
debate within the Alliance, including within the Party, about the merits
of the Alliance. We believe that such a debate is healthy and necessary.
The comrade is

certainly entitled to engage in this debate with his own views. However,
the views he expresses are certainly not the official views of the SACP."

The next day, the 22nd, the Johannesburg Star picked up the story, but
described the letter as "a document prepared for publication in the
Party organ, Umsebenzi." The headline took it further: "SACP
paper urges review of alliance with ANC," which implied that Umsebenzi
had already printed the document as editorial policy.

The document was not prepared for Umsebenzi, and Umsebenzi has not seen
it, let alone printed it.

We took the matter up with John Patten, ombudsman of The Star. In an
article in The Star of December 3rd, he acknowledged that the headline
had been misleading.

Pagad
and Core

Social movements or social problems?

The Western Cape was recently confronted with a new, community-based,
anti-crime movement calling itself People Against Gangsterism and Drugs
(PAGAD). It was able to mobilise vast numbers of people to march on alleged
drug dealers, to denounce them publicly, and to demonstrate discontent
with the failures of the criminal justice system, writes SACP provincial
secretary in the Western Cape, Philip Dexter MP.

After an initially confused response, the SACP and the Alliance partners
have generally analysed PAGAD as a genuine but misguided attempt to face
a social problem. PAGAD has never had a coherent leadership, strategy or
programme of action. Some excesses were inevitable, like the lynching of
Rashied Staggie. There are clearly elements within PAGAD that fantasise
of a revolution being won from the base of PAGAD, but most people have
seen through these elements. Recently, religious and community leaders
expressed their concern with the manner in which PAGAD was handling its
campaign, particularly after a life was lost.

Soon after PAGAD was seen to be gaining momentum, certain church leaders
and gangsters came together to form CORE, Community Outreach. This organisation
is clearly not one that can be regarded with as much sympathy. CORE unites
criminals for one purpose: to ensure that they continue business as usual,
but with a friendly face. By bribing communities with the offer of resources,
CORE seeks to consolidate its social base, to protect the business interests
of its members.

Both PAGAD and CORE are social movements, but vastly different in class
base and intentions.

PAGAD, while it may harbour some elements that wish to promote counter-revolution,
is a genuine attempt to better people's lives. It has failed, or been misguided,
to the extent that the Alliance has not given leadership in the fight against
crime. Because our attempts at government are weak at community level,
we have not been able to lead the community in this campaign.CORE, on the
other hand, is a formalised movement for gangsters. Whatever the social
causes of crime, these individuals have profited from violence, prostitution,
drugs such as Mandrax, and even collaboration with the former racist regime.
CORE is a social movement of counter-revolution, armed, trained and dangerous.
It has offered drugs to school children in the past, and it now seeks to
negotiate with the government to legitimise its profits.

The criminals have begun formalising their relationships with some people
in the working class areas, where gangsters are often the sole breadwinners
for families and communities whose lot in the past has been the violence
and injustice of the apartheid regime.

The SACP in the Western Cape must come to grips with these movements.
We need to give leadership to the working class. Our failure allows the
vacuum that counter-revolutionaries exploit. We need to end social problems,
but through genuine social movements that will fight crime, fight for development,
and fight for socialism.

Honouring
Chris Hani

Groups and organisations continue to honour the memory of our former
General Secretary, Chris Hani, who was murdered in April, 1993. Ceremonies
have been held, and more are planned for the future.

Some of our provinces organised memorial services in honour of Comrade
Chris at the time of the third anniversary of his murder.

A significant memorial on this anniversary was the opening by President
Mandela of the Lower Sabalele Water Project of the Department of Water
Affairs. Lower Sabalele was where Comrade Chris was born and grew up.

Visitors continue to go and pay their respects at Comrade Chris' grave
at Boksburg. We were involved recently in a church service at the graveside,
a moving, emotion-charged ceremony, involving a group of the young men's
union of the Methodist Church from Port Elizabeth.

A national commemoration at the grave involved both the Catholic Church
and our two branches of Reiger Park (where Comrade Chris was once a member)
and Vosloorus.

A break with the past came when the Greater Boksburg Town Council voted
to confer the Freedom of Boksburg posthumously on Comrade Chris. An event
to mark this will take place in April next year, as part of the fourth
anniversary memorial.

A documentary being made on the life of Amy Biehl, the student from
the US, who was murdered in Guguletu in the Western Cape, includes material
about Chris Hani's life. He was one of her heroes.

The Party's Chris Hani Peace Award is an annual event. Charles Nquakula,
SACP General Secretary, says: "The first recipient, Comrade Walter
Sisulu, was identified at Central Committee level. This time around, we
should take our branches on board. The provinces should galvanise our branches
as part of the commemoration of the next anniversary."

REGIONAL FOCUS

NORTH-WEST PROVINCE

Building a working-class spirit in Ventersdorp

Ventersdorp in the North-West has been known as a stronghold of the
far right. In 1991, local whites demonstrated violently against the presence
of FW de Klerk in the town, because he had instituted negotiations with
the Alliance. A SACP branch was launched in March, 1996, and its members
now believe that things are changing for the better. Branch secretary,
Lesego Boikanyo, reports.

The branch has become active, and members outside the Branch Executive
Committee have been deployed in community structures, like the Community
Policing Forum. There are three Communists on the Greater Ventersdorp Town
Council: the mayor, the deputy mayor, and one councillor.

The mayor, Comrade Meshack Mbambalala, is chairperson of the SACP branch.
Because he follows a communist morality, and is seriously committed to
serving his constituency, he has refused some of the privileges due to
him as mayor, such as a car and mayoral house. We believe that he is building
a working-class spirit in the town.

At the time of the 75th Anniversary celebrations, the branch hosted
about 10 000 Communists from all parts of the North-West Province. We tested
our provincial strength and morale by making the centre of our town red.
The red flag was visible. Conservative Party members on the Transitional
Council raised no objections, our members were disciplined, and no one
was harmed or attacked during our celebration.

We condemned as criminal the bombing, that night, of Kgololo-sego (Freedom)
Intermediate School, and the bombing was criticised, even by so-called
moderates.

The Mayor has had two successful meetings with the white community.
One of them was with the parents of the Afrikaans-medium Ventersdorp High
School, who invited him to address them in November. In protest against
the meeting's being addressed by a Communist, the AWB held a rally, addressed
by Eugene Terreblanche, at Trim Park, about 3 kilometres away.

The school hall was packed with parents. The Mayor spoke to them about
reconciliation, and they gave him a standing ovation. By contrast, the
AWB rally was not well attended: there were only about 60 cars, whose registration
plates showed that many of them were from outside the province.

We believe that the far right is becoming isolated, and losing respect
in the white community. The branch will continue the struggle of JB Marks,
who was born in this region. We believe that, with Communist discipline
and commitment, we can show people a better way forward.

Farm
evictions in the new South Africa:

How can they happen?

The November issue of Umsebenzi carried a story about forced farm evictions.
The accompanying picture looked like a return to the apartheid years; it
showed an eviction being carried out by armed police. How can this happen
in the new South Africa? Jean Middleton asked spokespersons of the Ministry
of Agriculture and Land to explain.

What rights does the law give farm workers and tenants at present?

The new Labour Relations Act and Basic Conditions of Employment Act
both give more protection to workers, including farm workers. Legislation
has already been passed to protect labour tenants, those who have been
farming a piece of land in exchange for labour. Despite this, evictions
still take place.

Some evictions are illegal, for farmers are not allowed to take the
law into their own hands and evict without permission from the courts.
However, the presence of the police at the eviction in the photograph shows
that the farmer has been granted a court order to evict, and the eviction
is therefore legal.

Court orders may be granted for various reasons. Where the farm has
changed hands, and the new owner doesn't want those workers on his land,
a court order may be granted to evict them. Evictions also take place because
of termination of employment for reasons like old age. Some of these evictions
are clearly unfair.

What legislation is being prepared to prevent these abuses?

In consultation with agricultural organisations, the Ministry is planning
legislation to correct the imbalance of rights between land owners and
those who live on the land. It will apply to all farm workers.

The most important part of it is that it is intended to prevent evictions
without any alternative having been found; to prevent tenants and farm
workers being dumped on the roadside with no means of livelihood.

The Ministry is looking into ways to enable farm workers to own pieces
of land: for example, through government subsidies, bank loans and communal
village ownership.

Why has it taken so long?

The number of urgent transforming bills going before Parliament has
been massive.

There is a queue. All ministries have to wait their turn. There's no
magic short cut, because, in a democracy, all laws must go through Parliament.

The Ministry believes that the new legislation will take us a step forward
in our democratic order, in changing power relations in the countryside,
and offering protection to the most vulnerable members of our society.

The Minister of Agriculture and Land Affairs, Derek Hanekom, says: "I
don't only represent farmers. I have to represent the interests of consumers,
especially the poorest consumers, and, very importantly, the interests
of farm workers. Without farm workers, there is no agriculture in South
Africa."

World
opinion grows against US blockade of CUBA US disregards United Nations
vote

President Clinton has said publicly: "No one agrees with our
Cuba policy." He's right. Every year since 1992, the General Assembly
of the United Nations has voted for an end to the US blockade of Cuba.
Yet the blockade continues.

After the 1995 vote, the US passed the Helms-Burton law. In flagrant
defiance of world opinion, this law strengthened the blockade. It provided
for sanctions against foreign or international companies trading with,
or investing in, Cuba.

In November 1996, the Cuban representative told the General Assembly:
"Cuba has not blockaded the United States. Demands must be made of
the aggressor, not the victim. The United States lacks the moral authority
to require others to respect human rights." The vote that followed
showed international indignation rising further.



The blockade shows US contempt for Cuban sovereignty. The Helms-Burton
law, which strengthens it, shows US contempt for the sovereignty of other
countries as well, for it infringes their rights to investment and trade.

The US response to the United Nations vote shows contempt for the opinions
of other states, and for the United Nations itself.

Bonaventura Reyes, spokesman for the Cuban Embassy in Pretoria, believes
that Clinton's support for the Helms-Burton law was calculated to attract
the Cuban exile vote in Florida. He says: "We can't move Cuba anywhere
else. We have to stay where we are, and resist."

UN
votes to end blockade



This is how the General Assembly voted 1992-1996, in the annual resolutions
against the blockade of Cuba.

For ending the blocade:	59	1992
For continuing it:	3
Abstentions:	71
Absent from assembly:	46
For ending the blockade:	88	1993
For continuing it:	4
Abstentions:	57
Absent from assembly:	35
For ending the blockade:	101	1994
For continuing it:	2
Abstentions:	48
Absent from assembly:	33
For ending the blockade:	117	1995
For continuing it:	3
Abstentions:	38
Absent from assembly:	19
For ending the blockade:	137	1996
For continuing it:	3
Abstentions:	25
Absent from assembly:	16

Southern
African brigade to CUBA

Comrades give support

Representatives of trade unions and other organisations, journalists
and private people will be joining the Southern African Brigade visiting
Cuba from early December till early January.

During that month, members of the Brigade will contribute their skills
by putting in work-hours, and will form friendly links with organisations
and individuals.

Among their many activities, as they visit different parts of Cuba,
will be visits to hospitals and polyclinics to see Cuban medical services
at work, a visit to a Pioneer camp, where they will meet children from
Chernobyl, a meeting with the Committee for the Defence of the Revolution,
and a visit to the Bay of Pigs, scene of an unsuccessful US invasion in
the early 1960s. There will also be a jazz concert, and plenty of social
activities and sight-seeing.

The expedition has been organised by the Friends of Cuba Societies (FOCUS)
in South Africa. The cost per person is about R6 500, which includes everything
except pocket-money.

British
communists oppose Nato intervention in Zaire

The executive committee of the Communist Party of Britain has voted
to oppose the suggestion that NATO and Western troops should be sent to
intervene in Zaire. reports the British Communist paper, the Morning Star.

The executive committee was told that Western countries were interested
in exploiting the mineral wealth of Zaire, not in finding a solution to
the refugee crisis there. Any intervention in support of the delivery and
distribution of aid should be under the control of the Organisation of
African Unity.

Other countries should follow the example of South Africa, and introduce
an arms embargo in the region.