SACP with Red.png
SACP GS Comrade Blade Nzimande
Pietermaritzburg, 23 September 2016
Moses Mabhida Memorial Lecture
"Defeat the parasitic bourgeoisie, the immediate internal threat facing the
national democratic revolution; dislodge the chokehold of monopoly capital
on our country!"
"Do not destroy our universities, transform them and defend our democratic
heritage"
Let me take this opportunity to thank the South African chapter and the Vice
President of the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU), also the President
of Nehawu, Comrade Mzwandile Makwayiba for holding this Memorial lecture on
Comrade Moses Mabhida - uStimela, as Comrade Harry Gwala used to call him.
This lecture is part of the activities preceding the truly historic event of
the holding of the international congress of the WFTU in Durban, the first
ever to be held on African soil. I am also truly humbled for the Honour to
be invited to deliver the lecture.
There would have been no better way to celebrate the convening of the WFTU
international congress in South Africa, than to remember Comrade Mabhida,
who was a key participant in WFTU representing the then South African
Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU). Even more significant is the holding of
this lecture right here in Pietermaritzburg, where he was born and grew up,
and also the only city in South Africa that has the single honour of having
produced two general secretaries of the South African Communist Party, the
SACP.
Dear comrades, on 8 March 1986 the SACP lost its General Secretary, Comrade
Moses Mbheki Mncane Mabhida at the age of 63. He was born on 14 October 1923
at Thornville in Pietermaritzburg in a peasant household background. His
political activism and world outlook was shaped by his deep resentment of
his family and people at the dispossession they suffered under colonisation.
Mabhida attended school from 1932. His learning process was however
interrupted by periods during which he had to work as a "herd-boy" for one
shilling a week in support both of his schooling but also of life at home
given the peasant background and at the time his developing proletarian or
working class position and location in social relations of production.
Today our democratic government, in line with the Freedom Charter, or should
we also say in line with the Communist Manifesto as the two are worded
almost the same on this matter, has made a massive progress in rolling out
free education with focus on learners from working class and poor households
through the policies of no-fee paying schools and fee exemption for the poor
in fee-paying schools. Unlike under this social progress, at the time when
Mabhida attended school access to basic education was largely determined by
school fees. It is this very fact that led to Mabhida leaving school after
finishing what would become the ninth grade in today's terms. But this did
not happen before he met and went through the hands of "The lion of the
midlands", Comrade Harry Themba Gwala, a teacher and an outstanding stalwart
of our struggle.
It was Gwala who influenced Mabhida to join the African National Congress
(ANC) and trade union activism. Gwala provided Mabhida with basic political
education, among others covering the role played by the Soviet Union in the
Second World War. Mabhida joined the SACP in 1942 when that war was still
raging on.
South African characteristics
His working class position; his experience of oppression of the majority
African and Black people in general, under the yoke of White minority
supremacism; his rejection of economic exploitation; his opposition to
foreign and imperialist domination, furnished the material basis for his
active involvement in workers and political struggles. Mabhida's struggle
was therefore a comprehensive struggle to overthrow the entire regime of
exploitation, oppression and domination, including patriarchy. It is this
that saw him deepen his activism and organically rise through the ranks of
the progressive trade union movement, the ANC and the Communist Party.
Mabhida served as SACP General Secretary from 1979, after replacing Comrade
Moses Maune Kotane who died a year before in 1978. Kotane, rightly described
as the "Chief architect of the South African struggle", served in the same
position for 39 years, from 1939 during the most severe, deepest and longest
crisis of capitalism - the Great Depression, throughout the so-called Second
World War, until his death in 1978. He had a lot of experience and
contributed immensely in the development of the SACP.
Kotane played a major role in ensuring that Marxism-Leninism in South Africa
was anchored in our country's historical conditions. In the main, this
involved the grounding, or if you like the indigenisation or Africanisation
of Marxism-Leninism, as well as its correct application in our concrete
realities. His famous Cradock letter sums it all. Kotane's work in building
our revolutionary alliance and the progressive trade union movement; his
outstanding leadership in the SACP and the ANC; his international work
against colonial and apartheid oppression; his internationalism against the
entire system of imperialism, laid a solid foundation, in the context of
collective leadership, for the work that Mabhida was to take forward as SACP
General Secretary until his death.
SACTU
In his own right as an activist, leader and product of our struggle for
liberation and social emancipation, Mabhida had accumulated massive
leadership, military and strategic experience. He had been involved in
building progressive trade unionism in South Africa, in international trade
union work with the WFTU as a representative of SACTU - the legal
predecessor to the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU).
Mabhida's full-time work in building the progressive trade union movement as
part of the overall strategy of the SACP started after the 1952 Defiance
Campaign - in which 8 000 people were arrested for protesting against
apartheid laws. It was the SACP Pietermaritzburg District Committee that
proposed to Mabhida to resign from his job and work full-time in building
the movement. He started with the Howick rubber and chemical workers' unions
here in Pietermaritzburg, in Durban and in a number of other areas in what
would today become the KwaZulu-Natal Province. Mabhida's trade union work
saw him actively involved in the founding of SACTU.
Mabhida was involved in building the joint ANC-SACP military wing, uMkhonto
we Sizwe (MK). After undergoing his military training, he devoted himself at
building the MK. Both of this came as result of a request by ANC President,
Comrade Oliver Reginald Tambo in 1962, following the ANC's Lobatse
Consultative Conference held in Botswana in 1962. Mabhida was re-elected at
this conference to the ANC National Executive Committee (NEC). He became a
member of the ANC NEC around 1956. In 1958-1959 he was acting Chairperson of
the ANC in Natal. Mabhida served the ANC and the alliance in many
responsibilities. To dwell extensively on those responsibilities will be to
write a book. Unfortunately we are facing limitations of both time and space
at this single event.
However, there are certain facts we cannot leave out, even if it means
repeating what is already known about him. Mabhida was involved in the
processes that led to the adoption of the Freedom Charter in 1955 by the
Congress of the People. After the ANC Morogoro Consultative Conference held
in Tanzania in 1969, he played a vital role in the establishment of the
ANC's intelligence and security department. Ten years later, in 1979 , he
served on the Politico-Military Strategy Commission that developed the Green
Book, one of the high level ideological, political, strategy and tactics
documents to have been produced in our national liberation movement. The
Green Book is highly recommended for our cadres as it deepens one's
understanding of the shared perspectives of our alliance and our theory and
practice of struggle.
Strict Commissar; Commander
A strict Marxist-Leninist cadre, Mabhida served the MK as a Commissar, among
others, training new recruits politically and ideologically. He served the
MK also as a Commander. It is very important that we also say this today.
Comrade Moses Mabhida never deserted his course of duty at any particular
moment. Neither did he ever seek individualist solutions to collective
challenges.
Let us therefore take this opportunity to express our sincere gratitude to
all those MK combatants who took their cue from Mabhida, who were always
there whenever the revolution required their services.
If one follows in the footsteps of the good revolutionary example
established by the resilience and unifying leadership of Kotane, Tambo and
Mabhida, one will never put their individual interests to the front or
engage in any divisive and factional activities. The common attributes of
these great leaders of our struggle and movement, is that they built and
united our revolutionary alliance. We have many lessons of revolutionary
moral high ground to learn from them.
In fact as we remember uStimela, we must commit to fight against
factionalism - a disease that is threatening to destroy our movement. It is
also a disease that has contributed immensely to the relatively poor
performance in our last local government elections. It is a disease that is
threatening to tear our movement apart here in KZN and other parts of the
country. It is a disease which, if not defeated, will consume all of us and
take our country back into the pre-1994 period.
Monopoly capital
Let us take our cue from Moses Mabhida; let us roll back the chokehold of
monopoly capital on our revolution!
Monopoly capital remains the universal strategic adversary of the working
class and of our revolution. World peace and justice, shared human
prosperity and universal social emancipation, are all held back by monopoly
capital through capitalist exploitation of labour in general, through
neoliberal globalisation and, at the end of the day, through its overarching
regime of imperialism. The system is the common denominator in almost every
major conflict within and between different countries the world over. It is
this system that caused the 2008 global economic crisis that is yet to end -
considered comprehensively.
The massive attack on the co-operation between Brazil, Russia, India, China
and South Africa (BRICS) cannot be understood in isolation from a thorough
assessment of the role played by monopoly capital through its system of
imperialism. Efforts to destabilise Brics countries heightened aggressively
after they announced the implementation of the New Development Bank, also
known as the Brics Bank.
Imperialist machination does not mean that we do not have our own internal
weaknesses. For sure there are. In fact imperialism exploits those
weaknesses in order to drive its agenda including regime change. In many
instances this does not happen without local collaborators, or sponsorship
of certain local organisations or even offering them support by other means.
Brazil, Venezuela, Cuba
This is what happened recently in Brazil, where a parliamentary coup was
staged, through the involvement, among others, of corrupted politicians and
businesspeople who pushed for the coup in order to save their own skins.
At times internal weaknesses play into shifts of power to right-wing forces,
such as the one we have seen in India, and recently in a number of
metropolitan and rural municipalities in South Africa.
But, as we have also seen, external imperialist attacks include, in the
extreme military aggression, such as the one that destroyed Libya. It
includes sanctions as well, such as the ones we have seen in the case of
Russia where there are internal issues.
External imperialist methods include, for example, the support given to the
apartheid Israel continuously dispossessing the Palestinians of their land,
also denying them fundamental human rights such as freedom of movement.
Similarly, the challenges faced by Venezuela in Latin America cannot be
fully understood only from a national point of view, without scrutinising
the role played by monopoly capital through its system of imperialism.
The push, in the South China Sea, for a military confrontation cannot, also,
be understood without examining the role played by monopoly capital through
its system of imperialism.
In Cuba, as another example, the Cubans managed to achieve national victory
against the internal oppressor regime on 1 January 1959. Then imperialism
reacted directly stepping forth. The United States, on behalf of its
monopoly capital, externally imposed, in Cuba, various forms of oppression
and destabilisation against the new Cuban government and the Cuban people,
all to achieve regime change. This has been going on for over half a
century now. Let us use this opportunity, today, to reiterate our call on
the United States to end its illegal economic blockade of Cuba.
All of these cases of imperialist domination, and more others that we could
not cover in this presentation because of the limitations of time and space,
should remind us of our most important internationalist tasks that we must
carry out, in memory of Moses Mabhida.
The challenge of monopoly capital and its system of imperialism show that
our struggle is by its character an international struggle. The main
adversary to our struggle is a global imperialist force in the form of
monopoly capital. The likelihood of succeeding in tackling this massive
force is, as good as non-existent, if we are internally divided, if we
suffer from disunity, if we are domestically weakened by corruption,
rent-seeking and corporate capture.
In fact, at its highest level, corporate capture is imperialist capture. We
can only ignore imperialism at our own peril when we analyse the
configuration, the line up and the balance of forces, even in respect to
internal organisational and domestic affairs. We would rather investigate
and confirm if it is absent than not factor it in our analysis.
Parasitic bourgeoisie
This brings us to our concluding points on this strategic question.
In memory of Moses Mabhida, let us unite and dislodge the most immediate
internal and domestic threat to our movement and revolution!
Without getting our house in order, without tackling factionalism and the
visibly dwindling organisational cohesion in our movement, there is no way
we are going to succeed. There is no way we are going to succeed - without
dealing a decisive blow to the parasitic bourgeoisie, the most dangerous
class to the unity of our movement but also to our revolution internally.
Without finishing off corruption and rent-seeking - we are not going to
succeed in waging any noticeable battle against monopoly capital.
The looters, who are building an empire of oligarchies by means of looting
our state-owned enterprises through contracts and tenders, are going to
destroy the strategic capacity to face off with monopoly capital. Their
argument, that what they are doing is against monopoly capital, must be
dismissed with contempt. We must go for them too in the interest of the
success of our national democratic revolution.
There will be no second radical phase of our democratic transition should
the corporate capturers and the parasitic bourgeoisie win the day, and
should their networks of patronage, captured decision-makers and agents in
political organisation, in the state and generally with regards to societal
power, win the day too.
Let us unite, in memory of Comrade Moses Mabhida, and rescue our revolution
and our movement. No one will, if we do not do it ourselves. This is one of
the reasons why the SACP urged the ANC to ensure a smooth leadership
transition, to unite the motive forces of the national democratic
revolution; to unite the ANC-led alliance and its component parts; to unite
the various democratic mass organisations that support ANC and the ANC's
electoral base at large, all on a principled programmatic basis.
It is for that reason that we urged the ANC leadership, as part and parcel,
and therefore as a culmination of the consultative process that the ANC NEC
is already engaging in, to consider convening a non-elective special
national conference with the stated purpose of achieving the objective of
seeking to unite itself and the rest of our democratic movement. This must
turn the tide against the trend in the ANC's electoral decline and waning
hard-won democratic hegemony. It is important to appreciate, in this regard,
that what happens in, and to the ANC has an impact on the whole of the
ANC-led alliance and democratic forces; and indeed on our country as a
whole.
No to destruction
Transform and not destroy our universities, preserve our democratic
heritage!
It would be negligent for me to conclude this lecture without briefly saying
something about some of the chaos in our universities. In honour and memory
of Comrade Mabhida, let all sensible South Africans condemn the thuggery
that we see in some of our institutions. Those throwing stones and burning
libraries are nothing more than criminals. Let the rest of the students also
take a firm stand and say: "NO, NOT IN OUR NAME!"
We also welcome the stance being taken by our magistrates to lock up
suspected thugs for seven days, until they appear in court. If you are
arrested, incarcerated and convicted for destroying university property -
you are not a hero, but a reactionary and counter-revolutionary.
I am also deeply concerned about the continuing disruptions at the
Pietermaritzburg campus of the University of KwaZulu-Natal or the UKZN. I
urge both management and student leadership to find an urgent solution to
this impasse.
To the students, in particular, I say, whilst you have a right to protest,
but this right must not be abused and misused to risk the academic programme
and academic year. Please, go back to class while you concentrate your
efforts on negotiations with management. Otherwise destructive and violent
protests, as well as the violation of the rights of other students, run the
risk of completely discrediting whatever legitimate demands you may have.
Parents
I also wish to urge parents to stand up and help us deal with the current
situation. Surely, it cannot be that parents simply send their children to
public higher learning institutions and then fold their arms when academic
careers and potential future of those students are exposed to threat.
Let me also clarify the important intervention I announced on behalf of
government earlier this week.
For the 2017 academic year, government has gone further than it has ever
done:
Accordingly, the state will absorb the fee increase of up to 8 percent for
all students eligible for the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS),
over and above, paying all the fees for them. Moreover, the state will pay
for fee increases of all the students who come from families with household
income of up to R50 000! This would cover more than 70 percent of
undergraduate students in our universities! It will also cover students in
similar categories in our 50 Technical and Vocational Education and Training
(TVET) colleges. In fact, in some of our universities like Zululand, Walter
Sisulu and Limpopo, more than 90 percent of students will not pay any
increase. This is going to benefit the children of nurses, teachers, police
and many skilled workers who do not qualify for the NSFAS.
In addition, the government is far advanced in exploring and designing a
loan system that will assist the "missing middle", so that the children of
the working class and the lower strata of the middle class who do not
qualify for the NSFAS can get financial assistance and only pay them back
once they are working.
Meanwhile, the Presidential Higher Education and Training Commission is hard
at work exploring a lasting solution to the issue of student fees. We urge
all students and stakeholders to participate and make submissions to the
Commission.
Agents of the bourgeoisie
Given the aforementioned progress, principles and work, I am of the view
that there is absolutely no need for any, in particular, disruptive student
protests. It could otherwise be concluded that some of the small student
groupings that persistently seek to achieve disruption and destruction of
learning progress, are now acting like hired agents of the bourgeoisie who
want the state to pay for the rich.
Our democratic government's commitment is free higher education for the
poor, with reasonable measures to assist the "missing middle" while those
who can afford to pay - the rich and the well-off - must pay. The call for
free higher education for all is not inherently a revolutionary call - it
could as well be a reactionary stance that is inconsiderate of the objective
conditions, in particular, to social relations of class inequality that we
are yet to and must eliminate. What must happen after we have radically
reduced or eradicated class inequality, must not be confused for what must
happen towards successfully realising the goal.
In memory of Comrade Moses Mabhida, let us celebrate our democratic
achievements brought about by the ANC-led government. Let us defend and
build upon them as part of consolidating and deepening our national
democratic revolution and advancing its second radical phase!
I thank you!
. SACP General Secretary Comrade Blade Nzimande is also Minister of
Higher Education and Training.
__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature
database 14174 (20160924) __________
The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.
http://www.eset.com
--
--
You are subscribed. This footer can help you.
Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this
message.
You can visit the group WEB SITE at
http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options,
pages, files and membership.
To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You
don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put
anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this
address (repeat): [email protected] .
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
"YCLSA Discussion Forum" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email
to [email protected].
To post to this group, send an email to [email protected].
Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum.
To view this discussion on the web, visit
https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/yclsa-eom-forum/006a01d21699%24f9e3d0f0%24edab72d0%24%40com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
