EFF STATEMENT ON NUMSA’S INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON LEFT POLITICAL PARTIES AND MOVEMENTS 06 August 2014 The Economic Freedom Fighters will not be participating in the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa’s International Symposium on Left Political Parties and Movements, which will take place between the 7th and 10th of August 2014. The EFF believes that it is indeed always vital that all Left forces should unite in order to build and consolidate working class unity; not only in South Africa, but in the entire African continent and the world. However, the EFF will not be participating in the Symposium and this is based on two fundamental reasons. One is because the leadership of the EFF has not yet met with the leadership of NUMSA, despite efforts over a long period of time to do so. As things stand, it is not clear what defines the EFF and NUMSA’s relationship because all attempts to meet with the leadership collective of NUMSA were rejected and done so through media platforms. This makes it impossible to know and understand the deeper political and ideological programme that the platform will pursue because EFF has still not met the leadership of NUMSA. NUMSA’s refusal to meet the EFF was done so publicly and without any direct communication whatsoever with the EFF leadership. Above all, the refusal came with false ideological and political characterisations of the EFF, and at times left space for those with ulterior motives to vilify the Economic Emancipation Movement. The EFF’s Founding Manifesto provides a correct characterisation of the EFF, and this has been proven to be true also in the day to day programmes and activities of the EFF. The second reason why the EFF will not participate in the Symposium is a concern that NUMSA still forms part of the alliance with the ruling party, the African National Congress (ANC), through the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU). There is no clarity, for instance, whether the current differences in COSATU are deeper ideological differences, or political differences which can be settled through a process presided by, amongst others, Cyril Ramaphosa, who is an enemy of the working class and responsible for the murder of workers in Marikana. Furthermore, it is not clear if NUMSA intends to fight for socialism through the ANC-led alliance seeing that it has invited the ANC and SACP to a conversation about socialism. EFF sees these organisations as part of what the struggle for socialism should confront and dismantle in South Africa. ANC and SACP have presided, for twenty years now, over the neoliberal slaughter of the South African working class, and unashamedly continue to do so. Unfortunately, as things stand, the Symposium looks like those tripartite alliance gatherings where people discuss theory but with no bearing and reference to praxis, neither to the practical realities that confront the movements of the poor. The EFF will never share platforms of political convenience with the ANC and SACP, and will never be delivered to the ANC programme and politics by any Union or any formation in South Africa, Africa and the world. EFF is not in the business of saving the ANC or being trapped in the nostalgia of its former self as a liberation movement; the plan is to crush it and do so without any sunset clauses. The EFF is unashamedly in pursuit of a programme to take political power from the ANC led alliance, because they have thus far used such power to protect the interests of the capitalist class. Nevertheless, the EFF wishes NUMSA and all international Left forces that will partake in the Symposium a great success with the hope that a truly genuine left program can emerge. As for the EFF, sharing platforms with the ANC and SACP to discuss joint socialist programs will be an indictment against the souls of the 34 Marikana workers for whom justice is still not served. ISSUED BY THE ECONOMIC FREEDOM FIGHTERS MBUYISENI QUINTIN NDLOZI (National Spokesperson) Cell Number: +27 73 133 3012 | +27 (61) 482 6589 Website: effighters.org.za/ Email: [email protected] Facebook: Mbuyiseni Quintin Ndlozi || Twitter: @EconFreedomZA and @MbuyiseniNdlozi
Posted on: Wed, 06 Aug 2014 15:18:51 +0000
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