File spoon-archives/aut-op-sy.archive/aut-op-sy_2001/aut-op-sy.0109, message 72


From: "cwright" <cwright-AT-21stcentury.net>
Subject: AUT: report on WCAR
Date: Fri, 7 Sep 2001 23:20:07 -0500


This is a multi-part message in MIME format.


MASS MARCH IN SOUTH AFRICA AGAINST WCAR

by Lorenzo Komboa Ervin, special correspondent

Friday, August 31, 2001 DURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA

On the opening day of the United Nations' sponsored World Conference
Against Racism in Durban, South Africa, almost 20,000 persons marched
in an anti-government demonstration to protest the failure of the
South African government's land reform policy for the poor, and its
anticipated sale of the telecommunications industry, electrical
utilities and other state-owned properties to private entrepreneurs.
According to March organizers they also wanted to let the world know
about "this fraud of a conference fof the corporate rich, while the
poor suffer", as one marcher put it on his picket sign. Myself and a
small group of Americans, Asians, Europeans and others left the Non-
Government Organization portion of the conference to march in
solidarity.

This march was organized by the Durban Social Form, an umberella
group of the Landless People's Movement, the National Land Committee,
COSATU, the largest labor union in the country and numerous other
social and community groups. The demonstration took place as part of
a 2-day general strike called for by COSATU, which involved millions
of South African workers, and crippled the transport, construction,
and other industries, and snarled traffic all over the city of Durban
and othere parts of South Africa.

Protesters carried picket signs calling President Thabo Mbeki "a
liar", "bully", and warning that the government will face even more
disruptions, which would threaten the power of the African National
Congress government and "their rich friends backing them." Many
described the conflict between COSATU, the DSF, and the ANC
government as a "class war", which they saw as resulting one day into
a "coup of the poor" to throw the rich and their ANC politicians out
of power.  All day long, the marchers angrily spoke about
the "treachery" of the ANC, whom they said had "sold out" the poor of
the country. Some even said that President Mbeki "shamed" his father,
Govan Mbeki, who had died earlier that day, and whom was generally
respected as a champion of the poor. Because of Mbeki and the ANC,
they said, millions had neither land nor jobs, that over 3 million
were homeless, 3.5 million unemployed, and millions of others without
farms or land to sustain themselves.

Thousands of us assembled at the Natal Technical College, and marched
all the way through Central Durban, picking up thousands of people
along the way, until finally we came to the International Convention
Center in the business district, where the main conference was being
held. When the marhed ended, a rally was held, where speaker after
speakers condemned the United States and Israel as "evil twins"
sanctioning and carrying out genocide in the Middle East. President
George W. Bush ("that racist cowpoke") and the USA was especially
condemned for "arrogantly thumbing their noses" at the conference and
attempting to dominate the conference agenda, when Bush called for
the elimination of anydiscussions around reparations for slavery and
any designation of Israel as a "racist Zionist" state.

Because Israel had chosen the week of the conference to attack a
Palestinian city in the West Bank earlier in the week, there had been
serious tensions between the Israeli "peaceniks" and Palestinian
deloegates to the NGO conference. In fact, there were daily militant
demonstrations and counter-demonstrations, which quickly became
confrontations that had to be separated by the United Nations
security police and Metro Durban officers assigned to the NGO
conference (which preceded the meeting of heads of state). This also
inflamed the Arab and Asian communities in Durban and other cities.
Large numbers of muslim pro-Palestinian demonstrators poured into
Durban for the protest on Friday, and played a major role in the
march. In fact, there seemed to be more support from both the
Africans and Asians at this demonstration than at any other iId seen
since I'd arrived in South Africa, even more than at the NGO
conference itself.

The march included a number of urban homeless, rural landless (so
called 'squatters") and other desperately poor whom the ANC
government had recently used police forces to drive out of shantyowns
and settlements in the months preceeding the conference. (In video
that was shown all over the world, the police brutally destroyed
hamlets, personal property, and used excessive force), according to
protesters. At a press conference earlier in the week, leaders of the
landless movement, said that the ANC land policies were a failure,
a "tragedy", and that the poor were being crushed. They said that
landlessness itself was a symptom of racist and economic domination,
a carryover from the racist apartheid regime, but was not being made
a priority by the ANC ruling party.  The demonstration was called for
to unite all their forces, and to show that they would not passively
accept the government's anti-poor economic policies.

I have never been in a protest march like this one, though I had been
to a lifetime of protests all over the world. Elders and the youth
alike sprang into action, literally jumping and running many parts of
the route, while screaming slogans. The march itself lased almost 3
1/2 hours, over a course of about 5 miles. Thousands of ordinary
working class and poor people came out of their houses, churches,
stores, and other places to join in, and thousands of others stood on
the sidewalks to spur us on. It literally stopped all action in
Durban, a city of 3.2 million people. I know I will never forget this
march, and felt that I was part of a great historical happening. Most
felt that this was the start of a new movement, a poor peoples
movement which would not be denied or ignored, and that the poor
population would begin to speak with a loud voice. They were
insistent  that neither ANC government bureaucrats, heads of state,
or anybody else would speak for them anym! ! ore. They would not be
victims in a country they had fought to create in the battle to
overturn apartheid, and they forcefully said that they would take
control of their own destiny.

The real story in South Africa is not what is happening at the World
Conference Against Racism, whether with statesmen mildly "debating"
over racism or lawyers at the NGO arguing over fine details of
resolutions and political statements on reparations or United Nations
procedure, the real story is what is happening in the streets with
the poor and working class people of South African developing a new
social revolutionary movement.  That's where I always want to be: on
the streets with the common people while they make revolution.

-END-





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HTML VERSION:

MASS MARCH IN SOUTH AFRICA AGAINST WCAR

by Lorenzo Komboa Ervin, special correspondent

Friday, August 31, 2001 DURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA

On the opening day of the United Nations' sponsored World Conference
Against Racism in Durban, South Africa, almost 20,000 persons marched
in an anti-government demonstration to protest the failure of the
South African government's land reform policy for the poor, and its
anticipated sale of the telecommunications industry, electrical
utilities and other state-owned properties to private entrepreneurs.
According to March organizers they also wanted to let the world know
about "this fraud of a conference fof the corporate rich, while the
poor suffer", as one marcher put it on his picket sign. Myself and a
small group of Americans, Asians, Europeans and others left the Non-
Government Organization portion of the conference to march in
solidarity.

This march was organized by the Durban Social Form, an umberella
group of the Landless People's Movement, the National Land Committee,
COSATU, the largest labor union in the country and numerous other
social and community groups. The demonstration took place as part of
a 2-day general strike called for by COSATU, which involved millions
of South African workers, and crippled the transport, construction,
and other industries, and snarled traffic all over the city of Durban
and othere parts of South Africa.

Protesters carried picket signs calling President Thabo Mbeki "a
liar", "bully", and warning that the government will face even more
disruptions, which would threaten the power of the African National
Congress government and "their rich friends backing them." Many
described the conflict between COSATU, the DSF, and the ANC
government as a "class war", which they saw as resulting one day into
a "coup of the poor" to throw the rich and their ANC politicians out
of power.  All day long, the marchers angrily spoke about
the "treachery" of the ANC, whom they said had "sold out" the poor of
the country. Some even said that President Mbeki "shamed" his father,
Govan Mbeki, who had died earlier that day, and whom was generally
respected as a champion of the poor. Because of Mbeki and the ANC,
they said, millions had neither land nor jobs, that over 3 million
were homeless, 3.5 million unemployed, and millions of others without
farms or land to sustain themselves.

Thousands of us assembled at the Natal Technical College, and marched
all the way through Central Durban, picking up thousands of people
along the way, until finally we came to the International Convention
Center in the business district, where the main conference was being
held. When the marhed ended, a rally was held, where speaker after
speakers condemned the United States and Israel as "evil twins"
sanctioning and carrying out genocide in the Middle East. President
George W. Bush ("that racist cowpoke") and the USA was especially
condemned for "arrogantly thumbing their noses" at the conference and
attempting to dominate the conference agenda, when Bush called for
the elimination of anydiscussions around reparations for slavery and
any designation of Israel as a "racist Zionist" state.

Because Israel had chosen the week of the conference to attack a
Palestinian city in the West Bank earlier in the week, there had been
serious tensions between the Israeli "peaceniks" and Palestinian
deloegates to the NGO conference. In fact, there were daily militant
demonstrations and counter-demonstrations, which quickly became
confrontations that had to be separated by the United Nations
security police and Metro Durban officers assigned to the NGO
conference (which preceded the meeting of heads of state). This also
inflamed the Arab and Asian communities in Durban and other cities.
Large numbers of muslim pro-Palestinian demonstrators poured into
Durban for the protest on Friday, and played a major role in the
march. In fact, there seemed to be more support from both the
Africans and Asians at this demonstration than at any other iId seen
since I'd arrived in South Africa, even more than at the NGO
conference itself.

The march included a number of urban homeless, rural landless (so
called 'squatters") and other desperately poor whom the ANC
government had recently used police forces to drive out of shantyowns
and settlements in the months preceeding the conference. (In video
that was shown all over the world, the police brutally destroyed
hamlets, personal property, and used excessive force), according to
protesters. At a press conference earlier in the week, leaders of the
landless movement, said that the ANC land policies were a failure,
a "tragedy", and that the poor were being crushed. They said that
landlessness itself was a symptom of racist and economic domination,
a carryover from the racist apartheid regime, but was not being made
a priority by the ANC ruling party.  The demonstration was called for
to unite all their forces, and to show that they would not passively
accept the government's anti-poor economic policies.

I have never been in a protest march like this one, though I had been
to a lifetime of protests all over the world. Elders and the youth
alike sprang into action, literally jumping and running many parts of
the route, while screaming slogans. The march itself lased almost 3
1/2 hours, over a course of about 5 miles. Thousands of ordinary
working class and poor people came out of their houses, churches,
stores, and other places to join in, and thousands of others stood on
the sidewalks to spur us on. It literally stopped all action in
Durban, a city of 3.2 million people. I know I will never forget this
march, and felt that I was part of a great historical happening. Most
felt that this was the start of a new movement, a poor peoples
movement which would not be denied or ignored, and that the poor
population would begin to speak with a loud voice. They were
insistent  that neither ANC government bureaucrats, heads of state,
or anybody else would speak for them anym! ! ore. They would not be
victims in a country they had fought to create in the battle to
overturn apartheid, and they forcefully said that they would take
control of their own destiny.

The real story in South Africa is not what is happening at the World
Conference Against Racism, whether with statesmen mildly "debating"
over racism or lawyers at the NGO arguing over fine details of
resolutions and political statements on reparations or United Nations
procedure, the real story is what is happening in the streets with
the poor and working class people of South African developing a new
social revolutionary movement.  That's where I always want to be: on
the streets with the common people while they make revolution.

-END-





----------------------------------------------------------------------
----------
Do You Yahoo!?
Get email alerts & NEW webcam video instant messaging with Yahoo!
Messenger.


------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
Get your FREE credit report with a FREE CreditCheck
Monitoring Service trial
http://us.click.yahoo.com/MDsVHB/bQ8CAA/ySSFAA/XgSolB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->

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