In response to Trevor Ngwane’s comment, we must acknowledge that our article “Collective Bargaining by Riot” contained errors and misleading statements. We regret any statement or suggestion that Ngwane was a candidate either for the Johannesburg metro council in 2006, or for any position as an office-bearer of the Anti-Privatisation Forum at the time of the election of Bricks Mokolo as chairperson. We know of nothing in APF policy that denied Ngwane and his comrades the right to stand in the local elections via the Operation Khanyisa movement, nor would we have denied them that right, although we have consistently rejected electoral politics as an authoritarian method that can only undermine the struggles of the oppressed classes. Let them stand if they want, but we will neither vote for them nor in any way support them. Further, we regret the misspelling of comrade Bricks’ name, while noting that Ngwane was also in error on this matter.

At the same time, we stand by our rejection of Ngwane’s authoritarian and divisive electoral politics, and we further reject his comment as a whole: it is an entirely unsupported slander against the APF, Bricks Mokolo, anarchists and autonomists. We may, indeed, have gone too far in calling Ngwane a careerist. We must acknowledge that he has made sacrifices. If Ngwane had toed the party line of the ruling ANC, of which he was once a member, he could have been a prominent party bigshot or a “black economic empowerment” businessman. We assume that he rejected such opportunities on principle, and, indeed, that his sacrifices went much further than this.

Continue reading →

It is clear that what is happening at Wits – the fee increases, privatisation of residence etc – is part of the ANC government’s plan for the general neo-liberal restructuring of the universities in order to turn them into “market universities” orientated first and foremost towards generating profit. This is a hard fact which both the ANCYL and Sasco students leading the protests have tried studiously to avoid admitting.

In the same way that government’s neo-liberal policies (eg Gear and Asgisa), which say that service delivery must be based on cost recovery and ability to pay, affect primarily the working class and poor, so too does the restructuring at Wits and other universities. The proposed 25% increase in upfront fees, the 500% increase in admin fees for students coming from outside the SADC and increases in residence fees are obviously going to affect poor and working class students the most.

The proposed outsourcing of some residences to the commercial for-profit wing of the State, the Public Investment Corporation, in conjunction with various banks, shows clearly that the intention of the government and Wits management is not to improve the university and quality of education, never mind the access of underprivileged students to higher education, it is about making profit and needs to be resisted.

Continue reading →

On Tuesday morning, 14th of August, over 1000 community members from Sebokeng’s “informal settlement” attempted to blockade the Golden Highway between Sebokeng and Johannesburg in protest at the ANC government’s inadequate service delivery since its election in 1994.

The police arrived in numbers and fired randomly at the community members, allegedly with live ammunition, seriously injuring 6 people and injuring others, including small children.

Thirty-five people were then arrested and taken to the Sebokeng police station, and are being charged with public violence and illegal gathering. When leaders of the Anti-Privatisation Forum and Coalition Against Water Privatisation, under whose banner the protest was held, arrived at the police station to enquire about the situation and try and have their comrades released nine of them were also arrested, for addressing a community gathering.

The fact that the SAPS police, under the ANC, can shoot with impunity at poor people who are merely attempting to have their most basic human rights met reminds one of the Apartheid era police. And it only goes to prove that all governments, even those democratically elected, soon turn on those they are supposed to represent, in order to defend their newly acquired wealth, power and privilege. We know very well by now that the ANC is not concerned with providing for the majority of the population in South Africa and delivering on the promises that got the ANC into power, but that it is only concerned with making a profit out of the people, and further enriching the already disgustingly rich new back elite. Even if it means charging the poorest of the poor for the most basic necessities and essential human rights such as electricity and water, which are laid down in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, of which South Africa is one of the signatory states, as well as in the ANC People’s Charter.

Continue reading →

The Zabalaza Anarchist Communist Federation (southern Africa) supports the public sector strikers, not just in their demand for a wage increase of 12%, which has now been reduced to 10%, but also in their struggle to improve the standard of all public sector services. We call on all workers and community members to show their support for this strike, as it is not just about wages but an attempt to raise the quality of public services provided to us all.

We strongly condemn the government’s attempt to intimidate workers into ending the strike by issuing dismissal notices to striking workers, and by using apartheid-era police brutality against picketers – even though the police are headed by SACP national chairperson Charles Nqakula. We support the workers’ demands that any agreement reached must be accompanied by the unconditional reinstatement of any and all workers dismissed during the strike.

We strongly condemn the government’s duplicity in its negotiators, led by Kenny Govender, having pretended for four whole months to be negotiating in good faith when Govender’s team turned out not to have the mandate of the four ANC Cabinet ministers tasked with managing the strike: Nquakula, Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota, Finance Minister Trevor Manuel and ex-communist Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi.

Continue reading →

“MK”, a member of the ZACF’s underground structures in Swaziland was among eight Swaziland youth congress (SWAYOCO) members arrested by police following a SWAYOCO demonstration in the city of Manzini on Saturday, October 1st. The SWAYOCO demonstration was to protest against King Sobhuza II’s autocratic decree of 1973 that outlawed all pro-democratic political activity in this, Africa’s last remaining “white” (monarchist) dictatorship. Today Sobhuza’s successor, King Mswati III, presides over one of the world’s highest HIV/AIDS infection rates, in a country where for people to draw water from a stream without permission is a crime – while he continues to splurge millions of rands on a private jet, swan around in a r2-million luxury Maybach vehicle and a string of palaces, and kidnap schoolgirls as his brides.

Over the past two years, the ZACF has established a presence in Swaziland as the only grassroots revolutionary organisation pushing for the overthrow of the king and of the british-south african extractive capitalism he supports.

Continue reading →

July 8 2005

We, the Zabalaza Anarchist Communist Federation (ZACF) of southern Africa, stand foursquare with the working and poor people who were apparently the targets of the craven July 7th bus and train bombings in London. We were previously called to task by another leftist revolutionary organisation for offering similar sympathies in the wake of the Madrid train bombing on March 11th last year. But we are unrepentant in our bitter opposition to terrorism in all its forms, whether driven by state or sub-state opportunism.

It matters little to us that a supposed “Secret Organization of al-Qaida in Europe” has claimed responsibility for randomly slaughtering at least 33 ordinary travellers today and injuring scores more. It matters little that the killers may cloak themselves in high ideals, perhaps including religion.

Continue reading →

23 March 2005

Comrades!

Revolutionary syndicalist greetings to the FWUCI from the Zabalaza Anarchist Communist Federation (ZACF) of southern Africa. [“Zabalaza” means “Struggle” in Zulu & Xhosa].

We are friends with a veteran of the 300-strong Shagila, which split from the Iraqi Communist Party (HCI) in 1973 and waged a guerrilla war against the Ba’athist security police and whose members crossed into Iran to support the worker’s Shorahs and community Kommitehs during the Iranian Revolution 1978-1979. And as opponents of the US-lead invasion of Iraq, we have a great interest in your organisation.

Continue reading →

Comrades, friends and all working and poor people living on or travelling through the Iberian peninsula.

We southern Africans wish to express our deep disgust at the terrorist bombings of commuter trains in Madrid on March 11 with so much loss of life and limb. We join our voices with the millions of “ordinary” people who totally reject indiscriminate killing by faceless cowards as in any way justifiable, for any cause.

As people living on a continent that has experienced not only similar terrorist bombings (in Kenya and Tanzania), but also the murderous policies of the proxy regimes of French, British, Russian, Portuguese and American capital, we empathise with your pain. That pain, inflicted on you, our sisters and brothers, by heartless people without conscience, cuts to the heart of our shared humanity, regardless whether those responsible consider themselves inspired by faith or politics.

We stand united with the victims and their families, regardless of their personal creeds, recognising that we are all being used as canon-fodder in the wars of the wealthy. We beg you to refuse to allow your anger to be turned against your neighbours, whether Basque, Muslim or north African, by cynical politicians. Basques, Muslims and north Africans travelling through Madrid are doubtlessly also among those so callously murdered. They have bled, died and cried with you.

Continue reading →

Against capitalism – Against the US government –
Against state and fundamentalist terrorism

South African anarchist statement on the New York / Washington DC attacks – September 2001

The WTC attacks

The September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Centre (WTC) and the Pentagon by suicide bombers, leading to over 6,500 deaths have grabbed world attention.

We revolutionary anarchists condemn the attacks and extend our condolences to the families of those injured or killed. The death of thousands of ordinary civilians – including many ordinary workers – is not acceptable. The use of civilian aircraft for such an operation is authoritarian and coercive and shows the contempt of terrorists for human life. It also shows that the terrorists are anti-working class: attacking people just because they are “American” regardless of their class position is reactionary and xenophobic.

Continue reading →

PRIVATISATION VERSUS PEOPLE

Privatisation is an issue that affects the working class directly. At every election time, we are visited by politicians who promise us the earth. After the elections, business as usual continues with tens of thousands of working and poor people facing evictions, disconnections and attachments of property. This situation of misery is directly linked to the process of privatisation. Privatisation is the process of turning government services and government companies into profit-making activities. This means a few simple things:

• Less jobs and lower wages, with less benefits
• Outsourcing
• Sky-rocketing prices for services
• Evictions and cut-offs and attachments if we get behind in payments

Continue reading →