SAHEL, AFRICA AND IMPERIALISM: FOR INDEPENDENT WORKING CLASS AND POPULAR ORGANISING AND MOBILISING!
The following is reprinted from our comrades of the Revolutionary Workers Group of Zimbabwe (Section of the International Leninist Trotskyist Tendency-ILTT):
FOR INDEPENDENT WORKING CLASS AND POPULAR ORGANISING AND MOBILISING TO DEFEAT IMPERIALISM!
The terminal crisis of capitalism and inter-imperialist struggle over Africa’s markets is driving the masses to reignite movements for revolutionary decolonization. The African revolution, stalled by the combined assaults of imperialist military interventions and Stalinism and Menshevism’s popular front politics subordinating the workers revolution to the “progressive” petty bourgeois leadership of national liberation movements. Decolonization under the leadership of the comprador bourgeoisie left national borders drawn by and enforced by European colonizers intact. This arrangement created a system of subjugation that exacerbated rather than eliminated the divisions colonialism imposed on historically tribal peoples. Under these leaderships the liberation movements, from 1948 to the present, have been unable to win a Pan African decolonization. This left Africa trapped, and impoverished as divided and competing dependent semi-colonies exploited by their former colonizers. Xenophobia, chauvinism, nationalist and tribalist divisions ultimately serve the imperialist powers. The Pan African aspiration can only be fulfilled by Socialist Permanent Revolution through which the working class leads the oppressed and exploited to power based on workers, small peasants, and soldiers councils creating Workers’ states in regional and continental federation.
The long illusive sovereignty promised by compradors who have been licking the boots of the IMF and World Bank to claim a share of the wealth extracted by imperialism is being challenged today by the revolutionary movements in the Sahel. Driven to revolutionary measures such as nationalization of local resources, expulsion of Western military and mutual defense, the logic of the Alliance of Sahel States (AES) countries’ fight for sovereignty is a trajectory towards federation. Marxists must address how this movement, led by radical elements of the military, can be transformed into socialist revolutions that unite and liberate the continent.
It is not only the AES nations under military leadership that are addressing sovereignty with an eye towards federation and Pan Africanist solutions. Formally democratic nations such as Botswana and Namibia and movements such as the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) in South Africa are responding to the pressure of the masses to take back Africa’s wealth from the imperialists. Across Africa the comprador class knows it has failed to meet the masses expectations. The bill has come due.
The African continent is undergoing tremendous political and economic developments driven by the global imperialist dynamics as well as the objective economic and political conditions prevailing in different countries and regions. From the north to the south, east to the west and most importantly the Sahel/AES region, important developments are taking place with a bearing on the objective conditions of the working and poor masses. The capitalist motive for extraction and maximisation of profit through the exploitation of resources, labour and political systems is expressed through the battle between different imperialist blocs, U.S. and the west on one side with China and Russia on the other, and their local proxies. Importantly, these developments have also proved the important fact that in the absence of a credible revolutionary alternative, variants of populist politics from the left to the right dominate the working class and sow illusions in the possibility of independent national development outside of imperialist control.
The legacy of colonialism compounded by semi colonial extraction and oppression has resulted in African states being economically and politically subordinated to imperialism as a source of natural resources and cheap labour whilst buying expensive manufactured and processed goods resulting in the extraction of super profits and continued economic subservience. Colonial and semi colonial developments have generally followed the same route with minor differences in political forms reflective of methods utilised by colonial and former colonial masters. Pan Africanism was, and is, a variety of Stalinist and Maoist perspective which rejected the centrality of class struggle reducing imperialist relations to race relations thereby acting as a political cover for the emerging petit bourgeois class eager to gain a share from the looted resources. It also reflected the interests of the former degenerated workers state of Russia and deformed one of China as they sought to gain a political foothold in colonial nations to use as diplomatic tools.
Post independent Africa has been characterised by a variety of nations depending on former colonial masters with political systems that helped perpetuate and defend the dependence. Radical democracy based on constituent assemblies were inadequate to raise the masses let alone the working class to power. Utilized by the comprador bourgeoisie the constituent assembly has served and mimicked western capitalist governmental institutional forms conducive to the continuation of imperialist exploitative relations. Today “formal bourgeois democracies” such as Botswana and Namibia emboldened by the AES nations are re-examining the meaning of sovereignty. Occasionally, there have been attempts by the working people, middle classes and sections of the bourgeoisie to confront imperialist domination and local oppression with varying degrees of success.
Recently there have been popular protests in Kenya, Madagascar, Morocco and Nigeria against the effects of capitalist exploitation and worsening living conditions. However, by and large even the most far reaching economic policies and gains have failed to break the relationship and imperialism has continued to dominate and plunder; such are the limits of radical democracy, only federated workers states which arm the masses will have the power to break the hold of imperialism.
Since the early 21st century, China and to some extent Russia, have made economic inroads into African states as emerging imperialist states exporting capital and goods in return for raw materials and cheap labour. They have taken advantage of the political interests of bourgeois rulers and the unbearable terms imposed by traditional western imperialism, such as the IMF. Their win-win approach and focus on infrastructural development masks the brute exploitation of labour and resources reminiscent of primitive accumulation. The infrastructure projects foretell greater exploitation of the same kind!
SAHEL/AES BLOC
Developments in the Sahel or AES bloc have ignited popular interest in imperialist machinations and the role of the working class, youth and poor farmers. It has also highlighted the dangers of the absence of revolutionary workers’ organisations and perspectives in times of crisis and under threat of populist and radical political tendencies that seek to manipulate popular anger and acute crisis as well as imperialist rivalry to position themselves as the saviours of nations whilst enriching themselves and attacking the masses on behalf of local capitalists and their section of imperialism.
Military regimes in Mali, Guinea and Burkina Faso are examples of populist petty bourgeois leaderships reaching for radical solutions to the acute crises; in countries with a small proletariat, a disorganized popular base and no revolutionary workers party in Bolshevik tradition they fill the political vacuum. Whilst advancing limited popular social and economic measures these regimes are more sensitive to the machinations of capital and imperialism than they are to those of the masses. They are attempting to provide limited solutions; in the absence of a revolutionary workers party, its perspectives, program and strategy their attempts will prove temporary. These popular military leaderships will be trapped by the contradiction between the interests of capital and labor both locally and on the international stage. There is no independent path outside the capitalist imperialist system that excludes the expropriation of all key levers of the economy, taking them under democratic workers’ control. To defeat imperialism, an independent working class led revolution must transcend popular “anti-imperialism” to become socialist on a region wide and ultimately international basis. Such a workers’ leadership fulfills a historically necessary role, fighting for socialist revolution consciously planned for and organised by a revolutionary international coordinating national sections against capital and varieties of bourgeois and petit bourgeois forces.
The closing of civic organisations and democratic space in these states point to the limitations of populist measures that seek to delicately balance between wings of imperialism and under pressure from both the masses and imperialism through the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) countries led by Nigeria. We support these regimes in their fight against western imperialism whilst also exposing the danger of aligning with eastern imperialism and calling for independent working class and popular mobilisation and organising to defeat both imperialism and war. Revolutionary Workers urge them to reject any BRICS trap. The new imperialists make no money on any possible African social liberation.
SOUTH AFRICA
In southern Africa, the rivalry between the wings of imperialism has taken a somewhat hidden form compared to the Sahel/AES. Moves by China and Russia to supplant US and western states as dominant investors and economic lords has resulted in changing political regimes, combinations and systems with South Africa being the sharpest expression of that rivalry. China has overtaken western countries and is the leading trading partner in Africa, southern Africa included. In exchange for extraction of minerals and agricultural products China and Russia have invested in a number of industries mainly in mining and manufacturing squeezing the historical imperialists out of the super profits.
In order to protect their interests and to compete with the west China uses the jargon of “Win-Win” integration into the Belt and Road Initiative linked deals as a cover for the exploitation of resources and workers. They invest in political parties, unions and governments to produce political systems that defend and advance their interests at all costs.
Supporters of the US and EU inside the ANC are not asleep at the wheel. Their influence and power was asserted with the recent appointment of a former apartheid minister as South African envoy to the US. At the same time the US is using the pressure of punitive tariffs to pile pressure and ravage the economy. Trump and Musk, cheered on by racist settlers, have amplified the lie that there is a genocide against whites as a ploy to pressure a section of the ruling regime to accede to US demands and roll back Chinese advantages.
The imperialist stirred friction and contradictions within the South African government and Tripartite Alliance, (which has dominated politics since the end of apartheid,) has led to an announcement by South African Communist Party (SACP) that it will field separate candidates in the November local government elections. This signifies no actual break from the tripartite popular front, and in fact calls for further pursuing and developing the “National Democratic Revolution (NDR),” the “Democratic Stage” of the revolution, and this means they plan to stay firmly in a Tri-partite government saddle. Political factions loyal to the US and those who favor China jockey for power; this dynamic is playing out across the continent. The role of a revolutionary workers party is to mobilize an independent working class path out from under the thumb of competing imperialist blocs. The SACP and EFF are contesting for the China franchise while the uMkhonto we Sizwe Party (MKP) which is the third largest party, uses xenophobic propaganda associating immigrant workers with crime implementing a rightist trope with violence.
The xenophobic and afrophobic attacks and mobilisations in South Africa must be seen in the context of economic crisis and manoeuvres by political actors to distract workers and poor masses from the real problems confronting society. It is a desperate attempt to package the problem in terms of nationality and legality instead of class versus imperialist interests. Openly racist parties, populist parties like MKP and ad hoc groups like March and March and Operation Dudula are at the forefront of agitating and confusing desperate masses with xenophobic and afrophobic propaganda for their own selfish reasons and those of capital and imperialism. Workers should counterpose their arguments aimed at uniting the working class across nationality and race against the capitalist system that promotes nation states and immigration as a way to divide workers and lower wages. Calls and demands such as: No one is illegal, organise migrant workers, build worker and community self defence guards and for unity of the working class, should be adopted and championed by unions.
The recent SACP convened Conference of the Left (CoL) was a desperate attempt by SACP bureaucrats to reconfigure the Tripartite Alliance in the interest of China and Russia against the pull of the ANC by the Government of National Union partners towards a closer relation with the US and the west. It also represents a belated attempt to pacify the base which is agitated by the anti-working class trajectory of the Tri-Partite Alliance and the central role by SACP to prop up and defend the Alliance at all costs. The resolution of the CoL was nothing more than a deliberate attempt by the bureaucrats to put pressure on the leading faction in the ANC as well as prepare the ground for a broad electoral vehicle to contest the forthcoming November local government elections.
BOTSWANA
In Botswana, the inter imperialist clash has taken form through democratic means. Elections have been utilised by mainstream bourgeois parties to gain or keep political power on behalf of western imperialism. The ruling party is a front for western imperialism but is increasingly tilting towards China and Russia. Recently, President Boko, under pressure from the masses, has been forced to shift strategically from total western control. Calls to have a controlling stake in the diamonds giant, De Beers, reflect the pressure from below and also from the other wing of imperialism, promising win-win agreements. Sensitive to the regional and continental anti-imperialist pressure, the government was forced to publicly deny the presence of a US military base in the country.
NAMIBIA
In Namibia the ruling party, the party of liberation, is now firmly under the armpits of Chinese imperialism. It has managed to keep a tight grip on the masses through a combination of repression and popular measures especially towards the poor peasantry who constitute its social base. The party is a tool for imperialism and the comprador bourgeoisie not tied to traditional western imperialism and major companies from South Africa. China, and Russia, have invested intensively in key sectors such as mining, agriculture and manufacturing whilst increasing its share of profit relative to other imperialists through extensive violations of labour and union rights.
ZIMBABWE
In Zimbabwe, a faction of the ruling party and class, confident of the economic interest induced indifference on the part of all wings of imperialism and the destruction of organised mainstream liberal opposition and working class movement, has moved to install a political system that best serves imperialism and local capitalists in the era of acute crisis through a controversial constitutional amendment. The highlights of the amendment are the extension of presidential, parliamentary and council terms from five to seven years as well as the removal of direct voting for the president in favour of selection by parliament. The ultimate victims of this move are workers and the poor masses who will be subjected to severe and increasing exploitation without recourse to democratic solutions. Importantly, the silence of US and western imperialism is a clear sign of their eagerness to catch up with China and Russia in the extraction of minerals and exploitation of the masses in the service of global corporations.
In Zimbabwe, China has emerged as a key economic, political and diplomatic ally of the ruling party since the early 21st century when the ruling party was forced to look east at a time when China was emerging as an imperialist state. Since then, the relationship has consolidated with China and Russia investing in virtually all sectors of the economy and the ruling party of China, the CPC, directly supporting ZANU-PF. The ruling party uses elections to claim legitimacy but recent moves to amend the constitution suggest a forced transition to “controlled democracy” as a necessary alternative to manage a semi colony under the context of global economic crisis and discarding of nominal bourgeois democratic practices.
DRC AND SUDAN
The war in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and the civil war in Sudan are also expressions of imperialist fights over resources and control resulting in the deaths of many and the destruction of infrastructure, as contending imperialist factions use local and regional military and political forces to ensure their dominance over resources extraction and labour exploitation. In both countries, and especially in Sudan, the independent voice of the working and popular masses is absent and subdued, resulting in the domination by petit bourgeois and bourgeois forces aligned to different wings of imperialism and advanced Gulf region capitalist nations. War as the most acute and vicious expression of the rivalry between wings of capital and local elites exposes the masses to death and destruction. We condemn “national liberation movements” which link the masses to one wing or the other of imperialism; by doing so they disarm the working class and trade their desire for socialism for a comprador’s share of exported superprofits. In the DRC, what imperialism, east and west, wants to liberate is Copper and rare earths!
The war in DRC is a direct result of the imperialist fight for critical mineral resources in the vast country. The fall of long-time dictator and western imperialist tool, Mobutu, opened up the country to contending imperialist forces using local and regional forces as proxies. Countries such as Rwanda, Uganda, South Africa and Zimbabwe have at one point been involved in the conflict that at its core represents a brutal fight to control resources through massive plundering and extreme exploitation of the masses.
The Sudan civil war is a brutal lesson of the inability of the masses to take power and expropriate capital in a semi colony. The counter revolution that crushed the revolution has expressed itself in the civil war as contending local factions vie for control to manage plunder and exploitation. The failure of the masses, through their popular organisations, to crush the military factions has brought the country to the brink of collapse as imperialisms rush to loot the mineral and agricultural resources.
All the examples show, in various degrees and forms, the different expressions of imperialist rivalry in parts of Africa as a result of the rise of China and Russia as imperialist powers. They also show that without the independent intervention of workers and poor masses, bourgeois forces in their various political strands will continue to dominate and subdue the interests of the masses. It also shows that China, for all its pretensions as a progressive and anti-imperialist state, is actually a central force shaping the geopolitical developments for the benefit of global corporations exploiting the working class in semi colonies.
Workers break with both blocs of imperialism!
Critical support to anti-imperialist populist military regimes of the AES!
For a working class military bloc with the regimes in the anti-imperialist fight!
For working class independent organising and mobilising!
We strike united against imperialism but march separately for permanent revolution.
Smash Xenophobia through organising migrant workers and building worker/community self defense guards!
For a workers and peasants’ government on the basis of the armed people to implement decisions that benefit the workers and the poor!
For the African socialist revolution as part of the international revolution that alone can guarantee a better life for all!
For the federated socialist states of Africa!
For a new WORLD PARTY of socialist revolution based on the TRANSITIONAL PROGRAM of 1938 to lead the revolution to end capitalism and open the road to socialism!
