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May 28, 2016 - No. 22 Liberal Party's Controversial New Party Constitution What Kind of
Political Party Do
Canadians Need to Engage in Nation-Building
• Liberal
Party's Controversial New Party Constitution
Liberal Party's Controversial New Party Constitution What Kind of Political Party Do Canadians Need to Engage in Nation-Building Against Empire-Building?An item on the agenda of the Liberal Party of Canada's biennial policy convention taking place in Winnipeg May 26-28 is a new party constitution. The Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) thinks that whether or not the leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada manages to get this new party constitution adopted, all Canadians concerned about the state of politics today should take the time to study what the Liberal leadership is proposing.
In the opinion of CPC(M-L), the Liberals' striving to find a commonness between movement and organization is a form of anti-politics which will further concentrate political power in fewer and fewer hands while keeping the people disempowered. This means that the issue of the fraudulent way in which the consultation over this new constitution was conducted and the failure of this process to provide this constitution with legitimacy is not the only matter of concern when it comes to this new Liberal adventure. Of even greater importance is the question of what kind of political party the people need. This question is central to the success of the people's movement for empowerment. The deep crisis of the party-dominated system of representative democracy cannot be ignored by pushing the pretense that mass parties, also called "big tent parties," ipso facto represent "the people." Does the term "mass" when applied to a political party merely refer to numbers or also a quality? What is that quality? Does it not concern the question of who wields political power and to what end? Can this issue be circumvented by creating something called new based on the claim that it is new because it is open, and because it is open it is democratic? Far from it, the Liberals' own claim that the alleged modernization of the Liberal Party is for purposes of winning the next federal election in 2019 shows this to be a fraud. Canadians are deeply concerned by the domination of the political process by political parties of the establishment. These political parties function in very definite ways and are in very deep crisis precisely because they preserve privilege, serve the tiny minority of the rich and serve to keep the people apolitical, marginalized and out of power. It is not political parties per se which are the problem but the profound crisis of the bourgeois nation-building project and bourgeois nation-state which now lie in tatters in a world where the biggest monopolies have established their interests as supreme on a supranational basis. The claim that there can be politics without political parties so that policies can be made by the people, and not from positions of power, is to cover up what the establishment parties are up to. The question of what kind of political party is needed by a modern polity and by a society which requires sovereignty to be vested in the people so that it can progress and, ultimately, the question of political power itself are what need to be discussed. In this issue TML Weekly is providing information on the Liberal Party's new constitution and an item titled "More Than a Movement, Less Than a Party": Attempts to Wreck the Movement of the Working Class to Realize its Aim. This item was first presented by the Central Committee of CPC(M-L) in December 2007 at a National Seminar on the Evolution of Political Parties in Canada held as part of preparations for the 8th Party Congress held in August 2008. The Seminar was attended by Party activists from across the country and the presentation was subsequently circulated to all Party members in June 2008. Liberal Party's Controversial New Party ConstitutionAn item on the agenda of the Liberal Party of Canada's biennial policy convention, held in Winnipeg May 26-28, is a new party constitution. The Liberal Party's director of communications Braeden Caley is quoted by The Hill Times as saying that the proposed constitution aims "to modernize, strengthen, and open up" the party. Liberal Party President Anna Gainey said, "I believe that as we continue to open up and modernize and have more of a movement than a traditional political party, that this is a natural progression of that." Party Leader and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said, "Canadians are counting on us to keep building, modernizing and opening up our movement. We can't let them down."[1] Reports say the proposed new Liberal Party constitution
will go to a vote May 28, the final day of the Liberals' biennial
policy convention in Winnipeg. All delegates attending the convention
will be eligible to vote. To pass, the proposed new Liberal
constitution requires the support of at least two-thirds of voting
delegates in attendance for the plenary.
"Currently, the Liberal Party has more than 18 constitutions including the federal party constitution, constitutions of the party's federal wings in all provinces and territories, and commissions such as the Young Liberals Commission, National Women's Commission, Aboriginal Peoples' Commission, and the Seniors' Commission," The Hill Times reports. "The proposed constitution makes the membership free for any Canadian who wants to register, overhauls the party structure, and makes significant changes to the financial management and governance mechanisms of riding associations and commissions. If the proposed party constitution is passed this week, the party will have only one constitution ... and the party's board of directors will draft bylaws to run the operations of the party, its federal wings in provinces and territories, and electoral district associations and commissions," The Hill Times reported, adding it "has been trimmed down to 12 pages from the current 77 pages." If the new constitution is approved on May 28, some of the changes will take effect immediately, some changes will take place over the remainder of 2016 as the National Board of Directors passes new by-laws, and some changes will start taking effect on January 1, 2017. According to the Liberal Party of Canada, it is all about building a new Liberal movement through renewal and consultation. At the same time, the constitutional changes are advertised under the slogan: "One party, one goal: Modernizing our movement to win in 2019." The Liberal Party of Canada says the proposed new constitution "unifies the Party under one constitution and national board, while maintaining and guaranteeing regional voices and representation." As well, it "supports Electoral District Associations (EDAs) as the central engagement unit for Liberals in our communities, while making it easier for the Party to assist EDAs without 338 different constitutions and varying financial rules." It focuses regional boards on their core mandate of working with EDAs on election readiness and engaging Canadians, including supporting policy development." It also "maintains the existing voting composition of the National Board, with the positions of Policy Chair and Membership Secretary being renamed Policy Secretary and Party Secretary; eliminates party structures that had fallen into disuse or no longer served their intended function; ends the formal legal blended structure for Atlantic provinces (which presented legal challenges) while maintaining the successful status quo on staffing, organizing, and cooperation in these provinces;" and "substantially maintains all of the existing open leadership rules, which successfully attracted over 300,000 supporters during the 2012/2013 Liberal leadership race." However, despite the claim of the central Liberal Party apparatus that the proposed constitution has been broadly discussed and meets the approval of the majority of Party members, it has proven controversial. Tom Addison, president of the federal Ontario electoral district association of Kingston, says the proposed new constitution is an attempt to centralize power "within a small circle around the leader."
What is meant by consultation and how it takes place is
central to the concerns expressed over the proposed new
constitution. The website Liberal Members Matter set up by
Tom Addison to rally support to vote down the proposed
constitution has views such as the following: - "Less than 10 per cent of the party membership received a survey to begin with, among that number a significantly smaller number returned the survey. Of those who did receive it the majority could see that there was nothing balanced in the survey, it was created with the purpose of achieving a single result. A long time Liberal member, who happens to have spent his entire professional career with one of Canada's leading public opinion polling firms was heard to say, 'If one of my interns had ever brought me a survey that looked like that, they would have been fired on the spot.'" - "The Liberal Party has made a lot of claims surrounding their recent survey of the membership. During a recent National Town Hall Telephone Call, LPC National President stated that there were actually two surveys conducted. These two surveys yielded approximately 2,000 responses. So based on less than 5 per cent of the national membership and less than 0.5 per cent of the number of 'Supporting' members, the LPC considers this to be consultation." Liberal Director of Communications Caley's promotion of the process as legitimate would in fact seem to corroborate the accusations that the survey results do not constitute discussion on the actual proposed changes. He told The Hill Times that "more than 2,000 Liberals participated in the survey. He said that 98 per cent of survey participants said that they support modernizing the party, 91 per cent said the party should have one constitution like other parties, 96 per cent said they want to make the party more open, and 99 per cent said that they want to make the policy development process more innovative and open." He then said that delegates "will have the opportunity at convention, as they've had over the last number of months, to express their views and that's an important purpose of the convention... And that's the value of the democratic process within the Liberal Party is to have those discussions, and to constantly be looking how the party can improve its engagement with Canadians, be more open to their ideas, and their involvement, and I know that's going to be a significant focus for this convention."
Who Said What
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In a Hill Times report,
Addison said "grassroots
members were never consulted in the drafting process of this
constitution." He said "the party sent out a survey to the party
membership to gauge their opinion after the drafting process was
already completed. Even the survey that was sent out, less than
10 per cent of the party membership received it and some riding
association executives did not get it. Two other riding
association presidents who spoke to The Hill Times on a
not-for-attribution basis confirmed that a significant number of
members and some riding association executives never received the
survey and were not satisfied with the consultation process."
A speech given by
Public Services and Procurement Minister Judy Foote on May 25
focused on the government's program to escalate construction of
warships, referred to as a "National Shipbuilding Strategy."
Foote said that Prime Minister Trudeau has asked her to
prioritize this aspect including "ensuring the Royal Canadian
Navy is able to operate as a true blue-water maritime force."
Foote also praised the Irving Shipbuilding company in Halifax and
Seaspan in Vancouver, described as "centres of excellence"
selected to "build Canada's combat and non-combat vessels."
Inside the
CANSEC showroom Sajjan toured the booth of General Dynamics Land
Systems (GDLS), the manufacturer of the $15 billion in light armoured
vehicles (LAVs) approved by the Trudeau government for sale to
Saudi Arabia. Media report that Sajjan said "That's great" upon
being briefed by a GDLS official on the capabilities of the
vehicle. A May 11 report by the Globe and Mail showed that
Saudi Arabia used LAVs to suppress protests inside the country as
recently as 2015.
A most important quality
of Oscar López Rivera is his
refusal in 35 years to renounce any of the positions in support
of the sovereignty of Puerto Rico for which he was jailed. This
steadfastness and fidelity to the cause of the Puerto Rican
people has been recognized throughout Latin America, the
Caribbean, the U.S. and around the world by all the forces who
are fighting for dignity, justice and independence and against
U.S. imperialism. This is also the quality of the Puerto Rican
people who in the face of the massacres and other atrocities,
police intrigues, plunder and colonial dictate continue to fight
for their sovereignty and dignity. The all-sided support for the
liberation of López Rivera is an expression of the fighting
unity
of Puerto Ricans and their refusal to surrender.
It is necessary to take
into account that Oscar
López
Rivera has endured the toughest of all possible conditions in
prison during the past 35 years of confinement. Oscar Lopez is a
veteran of the Viet Nam war and received the Bronze Star Medal
for his heroic act of saving the life of an American during one
of the battles in which he participated. After Vietnam Oscar
returned to his community in Chicago where he became a respected
activist. Among other important actions, he helped found the
Pedro Albizu Campos High School in the Puerto Rican community
there and the Juan Antonio Corretjer Cultural Center, which
currently is still in operation providing services to youth and
adults residing in the area.
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No recent example has been more heinous than that of Libya, whose government was overthrown by the U.S.-led aggressive military alliance NATO and its proxy forces in 2011. This was the most cynical revenge by the imperialists against the Libyan people and their leadership which fought to defend Libya's interests and would not kowtow to imperialism. One particular consequence of the NATO bombing campaign was the racist terror inflicted on Libyans of Sub-Saharan African origin, many of whom were killed brutally and whole towns such as Tawergha were emptied. The NATO powers and their monopoly media went to great efforts to spread lies of "African mercenaries" specifically targeting Black Libyans for attack.
The aftermath of "regime change" in Libya has been widening instability, lawlessness and terrorism not only in that country but throughout north Africa and West Asia. The countries responsible include all the old colonial powers, as well as Canada. These countries must be held to account and reparations made for this crime and all the historical crimes and those of the present against African peoples. The U.S. and NATO are planning more such tragedies which must not be permitted to pass.
In the countries of southern Africa, many of which waged the most glorious and heroic Liberation struggles throughout the 1960s to 1980s against the colonial powers and racist apartheid rule, the people are displaying the same heroism as they confront the problems of nation-building today. A major problem they are confronting is the continued control of important sectors of the economy by racist monopoly capital, whether foreign or coming from the legacy of racist minority rule. The peoples of countries such as Zimbabwe, South Africa and Angola which delivered strong blows against imperialism have worked staunchly to ensure that this legacy does not have the upper hand. The question of the land and its historic theft from the people remains of utmost importance and land reforms and redistribution have been an historic step to ensure the people have an economic base which can guarantee their livelihood and development.
Canadians and Quebeckers, who proudly count among their ranks the daughters and sons of Africa, must see to it that Canada has a government that has foreign relations based on mutual respect and benefit with the countries of Africa. Canada must repudiate participation in imperialist aggression against African countries and take a stand against all those that seek to exploit, aggress or invade others.
The Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) firmly rejects the paternalistic attitude toward African countries taken by successive Canadian governments to justify exploitive relations or foreign intervention. CPC(M-L) calls on all its members and friends to oppose aggression against the countries of Africa, support the struggles of the peoples and inform themselves and others about the developments taking place there today.
On the occasion of African Liberation Day, CPC(M-L) sends militant revolutionary greetings to all the peoples of Africa fighting to exercise control over their lives, countries and economies so as to guarantee a bright future for themselves and their children. CPC(M-L) salutes their achievements and contributions to the worldwide movement for national liberation which are second to none and that have uplifted all of humanity.
Pentagon and CIA Continue to Destabilize
African
Continent
Today the African Union faces formidable development and security challenges
May 25, 2016 marks the 53rd anniversary of the formation of the Organization of African Unity (OAU), now known as the African Union (AU) since 2002.
The holiday commonly known as Africa Day or Africa Liberation Day, comes during a period of increasing interference from the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
At a summit in 1963 held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, at
least
32 African heads-of-state gathered to form the OAU in efforts to
foster the rapid decolonization of the continent and to move
towards greater cooperation among the various governments. From
the onset the OAU encompassed diverse and conflicting views on
how Africa should move towards unity.
Founding meeting of the OAU, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, May 1963
Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, the then president of the Republic of Ghana and founder of the ruling Convention People's Party (CPP), called for the immediate formation of a continental government with integrated military, economic and social systems. Nkrumah believed that if Africa did not unite imperialists would reverse the minimal gains made by the national liberation movements and political parties.
Other more moderate and conservative states represented in the so-called Monrovia and Brazzaville Groups advocated a more gradualist approach. Others even within the progressive forces did not embody the militant commitment to unification and socialism [of] Nkrumah and Guinean leader President Ahmed Sekou Toure, who along with Modibo Kieta of Mali had formed the Ghana-Guinea-Mali Union in 1960.
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Nkrumah stressed at the founding OAU Summit that "On
this
continent, it has not taken us long to discover that the struggle
against colonialism does not end with the attainment of national
independence. Independence is only the prelude to a new and more
involved struggle for the right to conduct our own economic and
social affairs; to construct our society according to our
aspirations, unhampered by crushing and humiliating
neo-colonialist controls and interference."[1]
He went on, saying, "From the start we have been threatened with frustration where rapid change is imperative and with instability where sustained effort and ordered rule are indispensable. No sporadic act or pious resolution can resolve our present problems. Nothing will be of avail, except the united act of a united Africa. We have already reached the stage where we must unite or sink into that condition which has made Latin America the unwilling and distressed prey of imperialism after one-and-a-half centuries of political independence."
Nkrumah was overthrown three years later at the aegis of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the U.S. State Department and other imperialist entities. His ideas nonetheless are still relevant today in light of the growing militaristic and intelligence penetration of the African continent.
Some Examples of Imperialist Militarism Today:
The DRC
and Mercenary Interests
In the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) a leading opposition figure was exposed for having hired mercenaries from the U.S. to provide security for his campaign.
Moise Katumbi, a former governor of Katanga Province, who is now a presidential candidate has faced allegations that he hired mercenaries to assist him in the bid to become leader of the mineral-rich state in Central Africa. On May 9, Katumbi was questioned by the authorities in DRC when he denied the accusations.
Reuters press agency said "The enquiry could lead to charges that carry a prison term and could also tie Katumbi in legal knots that could derail his campaign to succeed President Joseph Kabila at elections scheduled [in] November. Many Congolese people say Katumbi is the strongest opposition candidate to succeed Kabila, given his personal wealth and popularity as the former governor of Congo's main copper-producing region. He also owns a soccer team."
Senegal Signs Defense Pact with Pentagon
The Senegalese government in West Africa has signed a military agreement with the Pentagon giving Washington full access to the country.
Dakar participated in the Flintlock military exercises that are conducted annually by the Pentagon working in conjunction with other African and European states. The U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) coordinates these military maneuvers along with similar operations in various regions of the continent.
Relations between Senegal and neighboring Gambia have been strained for years. The U.S. escalation of military cooperation and economic assistance to Senegal are only fueling tensions in the region.
An article in Reuters reported "The Defense Cooperation agreement 'will facilitate the continued presence of the U.S. military in Senegal,' said Senegal's Minister of Foreign Affairs Mankeur Ndiaye. The agreement 'will also help to enhance security cooperation and further strengthen defense relations to face common security challenges in the region.'"[2]
War Threatened in Western Sahara
In the Western Sahara, Africa's last colony, there are
threats
of war from Morocco, a close ally of the U.S. Morocco occupies
Western Sahara in contravention of the official policy of both
the AU and the United Nations.[3]
Western Sahara is a former Spanish colony where Morocco took administrative control in the 1970s. A resistance movement known as the Polasario Front grew out of the demand for full national independence.
After years of fighting, a ceasefire agreement between Morocco and Polasario prompted the establishment of MINURSO in 1991, formally recognized as a United Nations mission. The UN will vote once again on whether to extend the mandate of MINURSO. The UN mandate provided for an internationally-monitored referendum in which the people of Western Sahara could choose whether to pursue independence from or integration with Morocco. This promised referendum has not been held.
The AU maintains official recognition of the Western Sahara people, which caused the Kingdom of Morocco to withdraw from the regional organization. Western Sahara has phosphates and other minerals, making it a source of potential wealth in northwest Africa.
CIA Trains Children as Spies in Somalia
[I]n Somalia, where the CIA has a field station, the agency is providing training to children as spies who target members of Al-Shabaab in the ongoing counter-insurgency campaigns in the Horn of Africa. These training programs are carried out through the Somalia National Intelligence and Security Agency (NISA) which works closely with the CIA.
Western imperialist states such as the U.S. and those within the European Union (EU) fund and train the African Union Mission to Somalia (AMISOM) deploying 22,000 troops that work alongside the Somalia National Army.
Sputnik News reported on April 7 that, "In an interview with The Washington Post, the boys said that the country's National Intelligence and Security Agency (NISA) had been using them as 'finger-pointers.' They would be sent to dangerous neighborhoods where al-Shabaab insurgents were hiding and told to point out their former comrades. On many occasions their faces were not covered, although the agents concealed their own. It's scary because you know everyone can see you working with them. The children were used on other missions to collect intelligence and sometimes told to wear NISA uniforms. According to the boys, they were threatened if they refused to cooperate, and their parents didn't know where they were."
Africa Must Unite Against Imperialism
Only an upsurge from the left and anti-imperialist forces can fulfill the visions of a true united Africa in line with the work of Nkrumah, Gaddafi and other revolutionary leaders. The worsening economic crisis due to the decline in commodity prices and western sponsored destabilization is reversing the advances made in regard to growth and development over the last decade.
Africa Liberation Day remains a vehicle to propagate the genuine liberation and unification of the continent under a socialist system. Africa Liberation Day demonstrations have been held annually in various cities across North America since 1972.
Abayomi Azikiwe is the editor of the Pan-African News
Wire, an
international electronic press service founded in 1998 to foster
discussion on the affairs of African people throughout the continent
and the world. Azikiwe is the author of numerous articles and
monographs and his writings have been published in the Zimbabwe
Herald, The New Worker in England, Africa
Insight in South Africa, the Center for Research on
Globalization in Montreal, The 4th Media in Beijing, Capital
Asia in Malaysia, the Albany Tribune, Black
Agenda Report, The San Francisco BayView,
SpyGhana.com in West Africa, Pambuzuka News in Kenya,
and Workers World, where he serves as a contributing
editor.
Notes
1. May 24, 1963
2. May 2, 2016
3. AllAfrica.com, April 29
The International Criminal Court:
A Mechanism for
Criminalising Opposition
to Foreign Intervention in Africa
A protest against foreign interference in the Central African Republic,
December 21, 2012.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) was established on 17 July 1998 when 120 states adopted the Rome Statute which is the legal basis of this organisation. The court, which is based in The Hague, Netherlands, should not be confused with the International Court of Justice (ICJ). The latter is part of the United Nations and deals with legal disputes between UN member states.
The ICC, on the other hand, is not part of the UN and has as its stated aims to "exercise its jurisdiction over persons for the most serious crimes of international concern" and "to put an end to impunity for the perpetrators of these crimes." The Rome Statute identifies these crimes of concern as genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression. The Rome statute entered into force on 1 July 2002 and so only deals with crimes which took place after this date.
One striking feature about the establishment of the ICC was that the organisation started life without an agreed legal definition of the crime of aggression and so could take no action against those who organised and carried out this crime. This was a rather striking omission, given that as far back as the Nuremberg Tribunals in 1950 crimes against peace were already clearly legally defined as:
(i) Planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression or a war in violation of international treaties, agreements or assurances;
(ii) Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of any of the acts mentioned under (i) Furthermore, such was the clarity on these matters at the time, that the chief American prosecutor at the Nuremberg Tribunals, Robert H. Jackson, described the crime of aggression thus: "To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."
Notwithstanding the existing body of international law, the ICC, at its inception was unable to legally define the crime of aggression which Jackson had described some 50 years earlier as the "supreme international crime" which contained all the other war crimes within itself. Eventually, in 2010 at its meeting in Kampala, Uganda, the ICC established a legal definition for the crime of aggression and the conditions under which such a crime would fall within its jurisdiction after 1 January 2017 when this agreement enters into force. These conditions are essentially two. First, a crime of aggression only comes within the jurisdiction of the ICC if it is referred to it by the security council of the UN. Secondly, a state which is party to the Rome Statute can refer a situation to the ICC if it thinks the crime of aggression has been committed.
However, before the ICC can act, it must approach the UN Security Council to find out if this body has determined that a crime of aggression has taken place. In addition, states which are party to the Rome statute can opt out of the court's jurisdiction with regard to crimes of aggression and those states which are not party to the Rome statute, such as the USA, are specifically excluded from the ICC's jurisdiction with regard to the crime of aggression. This contrasts strongly with the situation regarding the other crimes with which the court allegedly deals, namely genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. The court's jurisdiction applies to all countries for these crimes, whether or not they are parties to the Rome Statute, as long as they are referred to it by the UN Security Council. Through these mechanisms, the big powers which hold vetoes in the UN Security Council are able to carry out crimes of aggression and all the other war crimes that these entail with utmost impunity. This is why today when aggression, regime change and mass human right violations have become the preferred method for the big powers to secure their interests, the perpetrators of these crimes, like Blair, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Sarkozy, Aznar, Obama, Hillary Clinton and others are walking around scot free. Therefore it is crystal clear that from its outset, the ICC was not set up to prosecute "serious crimes of international concern" nor "to put an end to impunity for the perpetrators of these crimes."
Notwithstanding its inability to bring to book the major war criminals of our time, the ICC has busied itself with Africa. Of its 10 cases which the ICC currently lists on its website, nine are in Africa. Observers note that of the 39 people who have been indicted by the ICC, 38 are Africans. This vigorous pursuit of Africans by the ICC is contrasted with its approach when it comes to others engaged in war crimes.
For example, on 5 July in 2013 the Comoros Islands referred a case for consideration to the ICC, since the boats which were in the peace flotilla to Gaza and which were attacked by the Israeli army were registered in the Comoros. On 6 November 2014, the ICC rejected the Comoros case on the grounds that it did not meet 'the legal requirements of the Rome Statute.'
In reality, the ICC in Africa
operates as the legal arm
of
the USA/EU/NATO axis and its role is to criminalise any
opposition to the interference of these forces in Africa.
Currently, the former president of Ivory Coast, Laurent Gbagbo,
is being "tried" by the ICC in The Hague. His crime relates to
his opposition to the French and UN intervention into the affairs
of Ivory Coast following the elections in that country in 2010.
The contested results of the November election that year proved
to be the trigger for massive French and UN interference in Ivory
Coast for the purposes of propelling their preferred candidate
into power and for overthrowing the then government of Laurent
Gbagbo which was viewed as unacceptable to the USA, Britain and
France. Working closely with the troops of the so-called United
Nations Operations in Cote d'Ivoire (UNOCI), which has been
active in that country since 2004, the French troops overthrew
the government of Laurent Gbagbo and installed their preferred
candidate, Alassane Ouattara, a former IMF employee.
Another case in point is that of Libya. In the lead-up to the NATO attack on Libya and in order to facilitate it, the ICC rushed out indictments against Muammar Gaddafi and other leading members of the existing Libyan government. In this way, the ICC plays a key role in legitimising the attacks on Africa and criminalising any opposition to these attacks. Not surprisingly, the real war crimes that NATO committed in Libya, including the aggression itself, the ethnic cleansing of places such as Tawergha and the racist pogroms against West African migrants who were living in Libya at the time are of no concern to the ICC.
Clearly recognising the dangerous role that the ICC plays with regard to Africa, there are growing moves on the continent to disentangle Africa from this organisation. In October 2015, South Africa withdrew from it and at the 26th annual assembly of the AU in Addis Ababa in January 2016, the organisation agreed to create a road map for the withdrawal of the AU member states from this organisation. This is a step to be applauded.
Stop Foreign Intervention in Africa is a website organized by activists opposed to foreign intervention in Africa on a military, economic, political and cultural level. It can be found at stopforeigninterventioninafrica.org.
Pan-Africanism and
Communism:
The Communist
International, Africa and Diaspora, 1919-1939 by Hakim Adi
This ground-breaking book, based on research undertaken in the archives of the Comintern in Moscow as well as archives in France, Britain, the US and West Africa, documents the activities of the Communist International in relation to Africa and the African diaspora. It focuses on a period when the world was in flux, with inter-imperialist rivalry at its height, when African and Caribbean countries, amongst others, were under colonial domination. Black people in Africa, the Caribbean and other western countries were officially considered inferior, had few rights and racism was at the level of open state policy from so-called "Jim Crow" laws and lynching in the US, to pass laws and segregation in South Africa and the colour bar in Britain.
In these circumstances many were
inspired by the
creation of
the Soviet Union, following the October Revolution in Russia in
1917, and the creation of the Communist International in 1919.
From its founding under Lenin's leadership, the Comintern sought
to inspire and support the oppressed black people throughout the
world to organise and empower themselves and break the shackles
of imperialism. The book points out that it was the Communists
who were at the forefront of the struggle against colonial rule
in this period.
The book plays an important role in chronicling the many African, Caribbean and African American Communists who took up the struggle at that time, in particular those connected with the International Trade Union Committee of Negro Workers (ITUCNW), established in 1928 under the auspices of the Comintern. The ITUCNW acted to strengthen the work of the Communist Parties to take up for solution the question of how the liberation of Africa and the African diaspora might be achieved. The book points out that in that period many key activists gravitated towards or organised in unity with the international communist movement, including Lamine Senghor in France, Isaac Wallace-Johnson in West Africa, Elma Francois in Trinidad and Jacques Romain in Haiti. In this period the Communists were often in the forefront of major international struggles, for example, to oppose fascist Italy's invasion of Ethiopia in 1935 or to demand the release of the nine African American youth arrested in Scottsboro, Alabama in 1931.
The book also examines several areas of controversy and disinformation about the role of the international communist movement in relation to African liberation. Significantly the information outlined in Dr Adi's book highlights that disinformation has often become accepted wisdom and part of continuing efforts to undermine the crucial role of Communists of African descent and of the Soviet Union itself in this period. Using his extensively researched material the writer outlines the facts about the activity and demise of the ITUCNW, as well as the changing tactics and analysis of the Comintern in the period leading to the outbreak of World War II, and leaves the reader to make an independent judgement.
This book makes an important contribution to an area of African and Caribbean, as well as Communist history that has long been neglected and which many people are unaware of. Its focus on the activities of African, African American and Caribbean Communists in the period 1919-1939 is to be welcomed. It is an area about which there remains a great deal of confusion not only with regard to the facts but also concerning the lessons to be drawn from this experience.
Dr Adi focuses his attention on the efforts of ordinary African and Caribbean people who decided to take a stand and address the many problems that confronted them in their time. Problems such as Jim Crow in the USA, and racism and violation of human rights all over colonial Africa and the Caribbean disfigured the lives of millions of people. The Communists took up this struggle with the idea of finding a revolutionary solution to it and with an understanding that solving it would be bound up with the struggle of all oppressed people for their freedom. At great personal sacrifice, these activists made a significant contribution to the mass movements for African liberation which were to burst out in the 1950s and 1960s, such as the Civil Rights movement, the Black Power movement and the independence struggles in Africa and the Caribbean. The progress that has been achieved in the struggle for African liberation to date is due in no small part to the efforts of those individuals featured in this book. It shows what a significant impact we can have on changing the world in which we live when we take up the challenges facing us and try to find solutions to them.
This book has great significance for those who are
today
involved in trying to find a solution to the many problems that
continue to confront Africans both on the continent and in the
diaspora. The point is not that we should simply repeat what was
done in 1919-39 when people were grappling with the problems of
the world as it was then. Rather, it is that we should be
inspired by their example to courageously take up the challenge
of changing the world today and using the scientific approach
which modern communism offers us.
Dr. Hakim Adi is Professor of the History of Africa and the African Diaspora at the University of Chichester. He is the author of West Africans in Britain 1900-1960: Nationalism, Pan-Africanism and Communism (London, 1998); joint author (with M. Sherwood) of The 1945 Manchester Pan-African Congress Revisited (London, 1995) and Pan-African History: Political Figures from Africa and the Diaspora since 1787 (London, 2003). He has written widely on Pan-Africanism and the modern political history of Africa and the African Diaspora, especially on Africans in Britain. He has also written three history books for children. He is currently working on a film documentary on the West African Students’ Union www.wasuproject.org.uk. His latest book Pan-Africanism and Communism: The Communist International, Africa and the Diaspora, 1919-1939 was published by Africa World Press in 2013. In 2014 his children's book, The History of the African and Caribbean Communities in Britain, was re-published for the third time.
(Workers' Weekly, May 24, 2014)
Historic Montreal May 25 Meeting of The Internationalists
Reminiscences of Hardial Bains
on the Reorganization of
The Internationalists, Montreal 1968
We arrived in Montreal May 1, 1968. Awkward, perhaps, is the word to describe a situation when coming to a city with a handicap, an obstruction in the form of a close collaborator who at the particular time was not totally dedicated to the aim for which we had arrived. This awkwardness over aim was to become a continuous source of irritation and disruption for years to come. It is important to choose with whom one goes into battle but history gave us no choice at the time.
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The city appeared quite inhospitable during the afternoon bus ride from Dorval Airport downtown to the Queen Elizabeth Hotel and the slow walk to the McGill Ghetto. With our entire earthly belongings dangling from our bodies, it felt as if everyone were looking at us, wanting to know why we had come to Montreal. Some might consider me overly sensitive or self-conscious, but I hope never again to repeat such an experience. After a terrible night at the home of some émigrés transplanted from Vancouver, we set to work.
The same streets, which had looked so inhospitable the day before, now seemed inviting. A call echoed through the cavernous streets: "The Internationalists are here; The Internationalists are here." Within days, the ranks of our organization began to swell. Individuals joined us from as far away as Vancouver but the greatest response came from the inhabitants of the City of Montreal.
When we held our first public meeting May 25, 1968, the old house on Jeanne Mance Street was bubbling with energy. The adjoining living and dining rooms and long hallway were so packed people had to be turned away at the door. The old cliché declares "nothing succeeds like success" and that certainly was the case May 25. Like most clichés, it fails to describe how our success was based and dependent, besides other factors, on our own serious, honest and conscious work. Success does not come about without serious planning in accordance with the actual conditions. The Jeanne Mance meeting was a crucial one; it would determine just how deep and successful our initial organizing work in Montreal and in Quebec would be. We were confident but one can never be sure when dealing with actual people in the heat of the moment. A feature of the meeting, besides so many unfamiliar faces, was the enthusiasm for The Internationalists and the many many questions participants wanted us to answer.
After the historic Montreal May 25 meeting, word swept the city that The Internationalists were everywhere, in their hundreds! The second meeting held just a week later was once again a resounding success. Inside, the meeting discussed the ideological offensive being waged through decadent culture, while outside a demonstration organized against us by some hippies defended that ideological offensive. Not by coincidence the main organizer of the demonstration was a transplant from Victoria, British Columbia, who was extremely upset that The Internationalists had stolen his thunder. He wanted to disrupt our meeting to show how "tough" he was but we did not want such altercations. After making some noise, they left without swaying the youth. The behaviour of the police at the time must be noted and emphasized because it became a general feature. The police did not intervene to stop the demonstration against us and from then on whenever our meetings were disrupted the police were nowhere to be seen unless we took action to end the disruption when the police would suddenly appear to attack us.
Revolutionary politics developed with great speed that summer and the ranks of The Internationalists grew rapidly. By the end of December 1968, close to seventy delegates attended our First National Conference, with organizations either established or in the process of being founded in all provinces except the Maritimes. Most healthy forces were uniting around The Internationalists with many more to follow later. This rapid advance had an objective basis. Those who joined us had emerged out of the same conditions as The Internationalists, and gravitated towards an organization that was stable and strong ideologically, organizationally and in political line. Furthermore, the organization beckoned everyone to embark on the revolutionary Marxist-Leninist road that belonged to us all. The Internationalists were not a sect but an organization of the working class dedicated to the victory of revolution and socialism.
The Internationalists were a national organization called a "Marxist-Leninist youth and student movement" but with all the attributes of a genuine Marxist-Leninist Communist Party. Marxism-Leninism was the ideological basis of the organization, democratic centralism the organizational principle with proletarian internationalism at the core of its practice. The Internationalists had not yet established ourselves as the Party because we wanted to win over some other groups who called themselves Marxist-Leninist to found one Party of the working class. We did not want to unilaterally declare a Party. Such a move would have been considered disruptive for the movement, and in retrospect, history has fully corroborated that opinion.
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Those Montreal days of May are very dear to us. They were both delicate and tough. The Internationalists had to be circumspect. The situation demanded it. No straightforward Marxist-Leninist groups existed in Montreal. The practice of the leader of one of the better organizations reflected at best the ideological confusion he was suffering. We had to be careful with this group for we knew that most members had good sentiment but ideological confusion exerted a huge pressure. We had to lift this ideological confusion resolutely but by being extremely responsible and comradely towards them.
This group invited us to a meeting of one of its committees. We sat through the meeting quietly. The proceedings confirmed our opinion that this group suffered ideological confusion. This was very particular and came from mixing up one's own interests with the aims of the movement in a manner where personal interests become the aim of the movement. At the conclusion of the meeting I was literally commanded to give my impressions and opinions of the gathering and their organization. I told them very nicely and in a cool-headed manner that they would have to excuse me because to give opinions about another organization is a very delicate matter and we would have an opportunity soon to exchange opinions at a meeting between delegations of the two organizations.
There was no stopping some of them. A very ugly atmosphere was created with a few members accusing me of cowardice for not wanting to speak in front of them. I was forced to say something. And of course, when you are in such exalted company, anything you do or say will be used against you. I began:
"You have very good sentiments, and your aim is very good..."
"Get to the point," a real boor shouted from the back.
I had kept my cool so far. Very gently, I let them know that their ideology was liberal bourgeois but before I could finish my sentence someone shouted: "We will kill you if you repeat that."
To myself I said, "Trotskyite, typical petty bourgeois" and drawing myself up to my full height sternly shot back at the man who had voiced the threat: "That would be quite a feat for a petty bourgeois like you!" I then worked hard to cool the situation down.
The person who was so bold and haughty at that time later became a real careerist, a professor in psychology or some similar field and soon disappeared from progressive politics. However, in the political heat of that Montreal summer, he along with all the others belonging to that organization joined The Internationalists.
Others in Montreal who called themselves Marxist-Leninists were connected with the Progressive Workers' Movement from Vancouver. They spent all of 1968 trying without success to keep people away from The Internationalists and to cause a split in our ranks. Meanwhile the Front de Liberation du Québec (FLQ) had all but dissipated while the unilinguists were trying to whip up racist hysteria.
The main opposition to The Internationalists during the summer was centred at McGill University. The Students for a Democratic University (SDU) was decomposing after a period of sit-ins and occupations in the fall of 1967. Although nostalgia surrounded the SDU for the previous actions, there were also recriminations and the healthy elements gravitated towards us. From the death-throes of the SDU came a "socialist" group. The word "socialist" had become a cover for all those who did not want to really deal with the question of socialism and organize to bring it about through revolution. This anti-Leninist opposition culminated in a diversionary "McGill Français" campaign, the leader of which disappeared after the War Measures Act of October 1970.
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Those days in Montreal were crucial for the building of the Party. One cannot imagine a Canadian Marxist-Leninist Communist Party without the workers from Quebec. To build the Party when we arrived in Montreal, besides uniting the various groups, the missing element was precisely the Quebec workers. The summer seemed to have an air of great events in the making and while time passed very slowly, events moved quickly. One day, one afternoon or even one hour could make the difference, could change things in a significant way. Barely six days passed from our arrival on May 1 to the reorganization of The Internationalists on May 7. A battle raged over the organizational principle of democratic centralism. The debate centred on the key point whether an individual is subordinate to the organization or not. We strongly upheld the view that the individual is subordinate to the collective, and we practised that principle. Even though we were a small organization at the time, we knew that it was crucial to stand on guard for our principles. That stand on principles would later be essential for building and expanding the organization.
The May 25 meeting took place just 24 days after our arrival. The Internationalists already had mass appeal. They were a topic of discussion in all circles, a focal point for the unity of all Marxist-Leninists across Canada to found the new Party. July 26 was another important date, a milestone when hundreds participated in our weekend conference held at Sir George Williams University (since merged with Loyola College to form Concordia University), where the broad masses approved our political and ideological program.
Many events followed in that tumultuous summer of '68, and for those who directly experienced the period their fragrance is still so very fresh. If we were to ask what was so important about that particular summer, we would have to talk not just about one but all its varied aspects. The Internationalists were strengthened in every way -- ideologically, organizationally, politically and in quantity. The Internationalists irresistibly attracted all those thinking about taking that decision to join the revolutionary Marxist-Leninists. It appeared as if they were just waiting for us. It was the mother liquid waiting for that one crystal, and there you are -- everything is crystallized. Such was the freshness and purity of what transpired that summer. It strengthened our direction and gave us more confidence. It verified the path we had been working out for more than five years, a direction which was the summation of a period transformed into the form of a real advance, the reorganization and consolidation of The Internationalists as a Marxist-Leninist organization in every sense of the word.
The summer of '68 had such a far-reaching impact that even today, if anyone becomes a traitor, they have to first violate the decisions and spirit of that period. It has been observed that the same individuals who became passive or betrayed the organization have tried to throw mud at that period and its predecessor and have become emotionally unstable as a result. It is not possible to purge one's system of the truth and fill it with falsehoods without facing dire consequences to one's emotional well-being.
(Extracts from unpublished manuscript
written in 1989. Reprinted from TML Weekly, May 25, 2013.)
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Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca