2005-11-15,+Cheche+Selepe+on+Bofelo,+Cronin,+Moloantoa,+Papo+etc.

= Message from Cheche Selepe, The Developer, received 14th November 2005 =

Comrade thank you for the inputs. That one from Mphutlane Wa Bofelo writing on Gramsci and black consciousness (BC) is worth crushing, sounds like that one by Joe. But Cde Jeremy's input is comprehensive and crushes the bulk of what Mphutlane says. The practical and economic application of black consciousness is black economic empowerment.

Therefore, cde Jeremy’s critique of black economic empowerment (BEE) or the practical application of Mphutlane's philosophy of black consciousness, saves us lots of ink. You know to comrades there is no chinese-wall between the national and socialist revolutions. The NDR is the stage and driven by working class hegemony towards socialism. Cde Jeremy cites the taxi scenario as a sort-of case-study in his differentiation between BEE and broad-based-BEE. He talks positively of the failed taxi recap, a blow to BEE capitalism. Many did not know that the taxi recap has failed. Then what will happen to the near barrack-like taxi ranks being built?

Talking taxis, it was interesting to note cde Papo’s lament on the burning of train coaches in Soweto. As well as cde Moloantoa’s general defence of the acts.

Says Moloantoa: ‘... I suggest comrades we must not be too caught up in the so called rule of law, following procedures, using correct channels and all that. We live in a capitalist society, therefore the rule of law entrenches private property, ...A working class response to poverty and inconvenience induced by the Dominance of Capital and it’s a ideas can never be criminal.’

But then comes Papo alleging that in Cuba people engaging in such acts of arson can even be killed. Well, that sounds over-exaggeration; we value life comrades. But the interesting point from the comrade is that taxis are in private hands in South Africa.

‘Taxis in our country are currently under private and usually lawless hands and as the left movement we are not saying much about that fact.

Is it because the lawless are black and male that we are so quite?,’ questions Papo.

Cde Papo’s argument that taxis are in private hands is extremely arguable. It risks the fallacy of defining everything outside state-control as being private. It further negates the truth that even state-run enterprises reflect even more private characteristics.

Consider the salaries of CEO of public enterprises and mayors and city managers of local government, the likes of SAA, Telkom and so on. The argument further risks being unable to contend with the fact that there is also community control, not through the corruption-prone state in capitalistic society. And Papo’s argument invokes a highly emotive question. Some argue that the state with its failed taxi-recap wanted to nationalise the taxi industry yet big corporates like the banks and mines are left unscathed. Why wanting to bring taxis with such a wide-spread ownership into state control yet leave the gold or platinum with its narrow ownership untouched?

Cde Jeremy referres to the taxis industry and other like enterprises as petty-bourgeoisie. If that is true, which is arguable of course, then why do the likes of Papo wanting to extend state-control over petty-business yet leaving real business of banking, mining, farming and other strategic industries to act on its whims. We fighting over crumbs again. The only way out of “lawlessness” is proper public education and other public services, including a proper public transport.

Well, do the comrades know that the taxi operators do not pay rent at the new down-town camp-like mall in Bree Street, Johannesburg. They supposed to pay R2 a day, but they said NO. Even today the city of Johannesburg and its profit-driven agents running the rank are failing to source a penny from the operators. Taxi operators are also angry at having to pay fifty cents like the public to use a often smelly “public” toilet at the mall. Even in the most up-market and overtly capitalistic malls in the north of Johannesburg we do not pay to use the “public” toilets.

One once sighted the non-payment fact, triumphantly to you comrade, but taxis were dismissed as selfish in that they want a free rank yet they cannot give passengers a free ride. But what are the building blocks to socialism if it is not free education, free-toilets, free-housing, free-water and of course free ranks for the taxis. A free rank for the taxis is a building block towards a free ride to the passengers. Surely, we cannot expect a free ride when the operators have to repair their own cars, pay for petrol and so on. The next stage therefore is to get them a free petrol, free repairs, free education for their children, free housing and the stages goes on. And they will ultimately get a free lunch from the cooking hawkers once the free hawkers themselves have gone through the free-stages like the rest of others. Everything comrade goes in stages, we cannot expect a free ride before accomplishing the other preliminary stages in our struggle for freedom.

One still wonders why comrade Jeremy cites the case of taxis in his so profound piece lately. Maybe is because he works in that ministry in parliament. As to community interventions in public transport transformation, he cites interesting but not so radical interventions.

The singing inside coaches is predominantly religious sermons that really do not address the “state of the nation” issues. In fact one could expect Jeremy’s paper to be debated inside such coaches not John verse 20: in 2005. Issues around privatisation and even matters such as the JZ story need discussing inside these coaches. Not the one sided and often monologous religious rabble-rousing in which the mass participates through singing and shouting: “Amen.” You need to deploy communist cadres inside the coaches, we need to hear revolutionary songs, Igwiji inside the trains. You need to take the communist political schools out of the NO: 4 prison but right into the real prisons and the trains.

The commuta forums mainly formed in the trains have failed because of their top-down approaches that Jeremy critiques. There was and still is an unending feud between such a forum and the hawkers at the political capital of the country, Pretoria station. The station management has hegemonised the forum in such a way that crime becomes the main topic of their discussions without dealing with its root causes; poverty, joblessness, hunger and lack of education among others. Hawkers are excluded and being labelled criminals by the forum, their stock confiscated and sometimes attacked physically by the security and police.

Be that as it may, the taxi story reminds one of the recent march by operators against a radio journalist commenting that driving on a taxi is like being on a coffin-on-wheels. They marched to the offices of the SABC in KZNatal against the comments. I can assure you that the journalist did not invent the words, but borrowed them from one un-educated article flighted in the mainstream journals.

Nonetheless, any marxist criticism of BEE proves to be a valid criticism of the BC ideology, cde Jeremy’s has revealed. Whether you have a black billionaire or a black pope at the helm of the catholic church does not not make any difference really. But not to the BC ideology and and the BEE ideologue. A black Pope, black billionaire, black secretary-general of the UN and first black this or that counts a lot not only to the BC and BEE lobby but interestingly to its white racists counterparts.

It could be argued that the BC ideology and its BEE mentality justifies the racial superiority views held by racists. Did Bofelo read the City Press comment by his comrade Mathata Tsedu. Tsedu is angry at one insurance institution defending itself for calling people a kaffir.

What makes Tsedu upset is his comrade and ex-Azapo president and BC stalwart who is boss at the company of white racism calling and defending in court that people are kaffirs. The BC stalwart-boss is papering the cracks on the walls of a racist insurance company.

It proves therefore that a symbiotic relationship between BEE and BC exists. In other words there is a close relationship between capital(ism) and race(ism), BEE is legal capitalism for blacks. This relationship earns currency once backed by religion.

To elucidate the relationship between race, money and religion look at the great similarity of thought between Joe and Bofelo. They both writing on hegemony from religious stand-points, though one is black muslim and the other a white christian. Irrespective of their somehow differing race and class backgrounds, the duo is similar in thoughts.

Joe was attempting to understand, through the application of hegemony, why blacks accepted oppression, on the one hand. And on the other, Bofelo a black-conscious fellow is attempting to dilute class with race consciousness through the application of Gramsci’s theory of hegemony.

The similarities of their thoughts also apply to state levels. Even though a Muslim state somewhere in the middle east might differ with an outrightly christian democracy in the west or a Jewish state in Israel, all of them are similar in application. Their only difference is religious, otherwise the class contradictions which define their chosen ways of life is similar.

The classics say the opposition between Jews and Muslims or Christians and Jews is a religious opposition. And how do you make religious opposition impossible? By abolishing religion. How do you abolish religion? It is only by dealing a severest blow to the class contradictions permeating society. How? Abolish private property, private education, privatisation.

As for Bofelo, his greatest error is attempting to draw similarities of thought between Gramsci and Biko. Well, there is no denying that there is a racial class, the fascists in short. One racial group can be an elite and turn another race into an oppressed class. In the USA and in apartheid South Africa or Zionist Israel this has prevailed. People do get oppressed as a race, a class and a gender group, it happens. And such societies are fascists – they are either national socialists nor national capitalists. The Jewish state of Israel is fascist, so is apartheid South Africa and the current USA. They are extreme opposites yet similar in application – the same circle cde Jabu spoke of. It boils down to a unity of opposites again.

Even though Joe and Bofelo might embrace Gramsci’s hegemony, their application of the concept suffers due to their racial, albeit different, limitations.

They both share a similar limitation with the national liberation theory in general. Hegemony as articulated by Gramsci relates to class consciousness and not racial or national, even though a racial group can be in class opposition with another. The most serious limitations of the national liberation theory gets obvious when dealing with the colonialism of a special type. How do you give two or more nations their national liberation in one country? How does one strike a national liberation deal for the palestinians and Israelis at the same time without balkanising the country. Or the Hutus and Tutsis in Rwanda and Burundi. How do you strike a national liberation deal for black and white America in the USA without breaking the states and re-racialising populations. Here the national liberation theory reaches a cul-de-suc.

The national liberation theory, often capitalistic, racial and religious, creates barriers for the Palestinian workers’ ability to mobilise their Jewish counterparts for a real freedom for all.

Same as the general despondency felt by third world workers over their first-world counterparts. This exposes the limitations of the national democratic revolution. Within the national democratic dispensation, the Palestinian workers will never achieve their national liberation at the same time as the Jewish workers in Israel. But as articulated earlier by Marx – all religion is superstition, an opium of the people.

The BC ideology is not an ‘essential element of a counter-hegemony to white supremacism and a sine quo non for the replacement of Apartheid-Capitalism with an egalitarian and anti-racist society,’ as Mphutlane alleges.

There is no Miss White America in the US yet there is Miss Black USA contests backed by business right across. Not to say one appreciates the sexist-contests, but there is also no white lawyers association in South Africa but there is the Black lawyers association. No white management forum but there is an often glorified Black Management Forum.

Without going into details on what Mphutlane hopes to “replace” the system with, it is pretty clear that black capitalism is in tandem with white capitalism. To white racists, a first black this or that and most importantly the first black capitalists are a positive development. The existence of a Miss black America is no threat at all to the existing racist American culture. To white racism, the ideology of black consciousness is no big threat because it is the opposite of white consciousness, white chauvinism and so on. It is like white economic empowerment and black economic empowerment, the unity of opposites. Taken to extremes, such consciousness leads to tribal/ethnic consciousness, including gender stereotyping and fascism.

The practical application of white racism is the economic empowerment of whites at the expense of others. And conversely, the practical application of the theory of black consciousness is black economic empowerment. And they are both not revolutionary in theory and practice even though each might be tactically useful against the other.

Black economic empowerment is no threat at all to the existing white dominated economy. This reminds one of the descriptions of the political spectrum again provided by cde Moleketi. He defined it as a circle, the more you move to the left the greater you get closer to the extreme right. And vice-versa, the more you move to the right the greater you move to the extreme left. The economic spectrum is equally the same. Do you know that we could be having one voice representing all business in the country? A voice that could have united the black National Federated African Chamber of commerce, the Afrikaner SA handelinstituut, and the predominantly English SA chamber of business as part of the build-up to a national unified voices in the country, but there was opposition to that. South Africa was supposed to be boasting one united lawyers association for all irrespective of race, colour or creed, but there was again opposition to that also. The list of these racialised oppositions is endless.

Maybe one would expect opposition to this state of affair to be from the established white beneficiaries of the old disparities. To the contrary, it was the “black” bourgeoisie that opposed the replication of what we have in parliament; one parliament for all.

Of course it is the agenda of business to represent all business (including the “second-economy”) and express its views politically as a general business view-point. The “black” voices refused to be co-opted into the established business but instead opted to represent itself and the views of all small business as a black business view and present it politically. And this is what comrade Jeremy somehow fails to understand. Though one agrees with the cde’s utterances on the so-called second-economy, including his characterisation of it as spaza shops, taxi operators and so on, there are certain points that need clarification. Though he acknowledges the different conditions in SA today and the immediate post-1917 Bolshevik-Russia, he generalises the second-economy as petty-bourgeoisie, making him indifferent from the big-business’ agenda of representing all business and presenting their views politically as a view of business in general.

He generalises further by quoting Lenin saying: “The profiteer, the commercial racketeer…these are our principal `internal’ enemies…the million tentacles of this petty-bourgeois hydra now and again encircle various sections of the workers…profiteering forces ... they will overthrow our workers’ power as surely and as inevitably as the revolution was overthrown by the Napoleons and Cavaignacs who sprang from this very soil of petty proprietorship.” (“Left-Wing” Childishness and petty-bourgeois mentality, SW, p.438-9)

Surely the petty proprietorship of post feudal, poor and backward Russia can never be the same as that of post-apartheid South Africa.

Even within the very post-apartheid South Africa, a white petty-bourgeois is different from a black petty-bourgeois in economic terms. The same could be said of a white and a black teacher or a black and white police and even between the black and white middle classes.

Behind this racialised class characteristics lies the rationale for the predominantly black character of the second-economy in SA.

And confusion arises where we fail to acknowledge the class background of the second economy people. We fail to acknowledge the fact that the second-economy, or what cde Jeremy deems derogatorily called the informal sector, is in fact populated by people staying in the informal settlements (shacks) hence it is informal.

Having characterised the informal economy as spaza shops, back-yard hair-salon, makeshift motor mechanics and taxi operators among others, cde Jeremy says: Unless the ANC as a mass-based, democratic and self-styled “disciplined force of the left” begins to assert a real revolutionary authority and discipline over its legislature caucuses, for instance, a petty bourgeois cadre focused almost entirely on commercial racketeering will swallow the organisation.’

Really, very few, if any of the spaza operators and hair saloners do pose any serious threat of penetrating the movement for its own profit-driven interests. In fact this sector of the working class is so poorly organised that it could never pose any serious threat to the movement. Besides, this also boils down to the generalisation of the petty-bourgeoisie by the comrade. Naturally, being petty-bourgeoisie means being somewhere near the bourgeoisie. And no class in SA is so close to the bourgeoisie like the middle class. And no class stands to join the bourgeoisie than the middle class. The billionaire Bill gates was never from a working class background but middle class.

The converse is also true, over eighty percent of our cadres including the overseas educated is from middle class backgrounds, comrade Papo agrees.

In strict class terms the petty-bourgeoisie is mainly drawn from the middle class and very few middle class blacks and whites do opt for setting-up spaza shops and running a taxi business. The bulk of the second-economy people are drawn from the retrenched workers with little education but at times stuck with a retrenchment package. Others are very poor people from the countryside and townships with no prospects of ever finding employment. The rest being those who could not tolerate wage-slavery.

In essence the petty-bourgeoisie that Lenin speaks of is the middle-class of today’s South Africa not spaza shops and hawkers.

I understand why you suggest it should be distributed widely. Maybe because you see faults in it. Or is it a hot piece that needs dishing out as soon as possible. Of course it is a revolutionary piece by far.

His positions on the movement presidency, the so-called succession debate and the second economy are all interesting. He talks audaciously, trenchantly and unwittingly on JZ unlike in his previous document.

Earlier he cautioned against township revolts and 'some of the "JZ" mobilisations as acquiring a “populist,” “anarchic” character.'

Now the comrade points out that comrade JZ does not necessarily provide an alternative towards socialism and for him the wayforward is to build on the current momentum against corruption.

'The Zuma crisis, the constant round of corruption scandals, and growing township disaffection with perceived or actual corruption in local government, have created an important opportunity in which a principled ANC-led offensive against corruption becomes possible and desperately necessary.'

It is the comrade’s lament on the JZ saga that resulted in a debate with the then branch secretary and now provincial something; cde Zico.

Cde Zico also agrees with cde Jeremy on launching an offensive against “corruption” on the wake of the JZ-saga. He is a neutralist, arguing that cde JZ is a bourgeois fighting another within the movement. In other words, the movement is bourgeoisie. According to comrade Zico, the country was sold for R500 000 to French imperialism by a bourgeoisie comrade JZ and he should face the music. He should be charged, and if needs be, imprisoned.

‘Comrades Winnie, Yengeni as well as Nelson and Tshwete for rugby, all went to court and lost their cases, so comrade JZ should follow,’ says comrade Zico just like an editorial in The City Press. Of course one cannot accurately write what cde Zico have said, but generally he wants to say comrade JZ is criminal and should be jailed if found guilty.

Surely comrades, we agree with comrades Zico and Jeremy regarding the fight against corruption, including the rampant daily corporate theft of the country’s wealth. But comrades like Zico, are extremely biased.

This calibre of “comrades” fails to deal with the real criminals or even the root causes of crime, but instead they have resorted to witch-hunting within the movement and its allies. They are searching for criminals among the comrades and leave the real criminals doing the looting. They have re-instigated the old-apartheid policy of criminalising the comrades and tantamountly the struggle in general.

These “comrades” are beginning a very dangerous feeling of mistrust and fear among the comrades. Their agenda leads to nothing but a situation wherein the comrades shall concentrate on the BEE-left-overs that account for minus one percent of the wealth at the JSE, without dealing with the looted 99%. The comrades want us to concentrate on the alleged R500 000 per annum “stolen” by cde JZ instead of the +R500 000 billions looted by the bourgeoisie yearly or even daily.

“No one is above the law,” lies Zico. This lie is tantamount to saying some things are beyond human control. He is lying because the rich are above the law. He is lying because the laws are made, abided, broken and changed by human beings. The bourgeoisie account for less than ten percent of the population yet they pocket over ninety percent of the country’s wealth without any legal recourse because they make the laws allowing them to do so. If ever such laws contradict their march towards amassing further wealth for themselves, they change them.

Comrade Zico should never undermine the intelligence of the working class and the poor. The workers are aware that the laws are broken, the dockets go missing, the lawyers, police, magistrates and judges, like all other agents in the legal “BUSINESS” are bought and sold for money.

The comrade should remember that justice is a business like all other businesses and can be afforded by those with money.

If no one is above the law why the law arrests so many poor people as opposed to the rich in all societies. Why so many working class and poor people rot in prisons instead of the rich? Why there are so few police per 1000 people in Alexandra as opposed to Sandton? Why so many reported and un-reported murders, rape and robberies in poor communities instead of rich communities? Why so many poor, working class and black people rotting in US, British, S African and many more countries’ prisons yet so few rich people do? Why Shabir Shaick could be sentenced to prison yet still be out of it, and fly around the world, yet thousands of poor unsentenced and sentenced working class people rot in prisons around the world?

The answer to these and other similar questions point to one truth: Some people are really above the law. Not to say justice shall prevail if the rich also goes to prison like the poor. If Zuma is rich, we also not calling for his arrest for justice to prevail. We not calling for revenge, instead we say justice shall only prevail when the man-made-laws and divisions between rich and poor are abolished. The current momentum on the JZ case is a step in the right direction towards working class hegemony over the law and not towards consolidating bourgeoisie hegemony over law through searching for “corrupt” cadres within ourselves as comrade Jeremy alleges and Zico agrees.

‘In my view, Zuma does not (as some have argued) “represent the left” within the ANC alliance,’ says cde Jeremy, seconded by the likes of Zico. And this is where they make a fatal error. It is arguable that cde JZ does not represent the left, but what is more at stake is not what is alleged that he (personally) represents, but more about what his case represents. It is more about the political-economy of the case, crime and corruption in general rather than the individual that makes us shout. It is arguable to say cde JZ does not represent the left, there is no room for right-wing politics in the movement. If there is, then this is the right time to deal with it.


 * Cheche Selepe**