Julius+Baker,+SACP+message+to+the+family

South African Communist Party
1 Leyds Street, Braamfontein Tel: +27 11 3393633 Fax: +27 11 3394244/6880 PO Box 1027, Johannesburg 2000, South Africa

To: David Baker, 61 Edburton Avenue Brighton BN1 6EL UK

Dear David,

We would be grateful if the following could be read at your father’s funeral:

The South African Communist Party is sorry to learn of the death of our outstanding comrade Julius Baker, and expresses its heartfelt condolences to David, Patricia and their families.

Julius Baker was an active and leading member of our Party for the greater part of its 85 years of existence. All the comrades who knew him agree on one thing: He never wavered. Others may have had their opinions modified down the decades by one kind of pressure or another. Julius Baker was firm, staunch, and solid. Nothing could shake him. He was a model of adherence to the essential line of march mapped out by the communists as the vanguard of the working class. He did not hesitate to support the Soviet Union fully and wholeheartedly for as long as it was there.

The SACP is proud that in its present period of growth it can draw upon the memory of, and emulate, great Party members of the past. We are well aware that many of them relied heavily on one particular comrade for his quality of steadiness. That one was Julius Baker. Time and again the old-timers have told us so.

The SACP that the youth are now building at home is a Party that we would like to think would meet with Julius Baker’s approval in every respect, without exception. The SACP has every intention of continuing to be Julius Baker’s kind of Party.

We know that he was an intense reader of everything, all his life. This, too, we intend to emulate.

The story of Comrade Julius’ continuous revolutionary activities over so many decades will be told and retold without fear of exaggeration, but only of understatement. The number of people he helped, whether in the ranks of the Party or in the broader movement, cannot be counted, but is not forgotten.

The unparalleled prestige of the SACP today is based upon the spirit of those who did not waver, but pressed on steadily. Among these Julius Baker was second to none.

We as SACP can say no greater thing of one of our number than this: He was a true communist.

To his family we say: We are grateful. We loved him. We mourn his passing with you. We will not forget him.

Amandla!

Blade Nzimande,

General Secretary.
 * bn@sacp.org.za**