The ANC party of South Africa, broken and freed

South Africa like most countries of the continent has a story tarnished with apartheid and racial exploitation. Since the forced resignation of the ex-minister and leader of the ANC, Thabo Mbeki, the alliance party saw division take place among their ranks in an imposing manner. Furthermore, the Minister of Defense, Mosiuoa Lekota, left the party with many supporters and soon declared officially the creation of a new party.

Discouraged by the left-turn of the ANC, which includes Unions and the Communist Party of South Africa, the dissidents are preparing a meeting on November 2^nd to establish the basis of the new party which should be inaugurated in December. Therefore, they are making more and more public meetings throughout the country in order to gain support within the population.

The environment wasn’t at its best while they were proceeding on October 25^th to a militant meeting where 300 supporters of the ANC attempted to stop it. Police force had to get involved but nobody was arrested or hurt during the event. During the same meeting, Lekota declared that his supporters wouldn’t get intimidated by the loyalist threats of the party in power in South Africa. “We will not be intimidated”, he said in front of 2000 people in the Northern Cape Province. “I will not give up my principles.”. Another meeting in Limpopo province was cancelled due to the disruption of the Youth League of the ANC, that the police force didn’t manage to control, or so said the public tv station SAFM.

The dissidents have good hope of getting at least 20% of the poll during the 2009 election while specialists affirm it’s an objective of total unrealism, especially without the explicit support of Mbeki. Many are even waiting on the words of Nelson Mandela before taking their decision, him who was the president of the ANC and South Africa until 1999.

The ANC, ruling ever since the first multiracial elections in 1994, participated actively to the end of apartheid in 1991. Born in 1912, the alliance always fought for equality between sexes and races principles, removal of poverty, betterment of the healing system, access to healthcare for all without discrimination, etc…

During the last 14 years, the government sadly didn’t manage to better in a significant manner the situation within the ghettos and even throughout the country. Mbeki felicitated himself for the accomplishment of his government while the development of a row of 60 kilometres between the cities of Johannesburg and the capital, Pretoria, will only end in a huge concentration of 8 millions citizens within the next few years which will join the two cities into one, without solving any problems. Furthermore, the M1 highway neighbouring the row is called the “line” by the residents: the separation between the overpopulated ghetto of Alexandra and the luxurious houses of Sandton, the richest neighbourhood of Johannesburg. The promises of Mbeki haven’t created the equality sought but opened the door to projects such as the mega-mall of Soweto of 196 850.39 square feet, the Maponya Mall, which opening was celebrated recently.

Adding to this, Mbeki was reproached repeatedly his decisions since 1999. He adopted a denial policy regarding HIV which has been destroying his country for decades. He even retarded purposively the approbation of Nevirapine, a well-known medication which reduces the virus transmission’s chances from mother-to-child of 50%. His inaction made his government responsible of genocide while (as per Achmat) since 1999, 1,5 millions people between 0-49 years old died from the HIV and 2 millions people were newly affected. Njongunkulu Ndungane, Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town, described the government policies of « serious crime against humanity, as bad as the apartheid. ».

The unemployment rate is still a major concern in the country. Within the population of colour, it goes up to 40% while it stands at only 4% within the white population.

The forced resignation of Mbeki was perceived as undemocratic while in fact, on September 23^rd, a motion was presented to the congress, asking for the resignation of Mbeki which passed 299 to 10. The resignation of Mbeki was then followed by the resignations of 11 members of the congress along with the vice-president. At the same time, Mbeki was taking back again his legal offensive on Zuma.

Mbeki tried to get rid of his opponent, Jacob Zuma, by accusing him of corruption and frauds which the inquiry proved completely false. If Mbeki wanted Zuma out of sight, it’s indeed because he was a menace to his position. However, it is important to note that Mbeki hasn’t brought his support to the dissident group yet, even though they are claiming him as their main reason to leave the ANC.

While reading the various articles on the Internet, it’s easy to think that the new president of the ANC is against the creation of a new party while in fact, many are more than happy about the break up which will allow the majority party to push further projects that were held back by the right-wing dissidents of the party. The majority aspect of the ANC will however be hit, for the first time in South Africa’s history.

The U.S. Totalitarianism

Ironic behaviour or predetermined procedure, it seems that U.S. has understood the paranoia of Stalin himself. As most of you probably know, Totalitarianism is a term commonly used in order to define Communism or Fascism, yet more often referred to Stalin’s 5 years plan in URSS.

The term itself made its first appearance in early 20^th century, to define Italia fascism but on the contrary to today’s use of the word, it was positive propaganda. By definition, the totalitarian rule is a concept used to describe any political system where a state regulates every aspect of public and private life. There are four basic pillars to that regime and once they are implanted, it seems to be rather hard to get rid of it, yet not impossible (see how Gorbatchev destroyed totalitarianism because he was too…”Communist” to use the terms of Martin Malia in an anonymous article published in 1990…ironic…) .

One unique political party that controls the state

The United States have two official parties. They have the Green party and a few others but like in most Western Representative Democracy, very few manage to be known or heard of. (See control of State controlled Mass Media). So we have the democrats, and the republicans. Both parties standing in the right wing, Republicans are conservatives while the democrats are considered liberal. Both stand for Capitalism and make sure the U.S. remain to the political right wing. The well-known Elections of 2000 or even 2004, prove that even if the population choose one candidate, there are easy ways for the administration to ignore those facts in order to maintain their people in power.

State controlled Mass Media

The most watched cabled news channel in the U.S. is Fox News. I can’t blame the population for falling for that sort of propaganda because disinformation easy to understand, presented in eye-catching graphics and offering a show before anything else. (For those of Quebec, it’s pretty much like TQS news, enhanced 10 times). Fox News was created in 1996 by Rupert Murdoch who strongly believed that the information presented to the public was strongly democrat-influenced. As such, he declared his station as “fair and balanced” and to those who might not have noticed: strongly supports the republicans. By using the slogan “fair and balanced” it gives the idea to the population that they are being fed real information from both sides while everything presented to them has been dictated by the Headquarters, to represent a single point of view. Reporters and Interviewers don’t have a problem with interrupting their guest or telling them to “shut up” (Best example being the well-known O’Reilly) if they attempt to talk of matters that could be annoying to the Republican Party. Studies have also proven that the people, who watch Fox News, take positions on the republican side on various topics with a strong majority, compared to those watching CBS or other stations. It is clearly a manipulation from the state, in order to spread lies, terror and propaganda. Also, on all major news channels, you won’t hear about the communist party or the green party. When you do, it will be really short segments due to something major.

Centralisation of the Economy

Some will think that I will shoot myself in the foot by saying this but…the U.S. Economy is centralised. While not run by the government, it is held with a firm grasp by the private bankers. Also in most totalitarian states it’s the government who has full power, in the U.S.; it’s the bankers. The government is also a puppet to that small group of economic elites who decide the faith and future of the country. Nonetheless, it’s interesting to notice that the government support an anti-constitutional tax on income ruled by the IRS, while there is no law forcing a citizen to declare his incomes to the government. Yet, if a citizen doesn’t, he will have the IRS forcing his way into his life, terrorising his family until he pays or loses everything. Many have their houses sized or end in prison because they haven’t filled their form, or don’t manage to pay their taxes. The IRS even attempts to declare that the Supreme Court of the United States means nothing when it declares that the 16 amendment considers incomes as a profit or gain of a company, not an individual. Hence, companies can be taxed, not citizens. Interestingly enough, taxing the population brings nearly 5 times more incomes to the Government than taxing the companies. In order to have citizens compel to this unknown and unwritten law, the free country’s government will stand behind the IRS code of hundreds of pages to read, while the constitution and everything related to the rights of citizens stand on a few pages. Believing bluntly what they are told, they will look into the code and give up, instead of looking through their rights. If you ask people around you, they will tell you that you need to pay tax on incomes for education, roads or other services, yet there are so many taxes on everything already that there is no need for this tax at all. Education is paid with house taxes, roads with gas taxes, etc. The Government knows exactly how much you earn, and with new technologies, start to know exactly what you are buying as well.

Mass Surveillance

From the CIA to the FBI, adding up with the Patriot act and other powers presidents have given themselves, the terror propaganda of 2001 did a wonderful job in order to ease their investigations of the U.S. people. Families have accepted that the states might listen on their phone calls, on their Internet communications or historic of navigation on the web. They are also accepting to have secret FBI agents in their kitchen meetings unknowingly, even if it’s only to talk about peace and eat cookies.

This isn’t a brand new behaviour of the government, quite the opposite. In the 50’s until the 80’s, various groups of investigations were created to infiltrate small organizations of those fighting for freedom. As such, the Weather men later called Weather Underground were on constant monitoring, just like the Black Panthers, the Communists, or other left-winged groups. “Fred” who was charismatic leader of the Black Panthers was murdered by the FBI during his sleep, because he was a “threat to national security”. From 1947 to 1953, Joseph McCarthy declared a war on the “red” which was called the “Red Scare”. This was clearly an attempt to silence the freedom of speech of the population and people were strongly advised to report anyone expressing political or social opinions considered wrong to his (McCarthy’s) perception. It was also the birth of the Hollywood Ten, constituted of producers, authors, etc, who were taken by the House Un-American Activities Committee, to answer questions. They refused to say if they had been, were or not part of the Communist Party, claiming their right (1^st amendment of the U.S. Constitution) which earned them years in prison and a ban of the cinema industry. All of them had a really hard time finding work and the fact that they weren’t able to get food on their tables forced some to revise their position. For example, Edward Dmytryk gave to the HUAC the name of 66 personalities approving either by membership or ideals, the communist party. Right after that, he got employed again in Hollywood studios yet it’s obvious that it was an enormous failure for the freedom of the citizens of the U.S.

Also, more recently, a family in Florida accepted to have a chip implanted in their body which act like small GPS. Those idiots think they will be more secure that way, yet of course, they seem to forget that their every actions are now monitored by the state, and those chips will soon be implanted in passports, driving license and other items that are carried around. Unknowingly for most, they will see their freedom going away in no time as the states will be able to tell everything that they do (chips), say (spies and recording of phone calls, adding to other methods mentioned). There will be only their thoughts left and then, I doubt anyone will be able to do anything to know if anyone agrees with them or not, by fear of being punished by the state’s agents.

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The U.S. has become exactly what they have fought against and I doubt it’s a simple irony. In fact, my theory is that the elite have been impressed by the power, the control, and the influence of totalitarianism. They have fought it because it was in the hand of the left wing, to better apply it to the right wing. Considering that Capitalism has failed and will keep failing, the only way to maintain people in the ignorance, and control a possible revolution, is now to push their philosophy further by apply those principles.

Like everywhere else where the Western representative democracy applies, the population has been put asleep and if they don’t wake up anytime soon, it will be too late to do anything about it. We keep waiting for things to get worse, or hoping for better with a change of leadership but the fact remains that our very structure isn’t working. As long as the population won’t take its responsibility as a group, for the future of humanity, there will be nothing else than slavery gradually heading back toward all rights to the masters, no right to the slaves.

Private life is a right, not a privilege. Defend it.

- Sabbi