07.03.2002
Anti-Mugabe struggle enters new phase
An assessment and an appeal from the International Socialist Organisation (Zimbabwe) website
On the whole it is not safe for us to do street sales with our paper any more, though we can still hold public meetings if we are careful about security. The new press laws pushed through by Mugabe are going to make a lot of what we say very difficult to publish, because of course it is critical of the government. The state is protecting the thugs of the ruling party, Zanu-PF. It is encouraging them. The top brass and those who run the state day to day are personal appointees of Robert Mugabe himself. Since the beginning of January, we have had four attacks on us. Two comrades have each been attacked twice. They were attacks on individuals, not attacks on our offices or our meetings. Three of the attacks seem to have been random. There was one instance in which a comrade was known to be a member of the ISO and was targeted for selling our paper in a neighbourhood near the city centre. When passers-by came to his aid, the attackers made false accusations against him. They took him to a police station, and now that case is before the courts. There is also some danger for us from the Movement for Democratic Change, the main opposition party. We live in the urban areas where the MDC has most of its support, so, with Zanu-PF and the MDC, we are between a rock and a hard place. Most of the people in the top positions in the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions are toeing the MDC line. A few toe the Zanu-PF line. But on the whole the ZCTU has fallen hook, line and sinker for the MDC line, which is that we must have peace before the election; the MDC will win the election, but there should be no action before the election. The MDC's economic policy - 'The bridge' - is neoliberal, pro-privatisation, but it has not been publicised or debated much. The great tragedy is that most workers are not aware of the MDC's policies. They do not have an understanding of the MDC's policies. They just see the MDC as representing the hope of more jobs. The line is that Zanu-PF has failed to open up the economy properly; because of that we have inflation and unemployment; and neoliberal economic policies will solve the problem. Advanced sections of the working class have become disillusioned with the MDC. We're working with those advanced sections of the working class in campaigns in some unions where we have influence: the printing, engineering and construction unions. We have been involved in the MDC on a united front basis. Because of the rightward shift of the MDC leadership, we have realised that there is no future in the MDC for any worker-activists. We have shifted more to working with unions where we have an influence, and with rank and file trade unionists. Is there a chance of some unions breaking publicly with the MDC? Not in the short term, but in the medium to long term. We are working in unions affiliated to the ZCTU to put pressure on the ZCTU leadership, but the aim is to build an independent rank and file trade union movement, independent of both Zanu-PF and the MDC. The idea of a mass independent workers' party has no hearing at the moment. There is a high level of disillusionment among the more advanced workers with what they have gone through with the MDC. We have to take a few steps back. We are saying, 'No to dictatorship' - meaning Zanu-PF - and 'No to neoliberalism' - meaning the MDC. Both those parties represent one section or another of capital, of the bosses. We have to be prepared to fight whichever of the two comes into power. We must have no illusions in either. We haven't been advising people which way to vote. The advanced workers have been so disillusioned with the MDC that to advocate voting for the MDC would be political suicide for us. I think the presidential election will take place. All the authorities have done is to question Morgan Tsvangirai about his supposed plot to assassinate Robert Mugabe. If they decide to press charges, it will be after the election. I don't think they will want to risk a backlash from the MDC at this time. While there is disillusionment, the MDC has a lot of young members it can call on to take to the streets. The activists of the MDC are still mainly working-class based, and it is also recruiting a lot of young unemployed people. The MDC has never really had any middle class activists in it. The whole economic situation appears to have worsened steadily with the neoliberal policies of the economic structural adjustment programme, since 1990. Zimbabwe's acute economic crisis started, essentially, in about 1995. There was de-industrialisation. Capital moved its investments out of the manufacturing sector and into the financial sector, where it could get quicker returns. Manufacturing's share of the economy fell from 32% to well below 20%. And then what led to a rapid worsening of the crisis was when the government announced its plans to compensate war veterans, in 1997. Not long after that, the Zimbabwe dollar suffered the first of a series of crashes against foreign currencies. Inflation is now at 120%. The MDC recommends a Marshall Plan-type of recovery. But look at Argentina! Argentina has collapsed, and neither the World Bank nor the IMF has poured in money to help it recover. To expect that sort of assistance for a country the size of Zimbabwe is day-dreaming. The government has been threatening to take over companies which have been artificially creating food shortages, and turn them over to be run by the workers. But nothing like that has happened. Inscor, a major company, has been exposed for hoarding, but nothing has happened. What Zimbabwe is going through is a manifestation of an entire global economy in recession. There is no way out of this crisis using capitalist means. The state can revive the economy a bit by pumping out money, but then inflation will rise even further. There is only one way out of this crisis, not only in Zimbabwe but worldwide, and that is dismantling the whole system of capitalism. Despite all the hatred there is for him, Mugabe has built up a base of support in the rural areas through the land redistribution programme. In the process he has rejuvenated Zanu-PF. If you walk around the rural areas without a Zanu-PF party card which is at least nine months old, you risk getting beaten up. Mugabe got his first layer of support through the war veterans, by giving them monthly payments. He then moved to the peasantry. The peasantry in Zimbabwe constitutes at least 60% of the population, and most of them have received land through the land redistribution programme. That is another layer of support for Mugabe. He also has support in the army. The level of support for him in the police does not seem to be so strong. We supported the land redistribution, but in a critical manner. The government has not been distributing the tools needed to work on the land - the ploughs, the seeds, and so forth. But in the short term we are not able to cut against Zanu-PF's base of support in the rural areas. The government has been providing drought relief in the rural areas - essentially free handouts of food. After the election it will be interesting to see how long those free handouts last. The farmworkers displaced by the land redistribution have been demanding a section of the land that is being handed out. Munyaradzi Gwisai, our MP, an ISO member elected to the Zimbabwean parliament on an MDC ticket, made a scathing attack in parliament on the government's intention to compensate the white farmers for their land, their infrastructure, and so on, but to give nothing to the farmworkers. But some land has been handed out to the former farmworkers too. What about the argument that the commercial farms should not be divided up, but maintained as larger units, with higher productivity, and run as cooperatives under workers' control? That argument never got much hearing. The large commercial farms producing for export, and the large estates owned by multinational companies like Anglo-American, have not been touched. The farms which have been taken over are the smaller ones. 45% to 50% of the farms have not seen any redistribution at all. We say that the larger estates should be targeted - to be taken over and run collectively, not broken up. One other argument we have been making is that the peasants should be allowed to use the land without title deeds. If you start dishing out title deeds, it plays into the hands of market forces. A peasant who is desperate for money will sell the land back to the commercial farmer. Title deeds should not be given out. The land should be made available to whoever chooses to use it. Our paper is distributed only in the five urban areas where we have branches. It is too dangerous to try to distribute it in the countryside. With the crisis and the struggles that are bound to be erupting, and our very low level of resources, we have launched an international fund appeal so that we can get equipment for the reproduction of material for our own comrades, and for our paper. That is being done through the Socialist Alliance. We also ask socialists in other countries to forward the updates we email out, and to publicise them, so that workers internationally can get the real story of what is happening in Zimbabwe. In the days before the March 9-10 presidential election in Zimbabwe, the International Socialist Organisation has, for security reasons, effectively gone underground. Peter Manson spoke to ISO national treasurer Rosa Zulu The ISO was hoping that a mass stayaway would be called by the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions in opposition to Robert Mugabe's new anti-union and anti-democratic laws. What did the ZCTU decide? They voted against taking action. Probably one member of the general council would have voted in favour of the stayaway proposed by the February ZCTU conference against the anti-union measures contained in the Public Order and Security Act (Posa). Of course the stayaway itself would have been illegal. Essentially the members of the general council are sympathetic either to Zanu-PF or, most of them, to the Movement for Democratic Change. ZCTU president Isaac Matongo is one of the top three on the MDC leadership. With both the MDC and Zanu-PF predicting victory in next weekend's elections, neither were willing to rock the boat. The attitude of the MDC union leaders is 'We're going to win anyway', while the Zanu-PF elements basically take the government's positions - although they cannot do so openly, in view of Posa in particular. These positions are that the poor situation results from the actions of internal and overseas investors. Zanu-PF says, 'We created the trade unions and passed the laws that protect workers. We had to bring in Posa because of the pressure we were under.' The government continues to play on the fact that the MDC is aligned with big business. It is anti-working class, they say, while Zanu-PF has implemented price controls. But Mugabe is hated so much by workers that it would jeopardise the positions of the union leaders to say these things openly, so they remain quiet. The history of the top leadership of the ZCTU is that it has had to be pushed into taking action. As recently as 1997 workers tried to put pressure on them to back up one of the largest street demonstrations seen in the capital with strike action, but they refused. So what are your immediate plans? In effect we are going underground in this coming period. We are moving into the election weekend and the campaign is largely over. The period after the election will be tricky. It is quite possible that neither Zanu-PF nor the MDC will accept defeat. If Mugabe wins, will there be some sort of reaction from below? If so, how will the MDC react to the actions of their own supporters? Where will it lead? - the question is open-ended. If the MDC win, will the military accept the result? In January they came out in public to try and pre-empt an opposition victory. The situation will be clearer by next Wednesday, when the final results will be out. The announcement of the results could push Zimbabwe into another phase. Isn't it possible that Mugabe will win and Morgan Tsvangirai will accept the result? Yes, but the feeling is so strong in the cities that anger could boil over to the point where workers might well ignore the call to accept the result. The level of hatred for Mugabe is not something to be underestimated. Workers view him almost as the sole creator of the crisis - he is to blame for the food shortages, for the devastating unemployment. Besides, the accusations of plotting against the MDC are not without foundation. Zanu-PF says that two top MDC officials tried to bribe general Terence Shiri, who is said to have firm control over the military, into backing the MDC. He is commander of the 1st Brigade, which murdered and terrorised civilians in the actions against so-called 'dissidents' in the 1980s. The MDC has not denied this. What is the ISO's current position in relation to the MDC? The original decision on our participation in the party goes back quite a long way. The MDC was formed out of the workers' struggles in November-December 1999. But as soon as it had been set up the leadership invited technocrats and rightwing neoliberals to join - most notably Eddie Cross, Tendai Biti and David Coltart. Cross is the author of the MDC economic policy which advocates 100% privatisation, including schools and hospitals. In Zimbabwe inflation is running officially at 120% and the cost of living is high. Workers and peasants are not able to afford to pay for visits to clinics or to send their children to school. The leadership has moved well to the right - politically, economically, in every sense. Within six months of the 2000 general elections, serious cracks started to open up between the top leadership and the rank and file. By January 2001 the break had been taken further, with the programme of forcing out popular activists and trade unionists from the middle and lower levels of the party, and replacing them with hand-picked individuals. One year after the elections the advanced sections of the working class were thoroughly disillusioned with the MDC. All the best worker-activists had pulled out. By October 2001 the ordinary rank and file had become disaffected by the MDC's anti-working class policies. The party has instead started to build a base in the lumpenproletariat amongst the unemployed youths. Our view is that to advocate voting Tsvangirai is now extremely risky politically - it ties in the ISO with the image of the MDC's anti-working class politics. The MDC is now more rightwing than Zanu-PF. We will have to wait until after the elections to decide our relations with it. But you have called for a vote for Tsvangirai. We called for a vote for Tsvangirai in an extremely critical manner and we have not openly done so. Neither did we openly say, 'Don't vote Tsvangirai'. In my opinion the policy you adopted last year was an excellent one - trying to build a united front which would present Tsvangirai with a series of pro-working class demands as a condition for voting for him. What happened to this policy? Because of the rising levels of discontent that united front couldn't be built. Civic organisations under middle class leadership began to balk at taking mass action - they were scared of exacerbating tensions. Since that time we have identified four trade unions, plus the rank and file group in another, along with the ISO student union, who we're working with in another united front. Couldn't the ISO have put out such a raft of demands in its own propaganda anyway? If Tsvangirai refused to commit himself to them, that would have exposed any claims to represent the interests of workers. By the time we realised that it was too late after the failure of the previous attempt at a united front. It was only in the last three weeks that a new united front with the unions has come into being. Is the National Constitutional Assembly part of this united front? No. We've been working with the NCA for a long time. Along with ourselves and the Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe, they were the joint organisers of the demonstration three weeks ago when Munyaradzi Gwisai, our MP, was arrested. But the NCA broke an agreement to advertise it in the name of all three organisations and put up posters in their own name. We are maintaining an open door policy with the NCA and continuing to work with them, but the new united front with the unions is separate. Are there any other socialist groupings in Zimbabwe? There is a group called the Left Wing which split from the ISO last year. It is very tiny and I am not aware of them doing anything other than campaign for the MDC. Why did they leave? They claimed disagreement over the way the organisation was run, but it was to do with our analysis of the MDC. When the ISO was seriously thinking of leaving the MDC, these members were extremely uncomfortable with the idea. Left Wing are now basically cheerleaders - they have uncritical acceptance of the MDC. Isn't it still possible to work within the MDC, aiming to split it along class lines? Wouldn't comrade Gwisai, who was elected as an MDC MP on a revolutionary socialist platform, be well placed to lead such a struggle? To an extent he has a good reputation amongst leftwing activists, but one danger he faces is being seen as part of the MDC. On the question of splitting the MDC, the situation on the ground has changed. This has been illustrated by what happened between the two factions led by MPs Tapiwa Mushakala and Job Sikhala. They came out in open clashes and the infighting lasted quite a while. We have further discussed attempting to split the MDC and we realised that it would present a danger to the ISO - because of our support for land redistribution the ISO would be seen as a Zanu-PF agent.
Worker