South African anarchist perspective on fighting privatisation
Tens of thousands of working and poor people facing evictions, disconnections and attachments of property. This situation of misery is directly linked to the process of privatisation. Privatisation is the process of turning government services and government companies into profit-making activities.
PRIVATISATION VERSUS PEOPLE
Privatisation is an issue that affects the working class directly. At every
election time, we are visited
by politicians who promise us the earth. After the elections, business as
usual continues with tens of
thousands of working and poor people facing evictions, disconnections and
attachments of property.
This situation of misery is directly linked to the process of privatisation.
Privatisation is the
process of turning government services and government companies into
profit-making activities.
This means a few simple things:
§ Less jobs and lower wages, with less benefits
§ Outsourcing
§ Sky-rocketing prices for services
§ Evictions and cut-offs and attachments if we get behind in payments
PRIVATISATION = PROFITS THROUGH POVERTY
So, for instance, electricity payments increase because ESKOM wants to make
more money and
recover its debts. This is done in order to make the company more
profitable.
It is also to make the company attractive to big business: ANC and SACP
government minister Jeff
Radebe has vowed to sell DENEL, ESKOM, TELKOM and SPOORNET to the big
companies by the end of 2002. Radebe hopes that big business in South
Africa - companies such as Anglo-American and Sanlam and overseas
companies - such as Suez-Lyonnaise - will buy these companies.
GOVERNMENT OWNERSHIP IS NOT AN ALTERNATIVE
In makes no real difference, in practice, if these companies remain owned by
the government or
become owned by big business. The basic problem already exists: the drive by
government, led by the
ANC, to turn government companies and government services into sources of
profit.
ESKOM is 100% government owned. Yet it cuts off nearly 15, 000 people a
month in Soweto alone.
Government is co-owner of Servcon, the company that enforces evictions on
the East Rand. TELKOM is
70% government-owned, yet it has raised telephone charges over 30% over the
last 5 years.
The point is simple. When we fight privatisation, we do NOT think that government ownership of these companies and services is a solution. On the contrary, there is NO difference anymore whatsoever between government-owned companies and privately-owned companies. Both are profit-driven, anti-worker and anti-union in nature. This means our struggle is a struggle against BOTH big business AND the government.
GOVERNMENT OWNERSHIP IS NOT SOCIALISM
We should also add that there is nothing "socialist" about
government-ownership of companies.
Some of the most anti-worker companies in history have been
government-owned. For revolutionary
anarchists the question is clear: socialism means workers self-management;
self-management is the exact
opposite of state control; and repressive state control cannot in any sense
be described as workers selfmanagement.
Therefore we are not against privatisation because we love the government and fear it is losing power because of privatisation. We hate the government, to be honest. The real reason we hate privatisation is because it hurts the working class. And that is more than enough reason.
WHY IS PRIVATISATION HAPPENING?
Privatisation is happening because big business around the world is facing
an economic crisis. This
economic crisis is similar to the Great Depression of the 1930s. This time
the Great Depression is taking
place in slow motion: there is a long-term economic decline on a worldwide
scale since the 1960s,
which has become most noticeable since 1973. We are still living in the
crisis.
Big business is trying to make the working class pay for the crisis through a set of neoliberal policies such as privatisation and casualisation. In other words, anti-working class policies such as privatisation exist to drive down the wages and living conditions of the working class in order to restore the profits of big business. This means that these policies are NOT caused by a few rotten politicians, or ignorant managers: instead these policies are the evil heart-and-soul of modern day capitalism. Therefore, our fight against privatisation is a fight against CAPITALISM itself, a fight against the profit-making system of low-wage jobs, expensive goods and services, undemocratic workplaces, war and racism.
THE FRAUD OF ELECTIONS
We revolutionary anarchists call the elections a fraud. Not because they
were rigged, but because
the elections are NOT democratic. At no point whatsoever were the
politicians given a mandate from the
masses to implement privatisation. At no point whatsoever were the
politicians given the right to get fat at
our expense, to evict and disconnect us, to cut-off our rights and our
lights.
Clearly, the government does not serve the people. It serves big business and the rich. This is shown by the fact that every government in the world is implementing neo-liberal policies, and in no case with a mandate from the working class. We should not participate in this rotten system, this political Mafia. The bosses and the politicians are in it together, the rich ganging up on the poor.
WORKING CLASS MUST RULE
Therefore it is our right to fi ght the government and aim to replace it
with a new system that serves
the people. This should be a system of worker and community councils based
on mandated delegates.
Instead of voting every five years for a lying politician, we should have
the right to
immediately recall dishonest representatives. Instead of leaving all
decisions to a few so-called experts,
we should have the right to participate wherever possible in decisions that
affect us. We should have the
right to control our workplaces, as well as our communities and schools.
Is this possible? Yes, history shows examples of working class people taking control and running the world democratically, whether the Paris Commune, the Spanish Revolution, Hungary 1956, or "peoples power" in 1980s South Africa. The working class should own the means of production for our own benefit.
OUR AIMS
Our fundamental aim is destroy the situation of privatisation and to end the
system of
capitalism that gave rise to the problem. Our aim is for workers and
communities to
take over and directly control the government companies and services (as
well as the private
companies and services). Direct action, not elections, is the key. We aim to
collectivise these companies,
to take them over and place them under direct worker/ community control and
self-management
through revolutionary action.
Long live the working class.
OUR LIVES WILL BE BETTER WHEN THE RICH ARE
OVERTHROWN.
OUR DEMANDS
§ We call to intensify Operation Khanyisa: the working class must take
matters into
its own hands and refuse to allow disconnections to continue
§ We call for a boycott of service charges by working class people
§ We call on workers and communities to have the power to veto all relevant
decisions by government companies and services
§ We call for a halt to retrenchments, enforced through workplace
occupations
CAN'T PAY - WON'T PAY
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As revolutionary anarchists, we believe in a revolution by the working class that will overthrow the bosses and their governments, and create a society run and controlled by those who actually produce the wealth of the world. We believe that it is possible to live without government and to put in its place councils and assemblies where the "ordinary people" can decide what happens to this wealth. We believe in the equality of all and that maximum solidarity is needed between workers and other oppressed groups if we are to defeat those who live off our sweat.
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