Fightback (NZ)

MANA leader Hone Harawira (centre).

Statement by Fightback

June 10, 2014 -- Fightback, posted Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal with permission -- The decision by the MANA Movement to enter into a formal alliance with the Internet Party has drawn criticism from right and left. Fightback has voiced criticism of our own.

In our April 2014 editorial, we said that “Fightback opposes any close ties between the Internet Party and the MANA Movement.” We added: “Fightback also opposes MANA entering a coalition government with pro-capitalist parties.”

We argued that the Internet Party “is more or less a front for millionaire Kim Dotcom”, that the “Internet Party’s politics are extremely vague and no candidates have yet been revealed” and that “there is no sign that it represents a progressive force”.

We were wrong.

By Liam Flenedy

June 19. 2013 -- Green Left Weekly -- More than 50 people gathered in the Newtown Community and Cultural Centre in Wellington on May 31 and June 1, 2013, for the annual conference of the socialist organisation Fightback.

The sessions were filled with lively and respectful debate across a number of different perspectives within the left on national and international issues.

Fightback 2013 featured speakers from Fightback, the International Socialist Organisation (Aotearoa), the Socialist Party of Australia and the Australian Socialist Alliance.

The first panel session “Global context: Crisis, Imperialism, Fightback” set the tone for the conference — all speakers noting that the global capitalist system is still deeply in crisis and that the working class is being made to pay for it.

Discussion centred on the resistance to austerity in Europe and the rise of left parties such as SYRIZA.

Another key theme was the state of the Australian and New Zealand economies now that the Australian mining boom seems to be waning.