Richard Seymour: The problem of left unity
By Richard Seymour
South Africa: Marikana massacre – a turning point?
Marikana mineworkers on strike for higher pay.
For more coverage of South Africa, click HERE.
By Martin Legassick
August 27, 2012 – Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal -- The massacre of 34, and almost certainly more, striking mineworkers at Marikana (together with more than 80 injured) on August 16 has sent waves of shock and anger across South Africa, rippling around the world. It could prove a decisive turning point in our country’s post-apartheid history.
Marikana is a town situated in barren veld, dry brown grass in the winter, with occasional rocky outcrops (kopjes, hillocks). The Lonmin-owned mines – there are three, Karee, West and East Platinum – are situated on the outskirts of the town. Alongside two of them is a settlement of zinc-walled shacks festooned with lines of washing called Enkanini, where most of the mineworkers live.
South Africa: 'Sorting fact from fiction at Marikana' -- Terry Bell on the massacre of mineworkers
For more coverage of South Africa, click HERE.
August 27, 2012 -- Terry Bell is a widely respected labour reporter and activist based in Cape Town, South Africa. His "Inside labour" columns in Amandla! magazine and on his blog, Terry Bell Writes, are essential reading for those interested in developments in South Africa's labour movement. Below, with Terry Bell's permission, Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal posts some of his recent columns dealing with Marikana massacre and the background to it.
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By Terry Bell
August 23, 2012 -- Terry Bell Writes -- The deaths at Lonmin amount to the bloodiest tragedy of the post-apartheid era. As a result, the blame game is in full swing and is likely to continue in the weeks ahead.
South Africa: (updated Aug. 29) Justice now for the Marikana workers and community!
August 24, 2012 – In the aftermath of the terrible Marikana massacre on August 16, 2012, a number o
Aotearoa/New Zealand: Call for international solidarity with Burger King workers
By Joe Carolan
August 24, 2012 -- Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal -- Workers employed by the Burger King fast-food chain, organised by the Unite Union in Aotearoa/New Zealand, are suffering a sustained union-busting campaign, and are now fighting back.
Burger King workers are the lowest-paid fast food workers in Aotearoa/New Zealand. Most are on the minimum wage, even some who have worked there for 15 years. Managers on salary are forced to work extra hours, and sometimes work for less than the minimum wage per hour. Many workers in Burger King are migrant workers, mostly from the Indian subcontinent. They face a bonded labour system. They are terrified of speaking out about mistreatment in case the company revokes their visa sponsorship .
Now the company has tried to bust their union, and is seeking an injunction stopping them from speaking to the media and conducting teach-ins in the community. Unite has taken the company to the Employment Authority, detailing the company's illegal anti-union activities, in a battle that is now shaping up to be the McLibel case of the South Pacific.
Unite union appeals to workers in other countries to organise pickets outside Burger King outlets in all the great cities of the world in solidarity with our fight.
Our fight is for the low-paid precarious workers.
South Africa: The massacre of our illusions … and the seeds of something new
By Leonard Gentle, director of the International Labour Research and Information Group (South Africa)
Venezuelan communist talks about struggle for socialism
GreenLeftTV -- Venezuelan revolutionary Carolus Wimmer speaking in Perth on August 16, 2012, part of a national tour organised by the Communist Party of Australia.
By Jim McIlroy
August 14, 2012 -- Green Left Weekly -- Carolus Wimmer, a longstanding member of the Latin American Parliament and international relations secretary of the Communist Party of Venezuela, spoke at a Sydney forum on Latin America in revolt on August 11, part of a national speaking tour sponsored by the Communist Party of Australia. During his Australian tour, he also addressed meetings in Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide.
At the Sydney forum, Wimmer took up the question, “What progress has been made toward socialism by the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela?” He said Latin America is still dominated by US imperialism, supported by Britain and Europe. He described the Bolivarian Revolution, which began in Venezuela in 1999, as “an anti-imperialist struggle, with the goal of anti-capitalism and socialism”.
He said:
Revolutionary democracy in the economy? Venezuela’s workers' control movement
The workers at Grafitos del Orinico are proud of their collectively run factory. Photo by Ewan Robertson.
Tariq Ali: Why Ecuador supports Wikileaks and Assange's rights
August 20, 2012 -- GreenLeftTV/Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal -- "Why is it that an Australian, facing prosecution from a European country, decides to appeal for asylum to a South American republic?" Tariq Ali asked and eloquently answered this important question when he spoke outside the embassy of Ecuador in London on August 19, 2012. Ali spoke just before Wikileaks founder Julian Assange addressed the press and supporters from the balcony of the embassy, where he has been granted political asylum by the progressive government of Ecuador.