SOUTH AFRICA—Just the other day, after young comrades were distributing Red Flag to workers in the auto industry, we passed by three torched vehicles, including a bus. They were damaged by angry residents near where we stay. They were angry at the government and the local municipality officials for the lack of ‘service delivery.’
When we talked to some of the angry residents, they explained that they wanted the government to build them proper houses because they have been living in shacks for the last two decades. The government of the African National Congress (ANC) has been promising to build proper houses for them. But it never did because it says that the businessman that owns that land where they want their houses built has made it too expensive and is reluctant to listen to their proposals.
The ANC has since been replaced by the DA (Democratic Alliance) in the municipality but the Westville residents still live in shacks. They have seen no improvement in their situation, nor any actions taken by the DA in addressing the housing problem they face. This goes to show that the electoral political parties have no interest in the needs of the working class and the masses.
They actually do not give a damn about them except for their votes. The anger the masses in Westville are showing is good. But it should be anger directed towards capitalism—capitalism that gives power to individuals to hold the masses hostage. This same capitalism has subjected them to poverty, lack of houses and the unbearable living conditions they face as results of staying in congested shacks where, when there are strong winds, they face the prospect of being homeless or shelter less.
Many in the masses are convinced that the problem is only the ANC (the different factions and Zuma). They are told that only if they vote the ANC out of government or if the ANC removes Zuma, then suddenly the problems caused by capitalism in South Africa will go away. This is the rhetoric by the majority of the media and the opposition parties. As a result they voted for DA and EFF (Economic Freedom Fighters, another electoral party) because they believed the lies that the DA tells about the so called “change.” Certainly they have seen the change in the mayor but not the change in their everyday lives.
The change that the masses from Westville must fight for is the change that will see capitalism destroyed by communist revolution and establishing a society built and based on the collective needs of the working class. The masses will build houses for themselves, the kind of houses that are convenient for them, that are proper and of quality to sustain harsh weather.
It will be a society where no one individual can prevent hundreds of people from having proper houses to live in. The willingness of the masses to go on strike in demand of better living conditions and to confront state police is encouraging. This provides the opportunity to show the horrors of capitalism, but we must not become beggars who only vent to our slave masters. We must join the fight against them (capitalism); we must aim at primarily destroying the causes, not the effects.
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