Capitalists use sexism and xenophobia here ♦ Communism can end islamophobia in the Philippines here ♦
South Africa: Capitalists Use Sexism and Xenophobia to Divide Workers. Communists Unite the Working Class Against Fascist Attacks
PORT ELIZABETH (SA), August 22— Law enforcement officers, together with private security companies, have been raiding abandoned mines and arresting so-called “illegal” miners (Zama Zamas) for four weeks. More dangerous for our class are the openly fascist and xenophobic attacks on workers. Groups have attacked these undocumented miners, killing some and burning down at least one settlement.
These arrests and attacks follow the appalling gang rape of eight women who were part of a filming crew that was shooting a music video in an abandoned Krugersdorp mine. The rapists were highly organized, likely by a criminal syndicate. This is a clear example of the sexist ideas and practices that are part of this rotten racist capitalist system—especially in the mining camps. It’s a set-up!
The gang rape has been the pretext for the bosses to arrest and blame more than one hundred undocumented workers who are also “illegal” miners. They are charged with illegal mining, illegal immigration, possession of explosives and firearms, attempted murder—but not of rape.
People are angry! And well they should be! But they should be angry at the whole capitalist system. That includes how the racist mining industry set up these camps that separate male workers from their families and promote a violently sexist culture and ideology.
The politicians who now condemn the rapists are the same bosses who have done nothing but profit while South African women suffer high levels of sexual assault, low pay, high unemployment, and discrimination in the job market.
In the process of Mobilizing the Masses for Communism we will defeat sexism and put an end to exploitation and attacks on women.
Capitalism Forces Miners to Risk Their Lives
“Illegal” miners take huge risks to go underground where their chances of returning are very slim. These are abandoned mines and they lack necessary equipment. Miners take these extreme risks because they need money to survive and feed their families.
There are many players involved in this trade. In fact, it’s a syndicate that exploits the “illegal” miners who go underground to mine the mineral resources.
There are the owners of spaza shops who sell to the miners at ridiculous prices. Two litres of drink that cost R15 (US $0.88 or 70 INR) is sold for R100 (US $5.89 or 470 INR). A loaf of the cheapest bread that cost R7 is sold for R50.
There are the security guards who alert the miners of danger, whom the miners must pay when they go underground and must also give a share of the mineral. Then there are those who buy the minerals below the market price since they know the miners, undocumented immigrants, are forced to accept anything.
These people are the ones who really benefit from the hard and dangerous work of these miners. These bosses include politicians, members of law enforcement, and mining bosses who know what to do with the minerals so they reach the same destination as the ones mined legally.
The main beneficiaries are the big capitalists.
The bottom line is that the illegal mining and these arrests are not helping the working-class in any way. Rather they are enriching the capitalist class. It is important to struggle with the working-class to know that blaming foreign nationals, especially the undocumented immigrants, is a bosses’ tactic to separate the working class, to keep us from uniting, because a united international working-class is a danger to them.
Therefore, this united working-class must struggle and fight for a communist society without bosses, poverty, and exploitation. A classless and non-sexist society where there is no work designated for males or females. Where we organize society based on mutual respect, and no sexist violence will ever be permitted.
That can only be achieved if the organisers of the International Communist Workers’ Party intensify the struggle to recruit the international working-class to join the party and fight directly for communism.
Only Communism Will End Four-Hundred Year Battle Against Islamophobia in the Philippines
SEATTLE (US)—”Massive amounts of resources have been pooled into a special department in the office of the Philippine president,” reported Daniel, an ICWP friend at our last collective meeting. It’s called the National Task Force to End Local Armed Communist Conflict (NFT-ELCAC). The United State has provided funding for these modern-day SS troops since its founding in 2018 under the Duterte regime. Duterte handed the leadership of the task force to the new president, Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
The NFT-ELCAC soldiers operate throughout the Philippines, especially in the southern island of Mindanao. Ninety-three percent of the country’s over 6 million Muslims reside there. The task force has labeled all Muslims as terrorists. It provides an ideological excuse for anti-Muslim attacks.
Daniel has worked with a campaign to halt US arms sales to the Marcos Jr. regime. The Biden administration has responded by reaffirming there will be “no restrictions” on arms sales to the Philippine military.
The Duterte-Marcos regime is most worried about civil unrest. That’s why they have launched a program to bolster the Philippine arms industry to guarantee a domestic supply of the weapons necessary to attack rebellious workers. The task force conflates anti-communism and Islamophobia to justify brutal slaughter.
Meanwhile, civil war and imperialist proxy wars are spreading. Exploitation of farm, industrial and service workers intensifies in the Philippines and around the world. Racist, sexist, and Islamophobic murders increase. There is only one solution. We must build ICWP communist collectives focused on reaching out to the masses everywhere.
There are differences in development among countries, but the need to end the horrors of capitalism with international communist revolution is universal. Hence the necessity of building one international communist party: the ICWP.
Capitalist wage slavery pits worker against worker. It provides fertile ground to nourish Islamophobia and other divisive ideologies used by the capitalists.
Communism relies on collective production. The motto is “From each according to their ability and commitment, to each according to their needs.” This economic base provides the soil from which will grow mass campaigns led by our party that will finally destroy capitalism’s poisonous ideologies.
We Aim to End Centuries of Islamophobia
Muslims in Mindanao have resisted Spanish, US, and Japanese rule for over 400 years. In 1968, Muslim recruits to the Philippine armed forces mutinied when they realized they were being used as counterinsurgents against a communist-led People’s War. In the Jabidah Massacre that followed, Philippines Armed Forces training cadre massacred paramilitaries of Filipino Muslim descent.
From 1972 through 1976 a ferocious war between Muslim separatist rebels and the Philippine military raged throughout the southern Philippines. An estimated 120,000 people died in the fighting, which also created one million internal refugees and caused more than 100,000 Philippine Muslims to flee to Malaysia.
The present government is taking advantage of this vicious history of Islamophobia. It has waged a deadly campaign of extrajudicial killing of Filipino Muslims, particularly those who have organized against capitalist oppression and exploitation.
The ruling classes will undoubtably create more death squads like NFT-ELCAC, but they are no match for mobilized masses determined to build our communist future. We’ll end the deadly legacy of nationalist, religious, racist, sexist divisions within the international working class with communist revolution.
ICWP Collective Plans to Mobilize Internationally Against Anti-Muslim Attacks and For Communism
The Seattle ICWP collective proposes that comrades from around the world who have been fighting Islamophobia promoted by capitalists in the context of civil war and fascism, should get together online to share their experiences. Some friends who recently visited Mindanao would like to participate.
These comrades will prepare for a broader meeting. The objectives are to advance the fight for communism, grow the party, expand our influence by developing communist relationships among the masses, and help develop the next generation of international communist leadership.
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