Appreciation and Lessons Learned here ♦ To Friends in South Africa here ♦
Appreciation and Lessons Learned
I would like to express my gratitude for the invitation that ICWP extended to the Costa Rican Workers and Farmworkers Movement (MTC) to participate in its International Leadership meeting, June 8-9, 2024.
The MTC is a political organization that carries out grassroots work in popular sectors in the struggle for housing, among farmworkers and indigenous people. We also work among the working class in the public sector that defends itself from neoliberal attacks by the government of Rodrigo Chaves. Likewise, it is an organization whose goal is a government of urban and rural workers.
The meeting was very interesting. The point dedicated to the work done in the student encampments against the genocide in Gaza was very relevant. It is encouraging to see that many young people in the US have become aware of the situation in Gaza, defying their own university authorities. A student encampment was also held at the University of Costa Rica.
This international solidarity movement has mobilized many people globally. That gives the opportunity to discuss the imperialist-Zionist policy in Gaza that has meant the extermination of thousands of people either by military massacre or starvation. This is a horrific example of where the leaders of capitalism are leading humanity to defend their interests.
Another point of great interest to us was the work against the imperialist war in progress. In this increasingly warmongering framework, the largest maritime military exercises in the world are being prepared, commanded by the United States and named RIMPAC (Rim of the Pacific). Latin American countries such as Brazil, Mexico, and Peru are among 29 countries participating.
ICWP is preparing activities of protest, analysis, and denunciation of these exercises. These are part of the existing tensions between different imperialisms, fundamentally the United States, Russia, and China. This has the world in high and increasing tension, to the point that it is possible to speak of the terrible possibility of a Third World War.
Another point was the political work among workers being carried out in some countries, among them South Africa and El Salvador. These areas of work seem to us to be great successes of ICWP since it is necessary to put communism into practice. The concerns expressed by the working people of these countries are very similar to the grassroots work done by the MTC, which makes common learning very relevant.
In all these aspects, there are important points that unite us; ICWP-MTC. There are other issues about which we do not completely agree. But we are very willing to continue debating them in a respectful manner as we have done so far.
—A Comrade from MTC in Costa Rica
To friends in South Africa: My embrace, greetings, respect and admiration
Having the opportunity to listen to you is always an immense learning experience. With your knowledge and practical experience, you become an example. You show that our struggles are integral when, in our daily lives, we achieve a dialectical balance between all dimensions of our lives. That includes: the political, the ideological, the organizational, the spiritual (objective/subjective).
From this perspective, we make it a primary task to “know ourselves in depth” at home, in the factory, in the street, in other scenarios of social, workers’, popular, student and indigenous peoples’ struggles. And more: who we are, how we feel, how we think, how and from where we live, exist and relate to each other.
In synthesis, you are my great teachers, an example in praxis of this dialectical relationship between the political, the personal, the social and the cultural. The base to bring in more sisters, brothers, men and women friends, neighbors, and family members to the construction of society with a new order and logic. One that breaks or transgresses all kinds of relationships imposed from the capitalist system and its multiple expressions, which has torn and violated our identities.
This opens the possibilities of transforming ourselves to transform the world, in a community based on dialogue (discussion) under horizontal relationships and reciprocal learning. A world, a common home without borders, where there is no longer the slightest space for any trace of inequality, subordination/exploitation, or discrimination.
Together with you I have learned that our dream for equality goes beyond a precise manifesto, beyond a debate. It goes beyond our words. We sow and cultivate it so that it may bear powerful and permanent fruit every moment of our lives and in every space where we move. So that it may take the pulse of our times, rhythms, hearts, and knowledge with rigor, respect, and revolutionary love.
Thank you, thank you from the bottom of my heart! You always open my intellect and my heart to continue weaving and knitting without borders. You are my main teachers and masters of struggle. I wish to be at your service, experiencing that the ocean that separates us is only a physical matter.
—Comrade in Costa Rica, Central America, June 8, 2024