Haitian masses fight regime for democracy

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NUM President Cyril Ramaphosa: "This was a dress rehearsal for further action." Alliance Box 12082 Edmonton, Alliance P.O. Box 7 Vancouver V5R 5T3 vote freely for a new government in elections set for November.

But in June, the CNG declared that the election would be conducted by the junta itself instead of by the independent electoral commission the constitution called fore Facing the prospect of a rigged election, the Haitian masses exploded at the end of June in a series of demonstrations, marches, and strikes that involved nearly all sections of the country. It is similar to the uprising that forced Duvalier to flee, but on a higher political level.

A new opposition In the last 18 months, numerous political parties have been founded, and scores of leaders have emerged. Unions are functioning and peasant organizations have sprung up to demand land reform.

A coalition of parties and groups, known as the Organization of 57, has taken leadership of much of the anti-government activity. It calls for an end to the rule of the military junta and the establishment of a democratic, civiliancontrolled government.

The coalition is dominated by Mineworkers (continued from page 1: “[Will new 'peace plan' end war in Central…]”) three years to build up our strength again."

Ramaphosa emphasized, "This was a dress rehearsal for further action; 1988 has already been set by our members as the year when the National Union of Mineworkers is going to move to win more significant gains.' "A living wage"

After two weeks of the strike, the companies conceded some fringe benefits. But the NUM was stymied in its drive for a substantial rise in wages.

The workers were forced to accept the employers' offer of a maximum 23-percent wage increase-virtually the same settlement obtained in negotiations in 1985 and 1986. Given the country's inflation rate of 17 percent, Black mineworkers, as a whole, will remain in poverty.

Blacks earn about one-fifth the wages of Distributors of Socialist Action in Canada:

Alliance for Socialist Action 229 College St., Suite 208 Toronto, Ontario M5T 1R4 (416) 535-8779 Alliance for Socialist Action Box 2728 Winnipeg, Manitoba R3C 4B3 for Socialist Alberta for Socialist ;916 Station S British Columbia who are moderate to conservative. Some of them demand no more than the addition of civilian members to the present CNG.

Lt. Gen. Henri Namphy, head of the CNG, responded to the first demonstrations with repression. He has $400,000 worth of crowd-control equipment, tear gas, shotgun pellets, and other military hardware at his disposal-supplied by the United States. The army was ordered to break up all demonstrations before they got out of hand.

The troops carried out orders in a brutal fashion when demonstrators in a number of cities demanded honest elections. Soldiers fired directly into the crowds, killing 37 and wounding over 100.

Despite the shootings, workers and students continued to march and protest. The government was forced to retreat and white workers in the industry. But the contrast between their wages and the profits gleaned by the mine owners is even more startling. Every 30 seconds, the mining corporations gain in profits what Black mineworkers earn in a year.

The strike was part of this year's "campaign for a living wage," launched by the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU). The campaign tears at the heart of the apartheid system, in which laws are used to hold down the majority of the population as a reserve of cheap labor for capitalism.

The living-wage campaign has helped to generate the largest strike wave in South Africa's history. During the first quarter of this year alone, businesses lost over 770,000 work days to strikes-more than the yearly total for any single year since 1980. Last month, COSATU threatened a massive general strike in solidarity with the mineworkers.

Business Week, voicing the concern of capitalists in the United States, warned that a victory by the mineworkers "would fuel Black union militancy throughout the economy and serve as a symbol of Black power." Faced with this prospect, the entire capitalist class closed ranks against the mineworkers.

"Liberals" lead the attack The employers' attack was led by the giant Anglo America Corporation, which owns close to 70 percent of the total capital invested in South Africa's mining industry. Anglo America's top executives style themselves as being "anti-apartheid." The company bankrolls the "liberal" Progressive Federal Party, and it even sent a representative to Zambia to meet with the African National Congress.

But this so-called "progressive" corporation showed little hesitation in firing return responsibility for election committee.

Unions call general strike When workers struck for a minimum wage of $6 a day, Namphy dissolved the main union body, the Autonomous Confederation of Union Workers (CATH). The workers responded by calling a national general strike that lasted over a week. Namphy was again forced to retreat and restore the union.

One problem for the junta has been the role of the army for the last 30 years. Unlike most Latin American dictatorships, the army did not serve as the major power base for the Duvaliers. Francois Duvalier distrusted the army, and constructed an independent military force, the Tonton Macoutes. This semi-gangster militia numbered 300,000, compared with only 70,000 regular soldiers. 36,000 of its employees. After the settlement, the company's industrialrelations director insisted that the dismissed strikers would only be rehired if their jobs were not already taken by scabs.

To sweeten the bitter medicine, he noted that the company's policies during the strike were "part of the painful transition to a modern, nonracial industrial society." In other words, the heads of the Anglo America Corporation will continue to advocate "an end to apartheid." They believe this course is the least troublesome for them to continue to make profits.

In South Africa, some 1360 families (less than 0.1 percent of the population) own and control 80 percent of the wealth. This ruling class and their stewards in the government, no matter how "progressive"

SOCIALIST ACTION of 57, firing into their homes.

In a particularly horrifying incident, government thugs lynched Louis Eugene Athis, a prominent mass leader, and two others. In typical Macoute fashion, the assassins yelled, "We don't want communism!"

Death threats, lynchings, and shootings have not smashed the organizations of struggle thrown up in the last 18 months. Living conditions have gotten worse since Duvalier fled. A long drought has led to famine conditions in parts of the countryside.

In the cities, the Organization of 57 and anti-government groups outside the coalition are debating means of continuing the struggle. There is unanimous agreement that the CNG must go. But many doubt that a new civilian government can solve the horrendous problems of Haiti.

The shantytown dwellers and the peasants call for uprooting the old order. They will not be satisfied with either the Catholic Church officials or the leaders of the coalition who are calling fo r restraint. Their strikes and protests will more than likely continue. they may profess to be at a given moment, have nothing in common with the interests of the majority of the population-the Black working class.

What is most troublesome to the "liberal" mine owners is the power of the Black labor movement that was expressed in the miners' strike. That power showed the ability of the Black working class to lead the struggle not only against apartheid, but against the capitalist system which supports it.

As NUM President James Motlasi said at the union's conference last February, "Under capitalism, we will never find a soluton to our problems. It is only with a democratic socialist South Africa that the working class and all the oppressed people will have the wealth which they produce under their control."

SEPTEMBER 1987 11 Louise Gubb/J.B. Pictures