THE AFRICAN REVOLUTION
"though the revolution sprung out of deep indigenous roots, by their own
force, achieved their emancipation independent of both Westand East, they
were externally not quite as non-aligned after gaining power, and,
internally, there was a separation between the leaders and the led. The
latter remained workers and had to work harder while the leaders became the
rulers. Sucked into the world market dominated by advanced technologies, the
technologically underdeveloped lands moved headlong to tragedy"
Frantz Fanon, 'The Wretched of the Earth'
The tragedy of Africa, to a great extend, could only be attributed to the
betrayal of the Revolution by the very leaders of the Revolution . Fanon,
clearly saw this situation and recognised the truth that not all the
liberation struggles run on straight lines. Since he is not here today, and
since he never witnessed the development of even the very Revolution he
himself sacrificed his life and time to defend, we are left to face the fact
none of the revolutions were grounded in the forces that could have made the
revolutions succeed. The Algerian Revolution, like all the others before and
after, ended in deep political antagonism, the result of which is that the
leaders now see the masses as nothing but a mere historical burden of the
Revolution. Though the question of how to put into practical life, the
slogan, Power to the Masses, was one which occupied many of the genuine
leaders of the revolutions. It was this desire, in my opinion, that brought
about the many ismsthat end up dominating the ideological debate. To be
frank, some were merely a product of an intellectual exercise. It is
preferable to look at the most serious attempt and we could not look no
further than the great works of Nkhrumah. To doubt the sincerity of Nkhrumah
contribution to the revolutionary course of the African people and
continent, is a non starter for any serious debate of the ideas of one of
Africas greatest leaders. Nkhrumah ascendence to power was the breaking
point and a source of inspiration to all the African revolutions that came
after. The key fact is not not only his leadership of the movement that took
Ghana to independence; it was his great desire and ambition in search of a
"Third Way" road to freedom, in which the African masses would not fail to
recognise themselves.
THE PARTY, A FORM OF ORGANISATION
Raya Dunayevskaya, the founder of Marxist-Humanism, who in the 1940s broke
with vanguardism following her collaboration with Leon Trotsky, wrote
...there is not a single African that does not speak with awe and reference
of the party. He does so not because he was told to do so by his leadership
nor because of the negative features in a single party-state which he
opposes. He does so out of his own volition and because he believes there is
absolutely no other way to achieve freedom. The party, to him, means the
organisation that has put to the fragmentations that imperialism brought..
(Philosophy and Revolution)
If a critic of the party to lead saw such a difference, in the African
revolutionary parties it is without doubt that the simple fact was that the
African masses not only saw themselves as an integral part of the party for
freedom, but that they were the life of the party in the struggle for
colonial freedom. There was little that could not have been convincing as to
the role of the masses to any genuine observer as it was to Raya, who wrote
"In any case, the sound of a single drumbeat or the sound of a truck with
the party flag flying brought out, in less time than it took the visitor to
get out of the truck, the whole village. With a minstrel present to transmit
words of the most bashful of any tribe, the meeting soon became a
many-voiced declaration of freedom demands or debate, or the actual working
out both of principles and ways to fight for them. In a flash the Bantaba
became transformed from the place of gossip to one charged with political
discussions lasting far into the night". Even though that this was true of
the African revolution, Duyevskaya, also never failed to recognise the very
contradictions that were prevailing and the fact that, the relationship
between the masses and leaders were gradually widening because of the
failure of the leadership to ground the revolution with the masses and thus
she wrote:
"the tragedy of the African Revolutions began so soon after the Revolution
had succeeded because Leaders were weighed down with the consciousness of
technological backwardness that they turn to one of the two poles of world
capital. The isolation from the masses deepened so that the new rulers
began to look at them as mere labour power. The result was not only that
wages dropped the rise directly after independence proved a temporary
feature-and that the aid they received from both nuclear titans decreased,
but also the leaders and the masses began speaking different language"
THE DAY AFTER THE REVOLUTION
Not that the leaders were not confronted as they drifted away from the
masses in creating their power base for one party rule. For example, the
veteran Gambian trade unionist, Jallow-Jallow, pointed out clearly his view
of the offensive when he said "I have the highest respect for both Nkurumah
and Sekou Touray as fighters, they are trying to adopt socialism to the
African reality, but, to be realistic, the AATUF (Trade Union Federation)
was built up for ideological reasons. And now in Ghana they call workers
strikes "Labour Indiscipline". We will not bow to such attitudes to Labour.
We will not bow to an organisation that calls workers strikes labour
indiscipline"
Nkurumah might have succeeded to a great extend, as did Sekou Touray, in
bringing the working class movement into the fold of the party, the
consequences, of which is clearly known. But in the Gambia, the courageous
insistence of the Trade Union movement not to become part of the party, or
to toe the party line but continue to defend the interest of the workers,
still puts them into direct confrontation with the state any time they rise
to defend the interest of the workers. In the Gambia, the neo-colonial PPP
party saw no other choice but to ban the militant trade union party. In
Guinea the party that won independence by leading proud Guineans to vote for
independence soon turned itself into a one-party state with no regard for
the differing opinions of the masses. Anything more was seen as
counter-revolutionary.
By the middle of the 1960, the governments of more than half of the African
countries which had by then won their independence had been overthrown by
the military. Yes no doubt, imperialism played perhaps the major role in
this cold war era, in speeding up the down fall of many great African
leaders, but the other side of the fact is that there were grounds on which
they were easily able to launch their offensive.
The Military Junta, which established it self as a political norm in the
continent, was not only a disruptive element in the physic of the ordinary
African masses; for even in African countries with civilian governments the
militarization of politics was total and therefore, the repression of the
masses was inevitable.
The masses were left to the mercy of international capital, not because
capital was interested in the industrialisation of the African continent,
for economic development, because of international capita increasing need
to
lie about its desires, the African economy never moved from it original
position of monoculture cash crop production. The inflow of cash was almost
exclusively in support of projects that were for political consumption and
not in response to the economic needs of the African masses. It was
inevitable that this was going to lead to the ever increasing external debt
of the African countries, and the marginalization and the deepening of the
poverty of the African people.
THE PRO-DEMOCRATIC MOVEMENTS.
It was under these circumstances that the pro-democratic movements was born.
The end of the Cold War signaled the brutal economic “recovery” led from
without by the IMF and World Bank. As the recovery programme took hold, it
subjected millions to poverty and death from hunger, war and diseases.
African leaders saw no other choice but to open new offices for the IMF and
World Bank officials who were to take over control of the national economic
programme.
In some countries this led to the rise to power of populist leaders like
J.J. Rawlings of Ghana and Samuel Doe of Liberia. Soon the African Left,
instead of trying to understand the situation and take an independent stand
and allying themselves with the struggle of the ordinary masses, were to
find themselves under the dictates of the military junta, with the supposed
pretext of having the possibility to hijack the agenda and minimise any
damage to the ordinary masses. But instead they have ended up being
murdered, jailed, forced into exile and left abandoned by the masses who
once more have seen their leaders again betraying the struggle .
In recent years, this alliance between the so-called Radical Left and
reactionary Liberal forces is taking a new form: the Big Alliance. However,
as the marriage of inconvenience between the so called revolutionary and
reactionary liberal forces takes a new form, no lesson seems to have been
learnt from previous mistakes. In Senegal, "SOPI" (change) was the slogan
that brought together the Left and liberal forces and forced the PS
party out of office. In Kenya "Everything is possible without Moi" was the
slogan that brought together the same forces and forced the KANU out of
power. Zambia and Ghana saw similar examples of this new alliance. Since
this is an alliance of convenience, rather than being born out of any
principles or desire for true liberation, their coming to power has in no
case resulted in any change of the condition of the ordinary masses. The
fact is that, for the African left to regain its position and win the
confidence of the masses, it must stop playing politics as petty-bourgeois
opportunists who are more now interested in political power than in the
condition of the masses. It is now essential for genuine African
revolutionary forces to understand that no alliance, other than the one with
the oppress masses will be enough to bring about a genuine change in the
continent.
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