Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire
  • omnibus

Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party launched in South Africa
Rafael Stedile
10 Apr 2019
Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party launched in South Africa
Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party launched in South Africa

Over a thousand gathered in Johannesburg to attend the Launch Congress of the party which seeks to build socialism in South Africa

“We are serious about the Revolution.”

 “Equality, work and land” is the slogan of the new radical political party in South Africa that seeks to revolutionize South African politics and contest elections this coming May. The Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party (SRWP) held its launch congress from April 4-6 in Johannesburg, South Africa with attendance from over a thousand of the party’s militants and cadre from distinct provinces from across the country, as well as international guests from countries such as Zambia, Argentina, Brazil, Sweden, Morocco, and Nepal.

The Congress was dedicated to “Fieldmore” Mapeto Baldwin Langa, a member of NUMSA, who passed in August 2018. Fieldmore was a lifelong communist and internationalist, when he was just 17 he joined uMkhonto weSizwe, the armed wing of the African National Congress during the anti-apartheid struggle. Fieldmore was forced into exile and on his return to South Africa in 1994, he became a key activist and intellectual in NUMSA and was central to the union’s political education program.

“Today we commit ourselves to the long and winding road of class struggle.”

The party stated in its dedication: “With the revolutionary spirit of Fieldmore Mapeto alive in us all, today we commit ourselves to the long and winding road of class struggle as we launch the Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party. We openly declare for all the world to know that we as Socialists are committed to building the organization of a revolutionary working class.A class aware of its own interests. A class that will overthrow the capitalist parasites. A working class that will seize power for the project of building Socialism, in which no human will be exploited by another.”

During the three days of work, delegates heard from different members of the Interim Working Committee of the Party such as the convenor of the SRWP, Irvin Jim. In his address, Jim remarked on the path that brought them where they are today and why the creation of this party today in South Africa is so essential.

Delegates were reminded that in 2012, the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA), sparked by the atrocities of the Marikana Massacre, began to chart a new course in South African politics. NUMSA left the African National Congress (ANC)-Led Alliance and embarked on a process to form an independent trade union federation as well as a Workers’ Party.

“We openly declare for all the world to know that we as Socialists are committed to building the organization of a revolutionary working class.”

In 2017, the South African Federation of Trade Unions (SAFTU) was officially launched with over 700,000 members and in April 2018 they held one of the largest national strikes in South Africa’s recent history demanding just labor laws and an increase to the national minimum wage.

In 2018, the goal of creating a workers’ party was also fulfilled. The party was officially registered with the Electoral Commission of South Africa in September and in December 2018, the first national meeting of the newly formed SRWP in Johannesburg South Africa on December 14 and 15.

On the second day of work, the delegates split up into different commissions to work on the different issues of the political platform including (education, health, housing, work, etc.), as well the different founding documents of the party.

The SRWP will emerge from this Launch Congress with a political platform, a constitution, a manifesto debated on and defined by its grassroots, as well as elected authorities of the party. They plan to contest the upcoming elections and are certain that the South African working class is ready for a party that promises to upturn the current capitalist systemthat has made so many South Africans suffer.

NUMSA President Andrew Chirwa addressed the Congress and stated: “This is not a party for reform. This is a party for communists. We are serious about the Revolution. We are a party for SOCIALISM and nothing else.”

COMMENTS?

Please join the conversation on Black Agenda Report's Facebook page at http://facebook.com/blackagendareport

Or, you can comment by emailing us at [email protected]

This article previously appeared in Peoples Dispatch.

South Africa

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles. Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.

Trending

Elizabeth Warren Wants Green Bombs, not a Green New Deal
Parallels Between Black and Palestinian Struggles
Cory Booker Hates Public Schools
Bill Cosby Should Have Been Denounced by Black America Long Ago
The Black Wall Around Barack Obama: Who Does It Protect Him Against?
How Complacency, Complicity of Black Misleadership Class Led to Supreme Court Evisceration of the Voting Rights Act

Related Stories

A Milestone for South African Shack Dwellers Movement
Pan Africanism Today Secretariat
A Milestone for South African Shack Dwellers Movement
14 October 2020
Abahlali baseMjondolo celebrates 15 years of revolutionary struggle for land, housing and dignity.
Blacks From Elsewhere and the Right of Abode
Achille Mbembe 
Blacks From Elsewhere and the Right of Abode
15 January 2020
Sorrowing over the treatment of migrants, Achille Mbembe calls for Africa to adopt a pro-migration stance, phase out colonial borders and become “a
Socialist Revolutionary Workers’ Party Vows to Resist South African Government’s Privatization Move
by Irvin Jim, NUMSA General Secretary
Socialist Revolutionary Workers’ Party Vows to Resist South African Government’s Privatization Move
06 February 2019
The new party insists that transition to renewable energy must be driven by the working class, not for capitalist profit.
South Africa Suffers Capitalist Crisis Déjà Vu
Patrick Bond
South Africa Suffers Capitalist Crisis Déjà Vu
09 January 2019
The old guard of South Africa’s ruling party put on new clothes last year, and a new party of the working class finally made its debut.
The Land Question: Unpacking Expropriation Without Compensation in South Africa
Nombuso Mathibela
The Land Question: Unpacking Expropriation Without Compensation in South Africa
04 July 2018
“Pay no one for land acquired illegally.”
In South Africa, channelizing Marx Towards Building a United Front
Musawenkosi Cabe
In South Africa, channelizing Marx Towards Building a United Front
09 May 2018
“The union understands that it will have to go beyond theory and mobilize the working class.”
Rural Workers Mobilized in South African General Strike
Dennis Webster
Rural Workers Mobilized in South African General Strike
01 May 2018
“’Land and the hunger for land’ is uniting rural and urban workers.”
“They Eat Money”: How Mandela’s Political Heirs Grow Rich Off Corruption
Norimitsu Onishi and Selam Gebrekidan
“They Eat Money”: How Mandela’s Political Heirs Grow Rich Off Corruption
18 April 2018
“Corruption has whittled away at virtually every institution in the country.”
A Tribute to Nomzamo Winnie Madikizela Mandela
Zwelinzima Vavi , Ncedisa Mpemnyama
Two Salutes to Winnie Mandela
04 April 2018
South African Federation of Trade Unions mourns passing of Comrade Winnie Mandela
South Africa: Unions Plan General Strike, Denounce “Sell-Outs” and “Rented Stooge” Ramaphosa
Pavan Kulkarni
South Africa: Unions Plan General Strike, Denounce “Sell-Outs” and “Rented Stooge” Ramaphosa
28 March 2018
“SAFTU called upon rank-and-file members to ‘break with the leadership sell-out deal and join our fight to defend their democratic righ

More Stories


  • Freedom Rider: No Human Rights in Texas
    Margaret Kimberley, BAR senior columnist
    Freedom Rider: No Human Rights in Texas
    24 Feb 2021
    The people of Texas suffer unnecessarily from bad weather because their state puts oligarchs first and does not recognize the human right to health and safety.
  • BLACK CITIZENSHIP FORUM: The Roots of Xenophobic Violence in South Africa—A Pan African Response
    Black Agenda Review Editors
    BLACK CITIZENSHIP FORUM: The Roots of Xenophobic Violence in South Africa—A Pan African Response
    24 Feb 2021
    South Africa must dismantle and transcend the colonial nation-state through creation of a Pan-African federation that stretches across the Southern African sub-continent.
  • Rusesabagina’s Show Trial and Shooting Deaths of a Rwandan Dissident and an Italian Ambassador
    Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    Rusesabagina’s Show Trial and Shooting Deaths of a Rwandan Dissident and an Italian Ambassador
    24 Feb 2021
    Is there any limit to how far the West will go to cover for Rwandan President Paul Kagame’s Crimes? asks Ann Garrison.
  • Democracy Now Provides Progressive Cover to State Department Propaganda Campaign Against China 
    Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor
    Democracy Now Provides Progressive Cover to State Department Propaganda Campaign Against China 
    24 Feb 2021
    The show has become a reliable platform for uncritical regime change propaganda, demonizing targets of US empire from Syria to Nicaragua.
  • He’s under suspicion…
    Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    He’s under suspicion…
    24 Feb 2021
    The rioters all knew him— it had to be an inside job— ‘cause to a man they spoke to him by name as they breached the building. Read their lips…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us