Umsebenzi Online, Volume 14, No. 19, 15 May 2015
In this Issue:
* Lessons of horror: Two and more other superpowers are guilty of
untold stories of human atrocities and suffering
Red Alert
Lessons of horror: Two and more other superpowers are guilty of untold
stories of human atrocities and suffering
By Justice Piitso
The history of the struggle of the people of Cuba and Haiti is the history
of the struggle of the people of the world. We must never underestimate the
role of the enemy against our revolution.
More than ever before one is much confident that during our lifetime
humanity shall witness the total destruction of imperialism and
neo-colonialism. One is confident that through our struggle of solidarity
and internationalism humanity shall triumph over adversity.
Throughout the history of our struggle, humanity has always found itself
having to confront the most difficult circumstances in the mist of the
hostile world economic and social power relations. Our task therefore is not
only to interpret the world - but to change it.
We therefore need from time to time give a deeper analysis of the unfolding
world events and how they impact on our present day society and we can
change them. The history of the struggles of the people of Cuba and Haiti is
the history of the struggle of the people of the world to achieve change.
On Monday the President of the Republic of France, Francois Hollande, led an
entourage during a rare historic visit to the Republic of Cuba. This was the
first ever official visit by a French head of state to Havana in history
since the year 1898.
In an unprecedented move, the following day, as part of its tour to the
Caribbean Islands, he also visited the Republic of Haiti. This was the first
historic official visit by a French head of state - since the declaration of
the independence of the Slave Republic in 1804.
Surely the remains of the revolutionary leader Jose Marti, the father of the
Cuban nation, will reverberate from the grave upon hearing that after a
century and seventeen years, President Francois Hollande has paid an
official visit to our Commander-in-Chief of the Cuban revolution, Comrade
Fidel Castro.
The bones of the revolutionary leader, Comrade Toussaint L' Ouvereture, will
reverberate from the grave upon hearing that after two centuries - that is
since the declaration of the independence of the Republic of Haiti, French
President Francois Hollande is walking on the dusty pavements in his
homeland after French colonialism was dislodged in that land.
After meeting the Commander-in-Chief of the revolution in Havana, the
visiting head of state, President Hollande, proudly confessed to the world
that: "I had in front of me a man who had made history". At Port au Prince,
Republic of Haiti, he unashamedly whispered to President Martelly: "We can't
change history, but we can change the future".
These are the hypocritical words of the head of state of one of the most
powerful world imperialist superpowers. A head of state of a colonial power
which has over the years inflicted much pain to the lives of the millions of
our suffering people in the former colonies and semi-colonies.
The historic visit by the French President to the Republic of Cuba and Haiti
is a sequence that follow the announcement by the President of the USA,
Barrack Obama, to resume diplomatic relations with the Republic of Cuba.
Over the years the hostile diplomatic relations between the two nation
states have been at the centre stage of the international political arena.
Cold diplomatic relations between the two countries escalated immediately
after the triumph of the Cuban revolution in 1959. The state to state
diplomatic relations ceased to exist immediately after the declaration of
the socialist character of the Cuban revolution in 1961.
This was after the heroic people of Cuba defeated the US sponsored
mercenaries who wanted to invade the revolution during the battle of Playa
Giron. This was the first ever military defeat of the US super-power in
Latin America.
The humiliation of US imperialism during the battle of Playa Giron led to
the US administration imposing unilateral economic blockade against the
human people of Cuba. It was an attempt to undermine the unity of the
revolution of the first socialist state in the American hemisphere.
During the eighteenth century, a heroic revolutionary slave leader,
Toussaint L'Ouverture, led an insurrection that saw the liberation of St
Dominique, now Haiti, from French colonial oppression and exploitation. The
victory saw the declaration of the first ever independent slave Republic in
history of humanity in 1804.
The declaration of the first slave Republic prompted the French colonial
empire to impose an international trade embargo against the newly
independent state of Haiti. For over twenty years French warships surrounded
the Island virtually making it impossible to make trade with other
countries.
As a result of the mounting economic pressure, Haiti was forced to pay an
"independence debt" as a compensation to the French colonial masters, for
the loss of land and slaves during the revolution. Haiti is the only country
in the world which was forced to pay excessive amounts of reparations to its
former colonial master.
This shameful arrangement took Haiti one hundred and twenty two years to pay
the ransom to France and over ten of millions more in interests to French
banks. The people of Haiti had to pay ransom to France for their own freedom
and dignity.
The payment of the debt had a devastating effect to the economy and the
living conditions of the people of Haiti. Over the years the French colonial
power harvested the revenue of the poor Island (i.e. made poor mainly by
France) at the expense of its education, healthcare, social development and
general economic infrastructure.
The hardships and sufferings by the people of Cuba and Haiti in the hands of
imperialism and neo-colonial powers is a lesson to the world revolutionary
movement. The history of the suffering people of the world is the history of
struggle against imperialism and colonial domination.
These lessons of horror by imperialist forces remind us of the revolutionary
words of wisdom from Vladimir Lenin when he says: "the advanced, most
civilized and 'democratic' countries armed to the teeth and enjoying
undivided military sway over the whole world, are mortally afraid of the
ideological infection coming from a ruined, starving, backward, and even, as
they assert, semi-savage country".
Historical materialism points out that capitalism is unable to resolve its
own contradictions. It always produces its own grave diggers which are the
suffering people of the world.
Imperialism exacerbates ethnic chauvinism, narrow nationalism and religious
antagonism. It breeds extreme reactionary and obscurantist forces and in
many instances support repressive and fascist regimes.
By its very nature, capitalism generates and intensifies mass unemployment
and poverty and wars.
The ongoing conflicts across the world are a living testimony.
Two superpowers are guilty of untold stories of human atrocities and
sufferings which they have to take responsibility of. The only truth is that
both the US and the French administrations must take responsibility for the
subjugation of the Cuban and the Haitian people respectively.
The question we need to ask ourselves is what is it that the imperialist
powers seek to achieve with the Cuban and the Haitian revolution. What we
know is that over the years they have proven themselves to be the most
unreliable in the cause of the struggles of the people of the world.
If we dare to underestimate the strength of the enemy, the Cuban revolution
will forever pay the debt for having declared the first socialist revolution
at the doorstep of the American empire. The Haitian revolution will forever
pay the debt for having declared the first ever independent slave Republic
in the history of humanity.
We can think about the future but not forget about the past. Human
solidarity and internationalism is the only weapon to salvage the poor of
the world from the bondage of imperialism and neo-colonialism.
* Cde Justice Piitso is former Provincial Secretary of the SACP in
Limpopo, former Ambassador to Cuba, and writes in personal capacity.
Umsebenzi Online is the voice of the South African Working Class
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