Big FourSecurity firms and AGOA threats Much commentary,debates and discussions have taken place in the public discourse especially inbusiness section of our newspapers of late about the imminent threat of SouthAfrica losing AGOA status or benefits. What is AGOA?Formally the US says that the African Growth and OpportunityAct (AGOA) is a Trade Act, enacted on 18 May 2000 as Public Law 106 ofthe 200th Congress. US Treasury department states that the act has objective ofexpanding U.S. trade and investment with sub-Saharan Africa, to stimulateeconomic growth, to encourage economic integration, and to facilitatesub-Saharan Africa's (SSA) integration into the global economy. To qualify for AGOA, South Africa and other countries of SubSaharan Africa (SSA) are basically asked to compromise their nationalpriorities and have market based economy that protect and promote privateproperty. In short SSA countries must pursue neoliberal policies Washington’sinterests in the Private Security Regulation Amendment BillSongezo Zibi of the Business Day argues that local producerscan’t produce enough to meet domestic demand for chicken, Washington chicken ischeap and so on. He then urges that we must open our poultry market for the US.His hot air sounds reasonable to unsuspecting individuals. It apparent that the big four security firms, i.e. USA basedADT, UK based Chubb, Sweden’s Securitas and the notorious G4S are behind theAGOA bullying and threats of economic embargo by the USA. SA Private Securityindustry is higher more than the army and police force combined and these bigfour multinationals stand to lose the most, should the Private SecurityRegulation Amendment Bill be signed into law. The strategy of sanctions,bullying adopted by these companies are similar to Dutch Royal Shell Company,who with the help Nigeria government executed Ken Saro-Wiwa, via a sham trialby the military junta of Sani Abacha. Saro-Wiwa was a well-known opponent ofShell’s environmental pollution in the Niger Delta. It appears that modern daySani Abacha’s of our times are in the form of South African Chamber of Commerceand Industry (SACCI) who have been quoted as saying that Private SecurityRegulation Amendment Bill is an enemy of the South African economy, somesections of the print media who act as messengers of multinational corporationsand Democratic Alliance well known shop stewards of big business and RoyalShell Company is the form of the Big Four security firms.AGOA as a foreignpolicy instrument of expansionismAGOA is also being used as a US foreign policy instrument tocontrol and curtail BRICS influence. This strategy of AGOA is similar to thereaction in the US in the late 1940s. When fearing the influence and the growthof communism in Europe and elsewhere in the world after the Second World War,Washington approved billions of dollars’ worth of aid. This ‘Recovery Program’was referred to as Marshal Plan. One the eligibility criterion to AGOA, acountry is required not to be engaged in activities that undermine United States nationalsecurity or foreign policy interests. It is no secret that our close andimproved relations with China and Russia is a bitter pill toswallow for Washington and that’s the reason we are being punished.It is this context that one concludes that, no amount ofbegging and concessions by South Africa will ever be enough, because thisthreat of economic embargo is not really about trade nor investment but is the‘Big Four’ security firms, our participation in BRICS that threatens the USexpansionist ambitions and hold over Africa. As the YCLSA we have a task of leading popular mobilizationand organization of the South African working class youth to fight againstimperialist bullying andfight threats of illegal economic embargo by US.Sandile Dayi is the Provincial Chairperson of theYoung Communist League of SA, Moses Mabhida Province
-- -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "YCLSA Discussion Forum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
