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People's Voice
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All members and friends of the Communist Party of Canada have been shocked by the impact of the Dec. 26 tsunami on the coastal regions of the Indian Ocean. A natural calamity of such a magnitude, resulting in a staggering death toll and wholesale destruction, fills us with deep sorrow and with determination to help overcome this tragedy. To all those who have suffered losses, we convey our heartfelt condolences.
The international response by working people to this tragedy is encouraging, but pledges from major western powers have been inadequate, to say the least. Much more emergency and long‑term assistance will be required to help the peoples of these countries to rebuild their lives and communities. The Communist Party will pressure the Canadian government to increase its humanitarian aid commitments, and to support calls to cancel the $350 billion in external debts owed by the affected countries in the region. At this point, the international community has pledged some $4 billion in emergency relief, compared to the $44 billion spent on debt repayments last year by Thailand, India and Indonesia. Debt cancellation would help to ensure that the reconstruction process is guided by the sovereign decisions of the peoples of these countries, not dictated by outside forces.
We also feel it is necessary to raise other important issues posed by this disaster.
First, we join with others in asking why the U.S. administration, which knew of the potential for a tsunami from its bases in the Pacific, warned its military base at Diego Garcia but did not take immediate action to sound a wider alarm in the region. Clearly, the U.S. was guilty of criminal neglect, at the cost of thousands of lives.
Second is the larger issue of the priorities for our planet today. For just a few million dollars - a tiny fraction of the nearly one trillion dollar annual global military budget - supplementary tsunami warning devices could have been placed in the Indian Ocean. Not far from the scene of this disaster, U.S. and British imperialism are spending $50 billion per year to occupy Iraq, where an estimated 100,000 civilians have been killed since their illegal invasion. These two countries have so far pledged just $500 million for tsunami relief aid - less than they spend every four days in Iraq.
Finally, we remember that the terrible loss of life in this event is exceeded by other ongoing human tragedies, such as the AIDS/HIV crisis which claims 8,000 lives every day in the world's poorest countries, the millions killed in civil wars in Africa (fuelled by arms sales from the major powers), and the 1.4 million children who die each year for lack of clean drinking water and adequate sanitation. The need for solidarity with the tsunami victims must not push these urgent crises out of our awareness.
We also note the growing concensus among scientists that the world faces a rising threat of ecological calamities, such as climate changes and higher ocean levels linked to global warming. The time has come for humanity to make a conscious choice that our survival depends on curbing militarism and blocking further aggressions by the imperialist powers, so that the necessary material and human resources can be devoted to finding ways to avert global catastrophe. Otherwise, we may be doomed to live in a world where dominant imperialist powers completely discard international law in their scramble to seize resources and secure profits, at the expense of any hope for a better life for billions of working people.
In this sense, the Dec. 26 tsunami is a warning signal to the entire world. Our choice must be peace and life, not militarism and death!
By Sam Hammond
The Graphic Communications International Union (GCIU) has ceased to exist. After a majority of the membership voted to merge with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the GCIU became an autonomous conference of the Teamsters effective January 1, 2005.
The GCIU was a hybrid union, the result of a series of mergers from the 1960's to the 1980's, made up of the Amalgamated Lithographers of America, the Photoengravers Union, the Bookbinders Union, the Stereotypers Union and finally the International Printing Pressmen and Assistants Union. Years of hard work and progressive thought were spent to accomplish the dream of "one union in the printing trades," which never became a reality because the International Typesetters Union was not brought into the GCIU. Canadian members of the ITU joined the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada (CEP).
The proposed merger with the Teamsters was hotly contested within the GCIU, with charges of illegal and unconstitutional decisions hurled by opponents. When the General Board was tied on the proposal, the International President, George Tedeschi, broke the tie by casting his chairman's vote for the merger. The constitution clearly stated that consensus of the General Board was required to recommend merger. This went by the boards and there could be court cases over it in the United States.
The divisions at the General Board level were reflected by the overall membership vote, which was for merger in some regions and against merger in others. In the United States the 29,180 members voted 55.2% in favour of merger with the Teamsters.
In Canada, a majority of members votes against, but the totals do not tell the whole story. The voting was very sharply divided between English-speaking Canada and Quebec. In Toronto, the two largest locals outside Quebec voted on both sides of the proposal.
Here's how the Canadian voting went. Three Quebec locals, two in Montreal and a much smaller one in Drummondville, voted almost 77% in favour of merger with the Teamsters. In English-speaking Canada, Local M100 with 1220 members voted 54% in favour and Local M500, with 985 members voted 85% against the merger. The overall vote of the 6309 Canadian members was 60.7% opposed.
The result is that the Quebec locals are staying with the merger and in the Teamsters, while the rest of the Canadian Locals have opted out of the merger, choosing to join the CEP. The position of Local M100 in Toronto is not yet clear.
This will put the locals in English-speaking Canada in a Canadian union which also contains within it the old ITU and the old Newspaper Guild, both traditional allies from the printing and publishing industry.
There may be further developments in this story because the finances, pensions and benefits were owned by the GCIU, who are now in the Teamsters Union. The Canadian finances, in the old GCIU, were always kept in Canada under Canadian control, so it is possible that these matters can be resolved amicably with good working class morality. Let us hope so.
By Kimball Cariou
The year 2004 closed with some tentative steps toward electoral reform in Canada, but no guarantees of real change.
In December, Quebec became the first provincial government to submit a draft bill for mixed-member proportional representation voting, although the legislation is considered weak by critics of the current "first past the post" system.
The province has proposed a draft bill to elect about 50 members of the 125‑seat legislature. The new system would reflect the popular vote while preserving local representation in the legislature, according to Jacques Dupuis, minister responsible for the reform of democratic institutions.
The Quebec Liberals, whose support is largely centred in Montreal ridings, won the popular vote but lost the election to the PQ in 1998. The Liberals would have won a minority government under the proposed new system, which will face several levels of public scrutiny and will not be in effect before the next provincial election expected in 2007.
"This is a significant step," said Fair Vote Canada president Wayne Smith, "but the current draft certainly requires improvement and the timeline for implementation is excessively long."
Smith noted that since the proposed system tilts towards the larger parties, it would not ensure that voters are fairly represented. While most other mixed-member systems give voters one ballot for their constituency representative and another for district representation, the Quebec proposal unnecessarily limits voter choice.
There are "fatal flaws" in the Quebec proposal, according to Paul Cliche, spokesperson on democratic reform for the Union des forces progressistes (UFP), and Andrea Levy, a Montreal urban politics activists.
In a recent commentary, the two say that "the Dupuis draft bill ... does not go far enough in the direction of proportional representation to truly mitigate the distortions of our electoral system. Voters will have only one ballot, not two as in mixed member proportional systems. They will not have an opportunity to rank candidates in order of preference, as in the single transferable vote system. The minor reform will benefit the Liberals and the ADQ; smaller parties, like the UFP and the Greens, will face an effective threshold of 15 per cent, which is too high to encourage genuine electoral pluralism. Because of its narrow scope, Dupuis' proposal falls fall short of the reform needed to energize the democratic process and ensure that a greater diversity of political opinion is reflected in government."
Of the provinces formally considering voting reform, Quebec is the only one not using a referendum process. British Columbia established a randomly-selected independent citizens' assembly, which recommended a Single Transferable Vote system to be decided by referendum at the same time as the May 17 provincial election. PEI premier Pat Binns has announced a new electoral reform commission to work toward a referendum. The Ontario government is expected to announce more details soon on the Ontario citizens' assembly and referendum.
In British Columbia, however, the STV recommendation faces a tough uphill battle. The BC proposal is based on dividing the province into a smaller number of constituencies which elect from two to seven members, depending on population. Parties can nominate up to the number of members to be elected in each riding, and voters will rank all candidates (including independents) in order of preference.
Citizens Assembly members say they want to reduce the power of big political parties in the electoral process, a feature not calculated to earn the backing of the Liberals or NDP. The STV proposal also lacks a strong element of proportional representation, making it less appealing to the Green Party, which won almost 14% of the vote in the 2001 election. Since the CA recommendation needs the support of 60% of the voters, it faces the obstacle of opposition (or at best lack of support) from the parties which have the ability to mobilize large numbers of campaign workers. Add to this a steady stream of media criticism against STV, and it appears that a huge groundswell of grassroots support will be needed for the proposal to make the 60% hurdle.
Commentary by Darrell Rankin
In a total betrayal, the Martin Liberals may shut down Canada's $1 billion internet pharmacy business within a few weeks. U.S. corporate drug companies are opposed to the import of inexpensive drugs. According to industry spokespersons, U.S. President George Bush gave Prime Minister Paul Martin an "ultimatum" last month to stop the flow of cheap pharmaceuticals.
Last year close to 2 million U.S. patients purchased drugs from internet mail‑order pharmacies in Canada, due to a combination of Canadian price controls, a lower Canadian dollar and a highly monopolized U.S. drug industry. Typically, drugs in Canada cost 30 to 40 per cent less than at U.S. drug stores.
The strongest push for this change is coming from U.S. corporate drug giants, which spent $235.7 million in the United States on lobbying between 1997 and 1999 alone, and gave $33.4 million to U.S. political parties and candidates between 1997 and 2000.
Federal Health Minister Ujjal Dosanjh, a former NDP premier of British Columbia, is drawing up regulations that will end the jobs of 4,000 people in Canada, about half of whom live in Manitoba, and boost U.S. corporate drug profits by billions of dollars over several years. Millions of U.S. citizens will be forced to pay monopoly pricing to the corporate drug giants, if they can afford it at all.
Arguments in support of the crackdown are convoluted on both sides of the border. The regulations may ban Canadian doctors from co‑signing prescriptions written by American physicians, to prevent the "unethical" practice of issuing prescriptions for patients not personally examined. But a majority of U.S. states (29) honour prescriptions written by Canadian doctors with no need for a co-signing U.S. physician.
Citing a need to guarantee the amount of drugs available to Canadians, Dosanjh may ban the export of a list of widely used prescription drugs. Surely there are less drastic measures that will ensure drug supplies.
In the U.S., politicians are concerned about the "safety" of drugs imported from Canada, many of which are first exported from the U.S. to Canada; they are the same drugs manufactured by the same companies in the same plants as drugs intended for U.S. citizens. This prompted one U.S. congressman to demand, "Show us the dead Canadians."
But a shortage of facts or valid reasons has never stopped pro‑corporate governments from acting when profits are at stake. The Martin Liberals are bowing to the bigger profit‑mongers who control Washington, and abandoning workers and businesses in their own country, an outright betrayal of Canada.
(Rankin is the Manitoba leader of the Communist Party of Canada.)
People's Voice Commentary
While a split among Coalition of Progressive Electors' councillors in Vancouver had been expected, the form of the division in mid-December came as a surprise. After months of speculation that Mayor Larry Campbell would run as an independent in the November 2005 civic election, he and three other councillors (Jim Green, Tim Stevenson, and Raymond Louie) instead said that they would sit as "COPE independents," and announced the formation of the "Friends of Larry Campbell," primarily a fundraising arm.
In theory, this would give the four the support of COPE's large membership during the campaign, despite taking positions contrary to longstanding COPE policy. They have voted together with the two right-wing NPA councillors on several key issues, such as support for the RAV line pushed by big business and the provincial Liberals, and expansion of casinos within the city.
To say the least, the announcement created confusion. Initial reactions from some trade union leaders and from the COPE executive (elected by acclamation last summer following intense negotiations to avoid an open split), presented the move in a positive light. But it soon became apparent that this spin was short term damage control, rather than a well-considered analysis.
It would be easy to succumb to a highly negative appraisal of these developments. After all, COPE's historic 2002 victory gave Vancouver's working class and democratic forces unprecedented influence at City Hall. While many progressive gains have been achieved since then, decisions such as the recent support by Campbell and Louie for another transit fare increase go directly against the interests of the working people who form COPE's support base. After promising to help keep a firm civilian grip on the police, the Mayor has turned into an apologist for the force's massive overspending and its slide back into open brutality. In effect, the "Friends of Larry" have increasingly turned to the business community for support.
Some have argued that COPE was wrong to pursue a strategy of building an alliance of left and centre forces against the NPA. COPE should only nominate proven socialist-oriented candidates, according to this position.
But such a view is based more on wishful thinking than on political realities. While the political left is larger in Vancouver than in most other Canadian cities, it remains relatively small, even if all members of the NDP were defined as "left". This is especially true given the weak left presence among key ethnic communities which form almost half of the city's population.
For this and other reasons, an attempt to "solve" COPE's problems by changing it into a civic socialist party would guarantee defeat. Harry Rankin's losing campaign for mayor in 1987, for example, was easily framed by the corporate media in "left vs. right" terms. The resulting big losses for COPE helped send the organization into a decade-long downward spiral.
Civic governments across Canada face a wide range of urgent, immediate problems, many of which can be addressed by policies which will not in themselves eliminate the power of big capital. In Vancouver, these problems range from the crises of poverty, addictions, and homelessness, to the ongoing regional transit mess, to inadequate provincial funding for the city's schools. On all these issues, a wide range of political forces opposed to the historic domination of City Hall by big developers and other corporate interests have positive contributions to make.
However, the left is crucial in this process; in fact, it was the Communist Party which played a vital role in winning the labour movement to the concept of building COPE as a broad alliance arising out of campaigns by Harry Rankin, Effie Jones, and other progressive candidates. Nor was it coincidental that COPE's decline starting in the late 1980s paralleled the near-liquidation of the CPC at that time, or that the Communist Party was a strong advocate of the COPE-Green alliance in the 1999 civic election, which helped set the stage for the organization's revival. The view of the Communist Party is that political progress in Canada depends on building broad unity in action among all progressive forces, both in the extra-parliamentary struggles and in the electoral arena, including at the civic level.
This will be a complex process; there is no straight path to "socialism in one city." The actions of the "Friends of Larry Campbell" have set back the movement for civic reform, not only in Vancouver, but across Canada. But rather than turn to left-sectarian tactics or even a withdrawal from municipal politics, the answer is to strengthen and mobilize COPE's base in the organized working class, and also among tenants and homeowners, transit users, environmentalists, anti-poverty activists, women's groups, supporters of peace, the LGBT movements, seniors, students, ethnic and immigrant communities, defenders of public education, and other sections of the population. This struggle may well involve compromises, such as possible electoral agreements with the Campbell group, as long as COPE remains a coalition based firmly on the interests of working people, with policy set by its membership, not by cliques in the backrooms.
The labour movement has a key role to play in the period ahead. Throughout COPE's history, the Vancouver and District Labour Council and its affiliates have been vital to the organization's efforts to mobilize working people around municipal struggles. Despite differences of opinion on some issues, the most consistent defenders of working class interests on the present City Council are the COPE majority, who deserve the strong support of labour when nominations are held later this year.
COPE has overcome difficulties and defeats before. We urge COPE members to pull together with the aim of winning majorities again this fall at City Hall, School Board and Parks Board.
Paul Celluci intends to leave his post as US Ambassador to Canada, heading for a more lucrative career in the private sector. The sooner the better, in our opinion. But for how, he is still interfering in Canadian sovereignty. In his latest intrusion, Celluci predicts that the Martin government will sign on to Washington's "Missile Defence" plan by the end of March.
"We've been told that it will be dealt with over the next couple of months," Celluci is quoted as saying by the National Post, going on to say, "We continue to hope that Canada makes a positive decision on the missile defence program, which we believe is consistent with the mission of NORAD."
The National Post story (Jan. 9) implies that Martin's conditions laid down last month (no space weapons, no costs to Canada, etc.) was just a "communications strategy" for managing domestic political opinion. Apparently, the next day Martin sent Alex Himelfarb, the clerk of the Privy Council, to assure U.S. officials that his comments did not reflect a decision by the government on missile defence.
Some speculate that Martin may announce his decision after the Liberals' biennial convention in early March, conveniently after the leadership review vote where the PM wants to score higher than the 90% approval levels which delegates gave to Jean Chretien after his first election victory. Kissing G.W. Bush's backside by going along with the Pentagon's wasteful plan to put nuclear weapons in space would not go down well with Liberal delegates, who have a resolution on the issue in their kits. We urge every peace-minded Canadian to keep up the heat on Martin and his MPs as this important decision looms.
PV Ontario Bureau
On Dec. 31, the ultra‑right Colombian government of President Alvaro Uribe extradited Ricardo Palmera to the United States. Palmera, better known by his nom de guerre "Simon Trinidad," is a leading member of the Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces‑Peoples Army (FARC‑EP).
Trinidad had been kidnapped in Quito, Ecuador last January. According to the FARC‑EP, his assignment in Ecuador was to line up a suitable venue for a meeting with UN General Secretary Kofi Annan and other international personalities to work out a solution for the humanitarian exchange of prisoners held by the two sides in the almost 40‑year long civil war in Colombia.
He was extradited to Colombia, where he remained in maximum security prison and faced 100 legal cases with charges of terrorism, kidnapping, drug trafficking and rebellion. In Washington DC, Trinidad was charged with kidnapping, terrorism and drug trafficking.
U.S. Attorney‑General John Ashcroft gloated over the extradition as he presented the indictments under which Trinidad will be tried in US courts. The main charges include his involvement in the kidnapping and ransoming of three US citizens in February 2003 when their airplane crashed in the Colombian jungle. The indictment also alleges that Trinidad managed and controlled money for the FARC that was used by the organization to conduct cocaine trafficking activities.
Human rights activists and opponents of the corrupt and neo-fascist regime in Colombia immediately denounced the extradition as a gutless act of pandering to the Bush Administration by their "puppet" in Bogota, President Uribe. Jaime Caicedo, General-‑Secretary of the Communist Party of Colombia, noted that "Uribe is ignoring the Constitution, which prohibits extradition for political reasons. Although Trinidad has not been formally charged for such reasons, it is blindness to deny his status as a political prisoner, being an outstanding figure of a Colombian insurgent force confronting the State."
"No one understands how it is that while Uribe extradites his opponents, the narco‑paramilitaries enjoy utter impunity. Curiously, those responsible for massacres of the civilian population, murders of dissidents, labour union activists, educators and journalists, are demanding further concessions and benefits from the government," Caicedo added.
"The intentions of the US Administration and its client government in Colombia are quite clear in the Trinidad case," stated Communist Party of Canada leader Miguel Figueroa. "They hope to use the Trinidad `show‑trial' in order to draw a link between the `war on drugs' and the counter‑insurgency war they have been waging against the people's revolutionary forces in Colombia."
"In a certain sense, this is nothing new," Figueroa added. "They have been trying to float this idea for years, under the aegis of the Plan Colombia. But the whole world knows that it is completely bogus, that it is precisely the right‑wing paramilitary thugs, the army and the government officials themselves who are in direct, daily collusion with the cocaine cartel interests. That's why an international campaign is needed to expose this charade, to protect Trinidad's legal and human rights, and to prevent U.S. imperialism from using this `trial' as a propaganda ploy and launching pad for even larger US military intervention in Colombia."
[More on the Trinidad case will appear in the next issue of PV]
PV Vancouver Bureau
The Hospital Employees' Union is seeking a strike mandate from its members at a Victoria long-term care facility in an effort to reach a first collective agreement with Compass Group, the multi-billion dollar British corporation.
The union has also filed a complaint at the Labour Relations Board against Compass Group alleging that the company has attempted to interfere in an undermine the strike vote by bringing in outside agents to threaten workers with the loss of their jobs.
The 22 food, laundry and housekeeping workers at Beacon Hill Villa have been without a contract for more than 13 months. On Dec. 6, Compass Group rejected a union proposal that included guaranteed hours of work, health and safety language and a grievance procedure along with a modest wage increase. The two sides have not met since.
“Compass Group must stop stalling and live up to its responsibility to negotiate a first contract with its employees,” says HEU acting secretary-business manager Zorica Bosancic. “Beacon Hill Villa is more than just a cash cow in the company's global operations.”
Compass Group employees at Beacon Hill Villa earn a starting wage of $9.25, about half the hourly wage earned before the work was contracted out in 2003. Compass Group CEO Michael J. Bailey took home more than $6 million (CAD) in salary, benefits and performance-related bonuses in 2003 – a 27 per cent increase over the previous year. According to the company's most recent annual report, Compass Group's global revenues are nearly $26 billion a year.
The Campbell Liberal provincial government has made hospital employees a major target of its anti-labour policies, tearing up their collective agreements and imposing contracting out on thousands of workers. But many of the workers hit by this attack have rejoined HEU in an attempt to regain their former wages and working conditions.
Thousands of working people have moved to Alberta in recent years, hoping to find a better life. But workers in Canada's wealthiest province hardly get their share of the pie. In fact, Alberta has the lowest minimum wage in the country, at just $5.90 per hour. As the National Union of Provincial Government Employees (NUPGE) pointed out recently, this rate “has remained unchanged for the past five years – the five wealthiest years in the province's history.”
Alberta is the only province without government deficits or debts, not thanks to any clever policies of Ralph Klein's Tories, but mainly due to soaring oil prices and the war in Iraq. RBC Financial Group recently made this comment about Alberta's finances: “The province is dealing with projected annual revenues that are $5.7 billion higher than projected in the spring budget, expenses that are $1.9 billion higher and a net surplus that is now projected to come in at about $4.1 billion.”
With 3.2 million people, the Alberta treasury will take in about $1,350 more per citizen this year than it will spend on all government activities, including huge ongoing subsidies to business. The province also has a Heritage Fund stuffed with $12 billion in extra cash. But the Klein government has no plans to boost the minimum wage.
Ontario will raise its minimum wage to $7.45 on Feb. 1, the second increase since Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty was elected in October 2003. Prior to that, the rate was frozen through eight years of Tory government under Mike Harris and Ernie Eves. Lest anyone think that Liberals are pro-labour, the Campbell Liberals in B.C. Cut the minimum wage for those on their first 500 working hours to just $6/hour. The Campbell government claims this was to help new workers find employment, but of course those earning six bucks an hour pay as much as everyone else at the grocery store and the gas pumps.
Mike Cardinal, Alberta's human resources minister, says that he is willing to “consider” a raise in the minimum wage – but only after consulting the business community. The Tories have been in office in Alberta since 1971, taking orders from big business from day one. Apparently, that's not about to change.
The North End Socialist Centre .... located in Winnipeg, where the first Communist in North America was elected in 1926. The Centre serves as the Communist Party office in Manitoba. On the evening of December 26, a burst water pipe damaged the Communist Party office. Major repairs will be needed to restore the structure. Fortunately, only a small handful of documents were partly soaked, and they are fully recoverable.
The Communist Party's Manitoba and Central Executive Committees are working on a plan to renovate the building. More news will be available later.
Speaking late last year to Reuters news agency, Princeton economics professor Paul Krugman, who has a regular opinion column in the New York Times, said that George W. Bush's victory would reinforce his administration's unwillingness to listen to dissenting opinions. That, he argued, could spell serious trouble for the U.S. economy, plagued by soaring deficits, waning investor confidence and anemic job creation.
“This is a group of people who don't believe that any of the rules really apply,” said Krugman. “They are utterly irresponsible.'”
Krugman, the author of popular bourgeois economics texts, worries that Bush will simultaneously push through more tax cuts and try to privatize social security, ignoring a chorus of economic thinkers who caution against such measures.
“If you go back and you look at the sources of the blow-up of Argentine debt during the 1990s, one little-appreciated thing is that social security privatization was an important source of that expansion of debt,” said Krugman, referring to Argentina's 2001 default on an estimated $100 billion in debt, the largest such event in modern economic history. “So if you ask, do we look like Argentina, the answer is a whole lot more than anyone is quite willing to admit at this point. We've become a banana republic.”
Crisis might take many forms, he said, but one key concern is that Asian central banks may lose their appetite for U.S. Government debt, which has so far allowed the United States to finance its twin deficits. A deeper plunge in the battered U.S. dollar is another possible route to crisis, Krugman said.
The absence of any mention of currencies in a communique from the Group of 20 rich and emerging market countries last November reinforced investors' perception that the United States, while saying it promotes a strong dollar, is willing to let its currency slide further.
“The break can come either from the Reserve Bank of China deciding it has enough dollars, thank you, or from private investors saying 'I'm going to take a speculative bet on a dollar plunge,' which then ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy,” Krugman opined. “Both scenarios are pretty unnerving.”
In the longer-term, Bush's social security “reform,” which would relegate pensions for the elderly to the whims of volatile financial markets, could have wide-ranging implications for future generations. The only bright spot in having Bush in power for another four years, he said, is that further economic mismanagement might trigger protests.
“I do believe at some point there is going to be a popular tidal wave against what has happened,” concluded Krugman. “In the meantime, you keep banging on the drum, you keep telling the truth. And then eventually we have the great demonstrations, which I think are important to let the government know that many Americans are not happy with what is happening.”
by Manuel Alberto Ramy,
Progreso Weekly, Cuba
There are some human, social and political events that go beyond the necessary, temporary conventions. They are not left behind after the last stroke of the midnight bell on Dec. 31; because of their importance, they refuse to become the past, to become dead events. Furthermore, they burst into the new calendar with vigor, displaying their various facets. One of those events is the series of accords reached between the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela and the Republic of Cuba.
Those accords were signed in Havana on Dec. 14 by presidents Chavez and Castro. In my judgment, they are strategic and have a special, transcendental meaning for both countries. Also, they send a message to the countries of Latin America, to the degree that they flesh out an integration project: the ALBA (Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas.)
ALBA demonstrates that the first requisite for any integrationist process is political will, the action of launching a project on the strength of the converging issues and recognizing the foci of complementarity. I should point out that another virtue of the accords is that they took into consideration the realities and particularities of Cuba and Venezuela.
The topic is broad, deep, and like kudzu – grows unrelentingly. Today, I want to give it a look from the Cuban standpoint. What is ALBA's significance to Cuba?
Omar Everleny Perez, a Master in Economic Sciences, a Cuban-born academician, member of the Research Center for Cuban Economy (CIEC), a guest professor at various universities in the United States and Europe, has agreed to talk about the topic.
Progreso Weekly (PW): What is your first impression of the accords as a whole?
Omar Everleny Perez (OEP): I think it's a strategic plan. It has advantages for both countries, it gives access to markets, to financial resources and investments, and all these elements constitute strategic factors. Besides, it is not a short-range project but encompasses a period that, in some parts, extends to 10 years.
PW: Any remarkable aspects?
OEP: The possibility of exchanging whole technological packages. The software industry in the field of education represents one element to be considered in future accords signed with other areas of the country.
It's a step forward in what, in my opinion, will be characteristic in the next four of five years, when accords are signed with other countries, given the need to work not only the economic streams but also the social streams, which have been pretty well abandoned in our continent. An example of this is Cuba's work in Venezuela on educational and health matters, which has had important results.
PW: In the Cuban-Venezuelan accord of 2000, these collaborations were contemplated. I'm referring to the presence of thousands of doctors and health-care workers for whom the [Cuban] government would not be paid in money or other form. Now, with this recently signed accord, things seem to change.
OEP: True. The present accord assigns a value to these services and,. Even though they are preferential, the benefits are mutually agreed upon.
PW: What's your opinion about the section relative to crude oil?
OEP: For Cuba, as for any other country that lacks energy resources, the accord that establishes the price of oil at no less than US$27 a barrel is extremely important. We live in a world where the price of oil is very volatile – it has reached $44 a barrel – so the signed accord guarantees us Cubans a price.
In turn, Venezuela obtains a guarantee that if the prices drop, there will be a fixed minimum price. But there are important aspects in the signed document other than the price of oil, such as the elimination of duties for products from either country.
PW: True, that's an important facility.
OEP: Of course, because it reduces the prices of specific raw materials and products. Also important is the issue of the scholarships offered by Cuba for higher learning.
PW: But there's also an outstanding issue: the possible recovery of the Cienfuegos refinery, an enterprise that was practically dead.
OEP: We are negotiating with PDVSA [the state-owned Venezuelan oil industry] the purchase of part of the Cienfuegos refinery for the purpose of a restart, which would give Cuba a guarantee of energy products. We are also negotiating with CORPOZULIA [corporation of the Venezuelan state of Zulia] the purchase of almost 600,000 tons of coal for the Cuban ferronickel plant, in partnership with China.
In addition, there is a high probability that, thanks to investments from Venezuela and the Canadian firm Sherritt, we can build a thermoelectrical coal-operated plant in Mariel. The accords are very broad and beneficial.
PW: One of the chapters of the signed accord says that Venezuela's state-connected investors can own 100 percent of a property, which is something unprecedented, I believe. Why was this exception made?
OEP: The Cuban law on investments enacted in the 1990s does allow for this 100 percent ownership, although I believe that only two or three investors enjoy such a benefit. It's interesting that, in the case of Venezuelan state-connected investments, the door is flung wide open. Undoubtedly, the fact that the Cuban government reaffirms that it will grant 100 percent ownership to the state sector is a stimulating factor.
PW: Could we think about the possibility of granting 100 percent ownership in accords with other countries?
OEP: The possibility exists, because it's contemplated in the law on investments I just mentioned. Now, at a state level and as a possibility, this type of incentive could be granted to other countries, such as Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay, but I am not certain that this will be so.
PW: Why not?
OEP: The type of relations between Cuba and Venezuela is very fruitful and for other, similar accords to be made, the conditions must be present.
PW: Not since the late USSR and the CAME 9Council of Mutual Economic Aid) has there been an agreement like the one signed on Dec. 14, is that right?
OEP: Not since the CAME has there been anything of such magnitude, compass and reach, because [this accord] covers all sectors of the economy, health care, education, communications, the environment. This is an accord that contains more than 13 articles, all of them very substantive – although we recently made accords with the People's Republic of China that cover several important areas.
PW: Is it your opinion that this accord is positive for the Cuban people?
OEP: It is very important for the country.
(Manuel Alberto Ramy is chief correspondent of Radio Progreso Alternativa in Havana and editor for Progreso Semanal, the Spanish-language version of Progreso Weekly.)
By Gregory Wilpert,
Venezuelanalysis.com
Caracas, January 4 – Several state governors of Venezuela have either recently passed or are in the process of drafting decrees to accelerate the country's land reform process. The decrees are meant to eliminate large landed estates (latifundios) and to clarify ownership and usage of agricultural land in Venezuela.
In late 2001, the Chavez government had passed a controversial land reform law, which was aimed at redistributing land holdings of over 100 to 5,000 hectares (250-12,500 acres), depending on its quality, to landless peasants. So far the government has redistributed state-owned land to over 130,000 peasant families, of about 10 hectares (25 acres) each. Except for disputes over which land belongs to the state and which to private landowners, no privately owned land has yet been officially redistributed.
Venezuela's land reform law specifies that large landed estates, especially if they are not being cultivated, are to be redistributed. In response to the decrees being passed in several states, Venezuela's Vice-President, José Vicente Rangel, said, “The struggle against the latifundio makes social and economic sense, which is why it is of the highest interest to the state.”
The Chavez government hopes to increase both social justice and “food sovereignty” via the land reform program. Venezuela currently imports 60-70 (percent) of its food stuffs and agricultural production makes up merely 6% of the country's GDP.
In Cojedes state, in Venezuela's North West, the recently reelected pro-Chavez governor Johnny Yanez Rangel, passed a decree that called for the “intervention” of uncultivated private land. The decree does not specify what it means by intervention, but says that the state government will intervene in “all lands, urban and rural land, public and private, that presumably is uncultivated or classified as part of the latifundio regime.”
Other pro-Chavez state governors, such as in Monagas, Yaracuy, Apure, Barinas, and Portugesa, have either passed similar decrees or are in the process of drafting them. While they vary in how they would be applied, they all involve the creation of technical commissions for identifying and redistributing the land.
Meanwhile, Vice-President Rangel has convened a special meeting to coordinate the efforts taking place in the different states. Also involved in this meeting was Eliecer Otaiza, the director of the National Land Institute (INTI), which is responsible for the land reform. Otaiza said that his institute recently conducted a study and now estimates that there are about 500 estates with uncultivated agricultural land, of which 56 would be classified as latifundios, the large landed estates that used to dominate Latin American societies. In Venezuela latifundios are defined as estates of over 20,000 hectares (50,000 acres). “We hope to issue 100,000 land grants within the next six months,” said Otaiza.
Land owners whose land is expropriated under the 2001 Land Law would receive market value compensation. Despite this, opposition leaders have criticized the law as being “communist” and as a violation of private property rights.
Sierra Leone's trade unions staged a two-day general strike on Jan. 3-4 to demand higher pay and better living conditions. The government conceded some of the strikers' demands and agreed to negotiate others, such as a reduction in income tax and an increase in the minimum wage of 40,000 leones (US$13) per month. A 50kg bag of rice, considered the bare minimum needed to feed a family for a month, now costs 65,000 leones.
The strikers also demanded a reduction in the price of fuel. The government tried to head off the strike by slashing pump prices by 20 percent on the eve of the stoppage, which was called by the Sierra Leone Labour Congress, the main trade union federation.
Many Sierra Leoneans greeted the general strike as a positive move in the country's return to normality after a brutal 10-year civil war which ended in 2001. During the industrial action, taxis and buses stayed off the streets, most government offices and shops were shut, and hospital workers and employees of the electricity and water company walked out.
The strike followed three months of talks between labour leaders and the government. After President Ahmed Tejan Kabbah met the trade unionists to discuss their demands, Labour Congress President Mohamed Deen called off the strike, saying the government had agreed to raise the earnings threshold at which employees start to pay income tax from 10 million to 20 million leones ($3,500 to $7,500) per year and make other tax concessions.
Three years after the civil war ended, Sierra Leone still ranks lowest of 177 countries listed in the United Nations Development Programme's 2004 Human Development Index, despite its potentially lucrative deposits of diamonds, titanium and bauxite. Three-quarters of the country's five million population survive on less than two US dollars per day.
(IRIN News Service)
UK employees did unpaid overtime worth £23 billion (about $45 million US) in 2004, according to a Trades Union Congress analysis of official statistics published on Jan. 6. On average each employee who did unpaid overtime would have earned 4,650 for their unpaid hours if paid at normal hourly rates. If they had done all their unpaid overtime at the beginning of the year, they would have worked for free until February 25l
The TUC has designated Feb. 25 as “Work Your Proper hours Day,' urging employees to only work their contracted hours to remind bosses how much they depend on the unpaid extra work. Bosses should take their staff out for a lunchtime or after-work meal, coffee or cocktail to say thank you, says the TUC.
“Most people do not mind putting in some extra time when there's a crisis or an unexpected rush. But too many workplaces have come to depend on very long hours. They get taken for granted and staff have to do even more if there is an unexpected rush,” said TUC General Secretary Brendan Barger.
Worst of all is that many long hours workplaces are inefficient and unproductive. People are putting in long hours to make up for poor organisation and planning in the workplace. It also puts employer complaints of the the costs of benefits such as pensions or time off for new parents into perspective. Employers have been cutting back on pensions even as their staff put in longer hours.”
Londoners doing unpaid overtime put in an extra 7 hours 54 minutes in a week – almost a full extra eight-hour day. If paid for this they would have earned an extra £7,000 a year.
Combined media reports
A leading Iraqi Communist Party member has been murdered in Baghdad. Hadi Salih, known as Abu Furat, was “assassinated in Baghdad in a cowardly act by anti-people terrorist elements and supporters of the ousted dictatorial regime,” an ICP statement said on Jan. 6. He was brutally tortured and then shot on the night of Jan. 4 by killers who broke into his Baghdad home.
Hadi Salih, 58, was a former printing worker who helped found the Iraqi Federation of Trade unions in May 2004. He was sentenced to death for his labour activism in 1969, but his sentence was commuted after five years in jail. After fleeing Iraq, Salih became a political refugee in Sweden, he returned to Baghdad after the war to help rebuild the labour movement, becoming the international secretary of the IFTY.
Salih frequently spoke out against the use of violence and terror in Iraq, In December, he participated in the ICFTU World Congress in Japan, where he condemned the US occupation and spoke of the tasks in rebuilding Iraq's labour movement.
U.S. Labour Against the War stated that “Hadi Salih was killed because of his commitment and dedication to making Iraq a democratic and progressive country, building a society in which its people can lead safe and secure lives, with full employment at a decent standard of living. US Labor Against the War shares his vision of a peaceful and progressive Iraq, and sends its condolences to his family and fellow workers.
“The ultimate source of violence in Iraq is the US occupation. The Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions calls for the end of the occupation and the US war. Salih's murder does not bring this end one step closer. Instead, it seeks to terrorize Iraq's labor movement, and other parts of its civil society, to keep them from seeking any peaceful means of gaining political power in the interest of its working people.”
Other assassinations of politicians have occurred in recent weeks. A prominent member of the Islamic party, the main Sunni faction, was killed on Jan. 5, while another leading communist, Saadi Abdel Jabber al-Caryatid, was killed south of the capital on Dec. 27. There was also an attempt on the life of leading Shiite politician Abdul Ariz al-Hakim in late December, and a bomb attack near the Baghdad headquarters of Prime Minister Dyad Malawi's party on Jan. 4.
There are also a growing number of attacks against ordinary workers and labour activists. On November 3, four railroad workers were killed, and their bodies mutilated. On December 25, two other train drivers were kidnapped, and five other workers beaten. On the night of December 26, the building of the Transport and Communications Workers in central Baghdad was shelled.
On December 8, eighteen young Iraqi construction workers were executed in a field about 50 km west of the city of Mosul. The men, who ranged in age from 14 to 20, had been travelling in two mini-buses. Their bodies were discovered later in a field, each with hands tied behind their backs and shot in the head. All of the workers, from Baghdad's northern neighbourhood of Kadhimiya, had been hired by an Iraqi contractor to work at a U.S. Base in Mosul.
Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II,
(updated edition) by William Blum, Monroe, Maine,
Common Courage Press, 2004,
469 pages, ISBN 1-56751-252-6
Reviewed by Steve Gilbert
In 1967 William Blum resigned from his position in the US State Department because of his opposition to the war in Vietnam. Since then he has worked as a freelance journalist in many parts of the world, including the US, Europe, South America and England. He has received numerous awards, including the “Project Censored Award” for writing one of the top ten censored news stories of 1999.
In Killing Hope, Blum catalogues criminal actions by the US military and the CIA since the end of World War II. According to Blum's calculations, the CIA has either assassinated or attempted to assassinate 37 prominent foreign political figures. In addition, the US has been instrumental in overthrowing more than forty foreign governments and has helped crush more than 30 populist and nationalist movements aimed at resisting oppressive dictatorships. In the course of these actions, the US has bombed some 25 countries, killed several million people, and caused intolerable hardship for millions more. These violations of international law were directed at countries which were virtually defenceless against overwhelming US firepower.
According to Blum, all these interventions have two things in common: the targeted country's “desire, born of perceived need and principle, to pursue a path of development independent of US foreign policy objectives”, and the belief of the US military that it was fighting against an international communist conspiracy. This conspiracy was, in the words of Senator Joseph McCarthy, “on a scale so immense as to dwarf any such previous adventure in the history of man.”
Added to these factors, in most cases, was the refusal of targeted countries to break off relations with socialist bloc countries, to outlaw leftist political parties at home, or to allow US military bases on their soil. In short, the targeted countries refused to be pawns in the Cold War. Blum cites many examples: “Arbenz of Guatemala, Mossadegh of Iran, Sukarno of Indonesia, Nkrumah of Ghana, Jagan of British Guiana, Sihanouk of Cambodia – all, insisted Uncle Sam, must declare themselves unequivocally on the side of the 'Free World' of suffer the consequences.”
Blum describes these and other interventions in detail. Each of his 56 chapters is brief, factual and well documented. Some,. Such as his chapter on the war in Vietnam, shed new light on familiar events; others, such as his account of events in British Guiana (1953-1964), will be unfamiliar to many readers.
Most of these interventions have been reported only in the most superficial way by the US media. In many cases slanted and fragmentary newspaper items were published some time after the event, but no attempt was made to bring them together to form an accurate and coherent account. As a result, the incidents were, in Blum's words, “non-events” to the majority of Americans. Like citizens of Nazi Germany, they could honestly say that they didn't know what was happening. Blum quotes Chinese Premier Chou En-Lai, who observed: “One of the delightful things about Americans is that they have no historical memory.”
To cite but one example: in December 1989 the US invaded Panama, allegedly to remove “bad guy” dictator and drug smuggler Manuel Noriega and “bring him to justice.” In the course of “operation Just Cause” over 15,000 Panamanian civilians were left homeless and an estimated 3,000 were killed, but these civilian casualties went unreported by the US establishment media. A reporter asked then-President George Bush senior: “Was it really worth it to send people to their death for this? To get Noriega?” Bush replied:”every human life is precious, and yet I have to answer, yes, it has been worth it.”
Blum writes: “The de facto censorship which leaves so many Americans functionally illiterate about the history of US foreign affairs may be all the more effective because it is not so much official, heavy handed or conspiratorial, as it is woven artlessly into the fabric of education media. No conspiracy is needed.”
He concludes that the CIA and the Pentagon consistently exaggerated the strength of the Soviet military and the scale of Soviet nuclear tests to justify huge increases in the US national security budget. He writes: “The whole thing had been a con game... There had never been an international communist conspiracy. The enemy was, and remains, any government or movement, or even individual, that stands in the way of the expansion of the American Empire by whatever name the US gives to the enemy – communist, rogue state, drug trafficker, terrorist.”
What makes Blum's work unique is the staggering mass of evidence of criminal activity perpetrated throughout the world with impunity by US administrations for over half a century. Killing Hope is highly recommended – a most valuable reference for libraries of all those concerned with human rights and international events
Betrayed: The Story of Canadian Merchant Seamen, the new documentary from Vancouver's Elaine Briere, will be screened at the next Left Film Night, 7 pm, Sunday, Jan. 30, at the Dogwood Centre, 706 Clark Drive, Vancouver.
In Betrayed, Briere, the director of Bitter Paradise: The Sell-Out of East Timor (1996), tells a little-known labour story with major international implications. The 56-minute documentary charts the turbulent history of the Canadian Seamen's Union, which organized to improve the lot of merchant seamen who served the allied cause so heroically during World War II. These young men were killed in larger numbers than were sailors in our Navy, but they had to fight yet another battle to get the government to provide recognition and pensions for their service.
In 1949, the Liberal government of Louis St. Laurent decided to privatize Canada's merchant fleet, then the fourth-largest in the world – and, to overcome CSU opposition, raised the spectre of communism to replace it with a U.S. Union run by the gangster Hal Banks. The CPU's strike in response was backed by workers in 26 countries, tying up 60% of global shipping, the largest international strike of the 20th century. Today, not a single deep-sea ship flies the Canadian flag. Canada Steamship Lines, owned by the family of Prime Minister Paul Martin, flies foreign flags to avoid Canadian taxes and labour laws.
Elaine Briere and surviving CSU members have presented the film on several occasions, starting with its premiere last November at Pacific Cinematheque, and recently at the Maritime Labour Centre in Vancouver. She will be present at the Left Film Night to discuss her documentary with viewers.
Left Film Nights are presented regularly by the Centre for Socialist Education, the Vancouver East Club of the CPC, and the BC Young Communist League. Donations are welcome at the door, coffee and refreshments will be available.
Betrayed is available in DVD format by mail from People's Co-op Bookstore in
Meeting on Dec. 15-16, the National Executive Board of the Canadian Union of Public Employees adopted the following resolution against the so-called “Ballistic Missile Defence” plan which the U.S. is pushing:
WHEREAS the U.S. Government's planned Ballistic Missile Defence system has been the matter of much debate in Canada, and around the world; and
WHEREAS U.S. President George W. Bush during his recent visit to Canada urged the Canadian government to support the BMD; and
WHEREAS the federal government has not allowed a full debate on this matter in Parliament and refuses to say where it stands on this matter; and
WHEREAS Canada has a history of respecting arms control, unlike the U.S. Government; and
WHEREAS the BMD initiative is a unilateral move by the U.S. Government and Canada has a tradition of multilateralism in terms of international affairs; and
WHEREAS whereas the BMD is an escalation in the global arms race and the beginning of the weaponization of space; and
WHEREAS Canadians want their federal government to maintain Canadian sovereignty and independence in matters of foreign policy;
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that CUPE's National Executive Board reaffirm our convention policy opposition to the BMD system and the weaponization of space; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that CUPE's National Executive Board call upon the federal government to allow a full and open debate on the BMD system in the Canadian Parliament; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that CUPE's National Executive Board actively lobby the federal government to reject the BMD system and to fully support the NDP Caucus and the Bloc Québécois Caucus in its opposition to the BMD system through the course of open debate in parliament.