<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;
margin-left:0in;text-align:justify;line-height:12.0pt;mso-outline-level:1;
background:white"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#D36206;mso-font-kerning:18.0pt">Zimbabwe:
First signs of united front mass action against elite settlement</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545;mso-no-proof:yes"><img width="343" height="212" src="file:///C:/Users/SAHBIT~1/AppData/Local/Temp/msohtmlclip1/01/clip_image002.jpg" alt="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/12/03/world/03zimbabwe-600.jpg"></span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";
color:#454545"></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><i><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545">Protesting health
workers in Harare, December 3. The protest was attacked by riot cops.</span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545"> By the <b>National
Co-Ordinating Committee, International Socialist Organisation Zimbabwe</b></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><b><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545"> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; font-weight: normal; "><b><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545">@ </span></b><span style="font-size:12.0pt"><a href="http://links.org.au/node/775">http://links.org.au/node/775</a></span></span></span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545"> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; "><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545">December 2, 2008</span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:
"Times New Roman";color:#454545"> -- The situation in Zimbabwe has reached
unprecedented levels of crisis. As we have been saying for the last few years,
such a crisis was climaxing and with a number of possibilities arising. First
and most likely was the likelihood of the bourgeois elite politicians in
[President Robert Mugabe's] Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front
(ZANU-PF) and the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) uniting
together in an elitist government of national unity in which ZANU-PF would be
the senior partner around a Western- and capitalist-supported neoliberal
economic agenda. The MDC's popularity would be used to pacify the urban working
people from rising up.</span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545"> The strong
possibilities of this happening has been shown with the MDC's willingeness to
accept the crumbs offered by the ZANU-PF and endorsed by the regional Southern
African Development Community in which Mugabe would remain with virtually all
his executive presidential powers with MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai acting as a
prop.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545">Indeed the cynicism of
the whole plot was shown in that as the MDC signed Constitutional Amendment 19
with ZANU-PF, Mugabe was appointing Gideon Gono for another five years as
governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe -- the same Gono who has been the central
figure in the ZANU-PF's and the ruling class' neoliberal onslaught against
working people for the last five years. He is the virtual de facto prime
minister of Zimbabwe, unelected and unaccountable to the people, accoutable
only to his equally unelected and illegitmate masters.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545">However, we also
argued that if the elites did not quickly resolve their differences through an
elitist government of national unity and if the country did not descend into a
failed state like Somalia, there was a real possibility of uprisings from
below led by the working class, but critically involving a united front of
labour and radical civic groups and social movements, and militant rank and
file activists from the MDC. We have consistently called for the urgent
formation of such a united front to lead united mass action, centrally
demanding a people-driven and anti-neoliberal constitution.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(69, 69, 69); font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; ">In the last few
weeks the tensions and fights between the elites in the ZANU-PF and the
MDC over the share-out of power and the continuation of sanctions, and the
economic crisis has accelerated the crisis and brought greater political
disllusionament among the ordinary people, leading to an increasing wave of
discontent in the last few weeks, with strikes and protests by teachers,
nurses, doctors, members of the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA), women
and students.</span><br></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(69, 69, 69); font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; ">And most decisively in
the last few days, riots by lower ranks of the army in Harare beating up cash
vendors sent by Gono, as well as shops selling in foreign currency. Yesterday
they ran in the city centre singing and followed by scores of people denouncing
Gono and the government. The situation is now extremely delicate ahead of the
protests called for December 3 by civic groups led by the Zimbabwe Congress of
Trade Unions and also involving he Zimbabwe Social Forum and the National
Constitutional Assembly.</span><br></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(69, 69, 69); font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; ">The International
Socialist Organisation (ISOZ) is centrally involved in the demonstrations
through the Zimbabwe Social Forum (ZSF), where many of its leading cadres are playing
a critical role. We welcome the demonstrations as the first sign of united
front mass action that we have been calling for as the alternative to the
elitist political parties' negotiated settlement.</span><br></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545">Please find below the
statement issued by the chairperson of the ZSF, Munyaradzi Gwisai, who is also
the general co-ordinator of ISOZ, calling for local, regional and international
mobilisation and support for the mass action tomorrow on December 3, 2008.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(69, 69, 69); font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; ">We shall continually
update comrades on developments whilst we call for your support on what could
be a decisive day of action. The resolution among the leadership of the ZCTU,
ZSF and NCA is that we are going all-out no matter what the dictatorship throws
at us and we are confident that hundreds will turn up for the demonstration.</span><br></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545">No to Dictactorship!
Viva Socialism!</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:
justify;line-height:normal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#454545"> </span></p>
<div style="mso-element:para-border-div;border-top:dotted #CCCCCC 1.0pt;
border-left:solid #FF6600 6.0pt;border-bottom:dotted #CCCCCC 1.0pt;border-right:
none;mso-border-top-alt:dotted #CCCCCC .75pt;mso-border-left-alt:solid #FF6600 6.0pt;
mso-border-bottom-alt:dotted #CCCCCC .75pt;padding:2.0pt 0in 2.0pt 6.0pt;
background:whitesmoke">
<h2 style="margin-top:18.75pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:1.5pt;margin-left:
0in;text-align:justify;background:whitesmoke;border:none;mso-border-top-alt:
dotted #CCCCCC .75pt;mso-border-left-alt:solid #FF6600 6.0pt;mso-border-bottom-alt:
dotted #CCCCCC .75pt;padding:0in;mso-padding-alt:2.0pt 0in 2.0pt 6.0pt"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#666666;letter-spacing:-.25pt">Zimbabwe Social Forum: December 3 day of
action to say `No to poverty, oppression and dictatorship!'</span></h2>
</div>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545"> </span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:
"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545">December 2, 2008</span><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545"> -- Following the
Zimbabwe Social Forum held in Harare on October 11 2008 and the Southern Africa Social
Forum of October 18 in
Swaziland, it was resolved that the only way to resolve the unprecedented
economic and political crisis in Zimbabwe is united direct mass action.</span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545"> </span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545">It was noted that whilst
the ordinary people were suffering and dying, elites in politics and business
were wallowing in luxury. Yet it is their system of neoliberal capitalism that
has caused the crisis in the first place. It was resolved that half-baked
elitist political settlements centred around imperialist-inspired neoliberal
economic policies, as in the non-inclusive SADC-Mbeki talks and already being
implemented by the unelected de facto prime minister of Zimbabwe, Reserve Bank
governor Gideon Gono, who has been imposed on the people of Zimbabwe for a further
five years, would only perpetuate the suffering of the people and the rule of
his illegitimate and unelected masters in the ZANU-PF regime.</span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545"> </span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545">We cannot and we will
not accept the same Gono who financed the destruction of our houses in
Operation Murambatsvina and stole millions of US dollars meant for drugs and
support of those with AIDS/HIV to buy judges, army and police chiefs and
politicians Prados and Plasma TVs.</span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545"> </span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545">[The social forums
agreed] that the only way forward to resolve the Zimbabwean crisis were
immediate fresh democratic elections held under a new people-driven
constitution that also guarantees the bread and butter issues of the working
people and subordinates the private profit and wealth of the few to the human
and social needs of the many.</span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545"> </span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545">To that end it was
resolved to mobilise for all-out united mass action on December 3 by the
Zimbabwe Social Forum (ZSF) together with the actions called by the Zimbabwe
Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) demanding the removal of bank cash limits and
the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA) rejecting the elitist constitutional
process agreed by the politicians, and instead demand a people-driven
constitution.</span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545"> </span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545">In addition are those
demands already stated in the People's Charter including:</span></p>
<ul type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#454545;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
auto;text-align:justify;line-height:normal;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;
tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"">Removal
of all limits on cash withdrawals in banks -- it's our money! Gono must go
now!</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#454545;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
auto;text-align:justify;line-height:normal;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;
tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"">Abolish
all forex shops -- pay workers tax-free minimum living wages in forex!</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#454545;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
auto;text-align:justify;line-height:normal;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;
tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"">Declare
the cholera outbreak a national disaster -- clean water for the people and
full compensation for those who have died of cholera! [<span class="reportbody"><span id="Body">According to the UN, Zimbabwe's
``unprecedented cholera outbreak'' has claimed 565 lives from the 12,546
recorded cases since August, and ``is worsening and is becoming difficult
to contain as it spreads from cities''.]</span></span></span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#454545;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
auto;text-align:justify;line-height:normal;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;
tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"">Free
antiretroviral drugs and support care -- open our hospitals and pay nurses
and doctors living wages. We want free quality health care for all!</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#454545;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
auto;text-align:justify;line-height:normal;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;
tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"">Open
our schools, colleges and universities now –- pay teachers and lecturers
living wages –- abolish all fees in forex. We want free quality education
for all!</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#454545;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
auto;text-align:justify;line-height:normal;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;
tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"">Affordable
quality state subsidised public transport for all!</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#454545;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
auto;text-align:justify;line-height:normal;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;
tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"">Living
pensions for the disabled and elderly and free aids for them like
wheelchairs and crutches, and an end to the stigmatisation and
discrimination against the disabled.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#454545;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
auto;text-align:justify;line-height:normal;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;
tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"">No
to harassment of informal and cross border traders -- passports are our
right!</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#454545;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
auto;text-align:justify;line-height:normal;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;
tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"">Full,
affordable and quality state subsidised social services: water,
electricity, refuse collection; housing, sewerage facilities -- no to
privatisation of social utilities.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#454545;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
auto;text-align:justify;line-height:normal;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1;
tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"">Full
democracy now: No to the elitist givernment of nationalal unity and the
Kariba draft constitution which keep the losers of the March 2008
elections in power! We demand free and fair elections under a
deople-driven constitution!</span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545">Already thousands have
been protesting and striking in the last few weeks -- from nurses, doctors,
women, students, the NCA and, in the last few days, riots by underpaid and
starving junior members of the armed forces.</span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545"> </span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545">The hour has now arrived
in Zimbabwe! None but ourselves shall free ourselves! We shall from tomorrow,
December 3, gather and march from bank premises in our thousands as AIDS/HIV
activists, traders, students, youths, women, the disabled, workers, residents,
artists, socialists and social, constitutional and economic justice activists,
regardless of what the regime throws at us. The hour of freedom is near. We
call on all progressive movements and activists in Africa and globally to stand
with us as we reject poverty, oppression and dictatorship and fight for
freedom!</span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545"> </span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545">Our country is not for
sale ... Another Zimbabwe is possible! Another world is possible!</span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545"> </span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545">Say No to privatisation,
neoliberalism and capitalism!</span></p>
<p style="margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#454545"><br>
[The Zimbabwe Social Forum is made up of more than 40 organisations and
movements from the following clusters: AIDS/HIV; disabled; labour and trade
unions; youth; residents; gender; social service delivery; informal trade; debt
and trade; human rights and governance and faith based.]</span></p>