IntroductionOn Wed 1 Sept 2010 the masses in Mozambique burst into an uprising over rising bread, water and electricity. The masses organised a general strike against the increased starvation that the crisis of imperialism imposed on the proletariat. The masses rose against the Stalinist regime (of Frelimo) and over the heads of the trade union bureaucracy. In the street battles that followed the police killed at least 13 people including 2 children, while well over 400 were injured. The SA regime immediately imposed a siege on the uprising, closing the borders and closing their embassy (thus preventing any of the resistance leaders from seeking refuge from the murderous Frelimo government). At least 6 of the resistance leaders were arrested while hundreds of workers were imprisoned as well. Thus the SA and Mozambican regimes acted as direct agents of US imperialism in crushing the proletarian uprising. Imperialism acted swiftly, keeping the troops off the streets as they were fearful of another Madagascar, which this time could spread throughout the region. The bureaucracy of the Cosatu unions moved quickly to suspend the general strike of the 2nd September, in support of the public sector strike, but which was in reality another rebellion against the austerity measures of US imperialism; thus they left the Mozambican working class isolated and allowed their rebellion to be drowned in blood. That the working class in South Africa managed to get a date set for a general strike against imperialism shows that the masses are breaking from the ANC-SACP bourgeois regime. With the discrediting of the Zanu-PF- MDC regime, and the overthrowal of the US puppet, Ravalomanana, in Madagascar, there is now a strong trend in the working class, breaking from the bourgeois regime and strong elements of a tendency towards a pre-revolutionary situation across Southern Africa. The world wheat price is controlled by US imperialism; the massive electricity increases have been imposed by US imperialism through their control over the SA regime. Even the privatization of water is driven by US imperialism. It must be added that French imperialism plays the junior partner of US imperialism in putting the crisis of capitalism onto the backs of the working class. The treacherous leaders of the working class in the imperialist centres also isolate the revolution in Southern Africa by refusing to mobilise the working class on their home soil against their imperialist masters. To them this is just another ‘riot’ among the starving masses in ‘under-developed’ Africa or they act to isolate the revolution by preparing the ground for reformist ‘anti-capitalist parties. It is in these class battles that the Fourth International is being refounded. We present in this edition a selection of our recent interventions in the class struggle, for the eyes of the world working class.
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