In a few days’ time BRICS nations, comprising two emerging imperialist powers and three advanced semi colonies, will meet in South Africa (SA). For the first time, one of the leading members of the grouping, Vladimir Putin of Russia, will be absent following manoeuvres by traditional imperialists, using the International Criminal Court (ICC), to disrupt the gathering. The meeting takes place at an important juncture in the development, or rather degeneration, of global imperialism. The proxy war in Ukraine, pitting NATO and Russia over the control of Eastern Europe, is the main feature of imperialist tension and aggression in frantic attempts to salvage the sure decline and death of capitalism without regard for the fate of humanity and nature. Many semi colonial states have applied to be part of the grouping and in most likelihood will be admitted.
The bloc is an international alliance of former deformed/degenerated workers states and former western colonies and semi-colonies for the purpose of projecting the economic and strategic interests of China and Russia as emerging imperialist nations engaged in a vicious war with their western counterparts for the extraction of surplus value and guarantee of key resources. One subject likely to be on the Agenda in South Africa is ‘de-dolarisation’. BRICS members and prospective members are building closer trading relations paid by currency swaps. Brazil (and Argentina which is a prospective member) are already paying for imports with their own currencies. The UAE and India recently agreed to trade in oil with their own currencies. The effects will be to trade with partners without being forced to use the US$. The advantage of de-dolarisation is that it undermines one basic mechanism which exploits the oppressed countries.
The US$ is a fiat currency which is overvalued due to its role as a reserve currency. This undervalues other currencies relative to the US$ allowing a transfer of value from oppressed countries to the US. As more nations are attracted to the new trading bloc the US$ will gradually devalue weakening the financial hegemony of US imperialism. Whether de-dollarisation brings genuine economic independence to the BRICs nations from Russia and China remains to be seen. As imperialist powers they cannot afford to allow the genuine national self-determination of their economic partners. Of course, as agents of Russia and China, those in government and the labour movement in the oppressed members of BRICS, and who bought and paid for, promote the narrative of a multipolar world based on equality and sovereignty, using this prospect to sell BRICS membership to the masses as the road to national independence and freedom.
The attitude of so-called Marxists on the nature of China and Russia informs their position on the war in Ukraine and has influenced their characterisation of the role of BRICS in semi colonial countries like South Africa. Failure to recognise the imperialist nature of the two states has led to either defense of these countries as “progressive” anti-imperialist nations fighting for a “fair” multi polar world or exaggerating the influence and hegemony of the west. Either way the implication of such a view on the role these nations are playing in semi-colonial states is that they play a progressive role that is beneficial to them all. Nothing can be further from the truth. The relationship with Russia/China is one of unequals riding on the misery of workers and poor peasants who are affected by poor working conditions and displacements to make way for extraction of vital mineral resources and surplus value.
The SA Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) is an excellent example of the new “progressive” popular front between a radical petit bourgeoisie party representing the ”Pan African” section of the national bourgeoisie in alliance with Chinese and Russian imperialism hiding behind the facade of mutual benefit. Malema is open about his admiration for Cuba as a model for future economic development in South Africa. China has found a reliable partner in the EFF which uses clever rhetoric to hoodwink the masses shifting focus from the African National Congress(ANC) which is reluctant to sever ties with Western Imperialism and the Maoist Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party (SRWP) which has failed to build a strong mass base in the working class. The bureaucrats of the South Africa Federation of Trade Unions (SAFTU) have delivered the workers to the dead end of the EFF-China/Russia Popular Front to ensure a compliant and distracted labour force. As in Cuba and other Bolivarian states this alliance comes at the cost of workers’ rights and acute exploitation. Petit bourgeoisie radical nationalist parties like the EFF have anchored themselves on pseudo Marxism with their radical rhetoric capturing thousands in the working class. An example of China’s influence on political parties across Africa is that of the leader of the Socialist Party of Zambia, allies of SRWP, who has openly voiced support for the bourgeoisie Zimbabwe African National Union(ZANU-PF) in the coming elections.
Recently a coup took place in Niger ousting the pro France president and government. The coupists claim they were forced to act as a result of the deteriorating security situation in the country, a key reason given by other western African countries which have experienced a coup recently, Mali, Guinea and Burkina Faso. Burkina Faso’s coup regime supports the coup in Niger and injects a strong advocacy for the Cuban and Boliviarian ‘revolutions’ in Latin America which are strongly tied to Chinese and Russian imperialism. We argue that the Bolivarian model has, along with the formation of BRICS, been a strong inspiration for national revolutions in Africa. We would predict more coups in Africa that hold up the Bolivarian/BRICS example as a guide to their participation in the dominant existing global imperialist popular front.
Soon after the coup France and other western countries together with ECOWAS condemned the coup and urged for restoration of civilian rule. France and ECOWAS have shown their intent to intervene militarily if civilian rule is not restored. This latest coup, showing popular hatred for France and support for Russia, is just the latest expression of the ongoing degeneration of Western imperialism which has caused untold suffering on the masses and ravaged the region through continuing war. The working masses are facing the brunt of the war and economic crisis through slave wages and high prices as France, along with other imperialist nations, want to shift the cost of paying for the structural crisis of capitalism to the shoulders of workers and the poor masses.
The coup is a pre-emptive tactic by a section of the local bourgeoisie to forestall popular revolt and direct anger to a wing of imperialism whilst leaning on another wing as the basis for maintaining capitalist relations against the threat of revolution. Popular support for the coup is a reflection of the desperate situation workers and the masses find themselves in and yearning to break free of the exploitative and oppressive environment they find themselves in. The only solution to the crisis of capitalism in a semi-colony is the permanent revolution that combines national liberation with socialist revolution in Niger as part of a socialist West Africa. We oppose the coup and call for the independent mobilisation of workers and poor masses against both the Bouzoma government and the coup government both representing wings of imperialism suffocating the country. This position arises from a correct view that contemporary global capitalist society is essentially characterised by the fight between traditional and emerging imperialist powers over resources and surplus value.
In SA the ANC and its spinoff the EFF arose out of the historic settlement to trade in the military struggle for bourgeois democracy in 1995. Since SA joined BRICS in 2009 it has pinned its hopes on China to break out of its subordination to Western Imperialism. 14 years later that dream has become a nightmare as the ANC regime is now not only the lapdog of Western imperialism but also China and Russia. The working people are locked into this imperialist popular front by the regime and by its corrupt unions incorporated in the state. In Zimbabwe ZANU-PF does China’s bidding legislating against Western sanctions, and against workers’ rights to meet the terms of China’s win-win deals. Here is the evidence that the BRICS model for development is a trap that denies the working masses any say in their future. This must not be the future of the Sahel and the whole of Africa where the military regimes are allowed to build new popular fronts with Russia and China. To smash the armed popular fronts like ECOWAS we call for independent workers’ organisations to form a continent-wide anti-imperialist united front capable of defending itself from military repression.
Marxists, opposed to Stalinists and centrists, should start from the basic position that China and Russia have transformed to become imperialist states exporting excessive finance capital for their own interests and using comprador bourgeoisie governments in semi-colonies and labour bureaucrats to protect and advance their interests. We argue that this relationship is that of an international popular front tying the working masses to the imperialists through the national bourgeois regimes. Against this popular front which exploits the masses desire for national independence to draw them into this popular front, revolutionaries must counter-pose the Anti-Imperialist United Front (AIUF) to break workers and oppressed from the bourgeois regimes and the imperialist powers they serve.
How will this struggle take shape? In West Africa we see the military leadership as one fraction of the national bourgeoisie substituting itself for the people. Marxists have no confidence in military rule which, like Sisi in Egypt, or Mnangagwa In Zimbabwe, imposes an authoritarian regime with the barest of democratic figleaves hiding their subservience to imperialism. Marxists warn against military regimes and their bourgeois and petty bourgeois nationalist agendas. We are for building an international united front of workers, poor peasants and rank and file soldiers in every country to take the power into our own hands, to join hands across national borders and fight to complete the unfinished bourgeois democratic revolution as the Permanent Revolution. The theory of permanent revolution is our guide for socialist action in a semi colony dominated by two wings of imperialism. Alliances like BRICS and NATO serve these different wings in a rush to maximise production and super-exploitation.
To provide jobs all big and imperialist assets must be nationalised and put under workers control and self-management!
For workers action committees to lead the resistance to the growing attacks on the wages and working conditions of the poor and the livelihood of the majority poor!
Workers form rank and file bodies to lead action in all unions and break with the reformist trade union leadership!
No to US/EU and China/Russia imperialism fronted by local bourgeoise parties!
No to reformism, centrism and fake Trotskyism, build a fighting revolutionary socialist party!
For workers and peasants’ government on the basis of the armed people to implement decisions that benefit the workers and the poor!
For an African socialist revolution as part of the international revolution that alone can guarantee a better life for all!
For a new World Party of socialist revolution based on the Transitional Program of 1938 to lead the revolution to end capitalism and open the road to socialism!
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