The Party is Abandoning the Line of New Democracy: C.P. Gajurel "Guarav"

Chandra Prakash Gajurel ‘Gaurav’, the Secretary of the UCPN (Maoist), is best known for his outspoken personality and reasoning capacity. Gajurel is one of the proponents of the hardline politics within the Maoists led by its senior vice chairman Mohan Baidya ‘Kiran’. Gajurel has been constantly stressing the need of another ‘revolt’ to safeguard the long attained achievements and write a people’s constitution, and has been demanding to review the party’s strategic policy. Gajurel spoke to Chandra Khaki and Bidhan Shrestha for Greatway on various issues ranging from party line, ideological debate, internal rift, peace and constitution, among others. Excerpts:

Your faction stood against the party’s decision to handover the key of container containing arms and ammunitions of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to the Special Committee. What are the logics and reasons behind it ?

The key of the container should not have been handed over to the Special Committee before the completion of certain processes like the finalization of modality for integration of two armies, determination of the number of PLA fighters to take part in the integration process, their rank division and the regrouping of PLA fighters. To handover the key of the container before the completion of these processes is to make the PLA fighters unarmed and the integration process cannot take place making the PLA fighters unarmed. According to the principal of army and other armed forces, the key of the container containing arms and ammunitions has its own significance and it has its own procedure to keep command on it.

The Nepal Army (NA) never hands over the key of the arms and ammunition storage to the Defense Minister or even the Prime Minister and they can not ask to take control over it. We should not forget that Peoples liberation army is also an army and there is no questions of hand-overing the key without reaching to any conclusion about its respectful integration.

Therefore, it is not the SC to whom the key should have been handed. The key should have been handed over to the commander of new force formed after the integration, which can either be from PLA or NA. It is a rule of the army and it should be followed. Therefore, the handover of the key of the containers of PLA does not indicate a respectful integration. This will only guide towards capitulation.

According to you what should be the modality for the integration?

We had proposed two modality for the integration of two armies. First, we had proposed to form a separate security force containing PLA fighters only under the directorate of the Nepal Army. We had proposed that the new security force to be a combatant force and provide them the responsibility of border security. However, other parties were skeptical that the Maoists would use the force for their own benefit. So, we again proposed to form a mixed security force commanded by PLA fighter in which PLA fighters would cover 50 per cent and remaining 50 per cent by the personnel from NA and Armed Police Force. As other parties have already rejected the first option, we are holding discussions to forge an agreement in the second modality for integration.

What should be number of PLA fighters for the integration?

I strongly believe that the number should not be ascertained in advance. The number should be fixed after holding with the PLA fighters themselves because there are many fighters who are injured, who may want self retirement, many female fighters are now mother and some may turn out unfit according to the fitness standard of new force. If we fix the number in advance what will the others competent fighters do? They might feel that they have been ignored and may resort violence again.

A large number of PLA fighters who had supported your party during the People’s War were declared disqualified and forced to leave the cantonment. Those who supported you during armed struggle are now living in a misery. Why your party has ignored them?

This is an outcome of unscientific procedure followed during the rehabilitation of the disqualified PLA fighters. Without proper management of their future, they were forced to head out with limited cash. They were just handed money without showing what to do next. So, this problem is likely to prolong. The disqualified PLA fighters have already captured the party headquarters twice in protest. The party has somehow has been successful to convince the disqualified PLA fighters to be calm and wait for the time being but this is not the permanent solution. Even if we provide them financial support, the question for their living will rise as they consume it. Again, they will come to party headquarter and raise their voices. They are thrown out from the cantonment without settling their issues. Therefore, if a scientific and respectable approach is not followed in favour of these ‘disqualified’ combatants and during the integration of two armies as well, the nation is likely to be hit by yet another disaster.

It is said that the issue regarding the handover the key was raised after the disagreement in the party regarding allotment of ministries . Is it true?

This is not true. We were close to agreement regarding the division of ministries within the party. Dr Baburam Bhattarai had asked me to join the government as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs as Chairman Prachanda had asked for Finance Ministry. Although chairman had asked for the ministry, he did not have any competent candidate with the adequate knowledge in economics. Therefore, there was not really any big disagreement and the issue was almost solved. The problem started when they abruptly handed over the key to the SC.

There are also reports that your protest has been backed by COMPOSA and RIM. What do you say?

This is not true. Why should COMPOSA and RIM back our protest? COMPOSA is not an organization which directs a party. It just a coordination committee of various organizations. Likewise, RIM is also not very active recently. It is completely a choreographed propaganda.

Your faction has time and again demanded the revision and assessment of the policy, tactics and strategy opted by the party after the Chunwang meeting. Does it mean that your faction believes that the policy and strategy followed after the Chunwang meeting is theoretically incorrect?

When a party formulates a policy, it can have both positive and negative outcomes. Therefore, the time has now arrived to evaluate the policy opted by the party after the Chunwang meeting as it has failed to meet the expectation of the decision made during the meeting. I want to put forward an example to justify my points. During the Chunwang meeting, peace and constitution writing process was termed as party’s tactics and a new peoples’ movement should be completed standing on this base. In practice, however, it turned as the strategy of the party. Thus, it has created a threat of conclusion of our revolution in the midway. The party is slowly forgetting populistism. That is why we have demanded the assessment of the decisions made during the Chunwang meeting sooner or later. I think, general convention of the party will seek the solution for this.

After the Chunwang meeting, your party has adopted the federal democratic system abandoning the line of New Democracy as the minimum program of the party stating that this should be the transitional mean to reach in New democracy owing to the current national and international situation. Do you think it was a correct decision?

There was clearly mentioned in the Chunwang meeting that federal democratic system will be the tactics of the party but it is implemented as the strategy in practice. There is no concrete base for doing this. This is why, we have demanded to revise the policies, tactics and strategies adopted by the party after Chunwang meeting.

Do you mean that party is abandoning the policy of New Democracy ?

Exactly, this is happening in the practice.

But the leaders of the party has clearly stating that they have adopted federal democratic system as the transitional means to move ahead towards the new democracy. According to them, going through this step is necessary in the present national and international context.

We don’t have any differentiating view that the federal democratic system should be taken as the party’s tactics. We had decided to complete the new people’s revolution making federal democratic system its base. However, instead of making it a base, we have been trapped in the same. The party has slowly started to renounce the ideology of revolution.

In which level is the contradiction within the Maoists, is it in ideological level or just limited to the political level?

The contradiction is at the political and tactical level up to now. However, politics and tactics is also related with ideology. Currently, we are holding debates with in the party referring it as a political and tactical contradiction but it is certain that in the due course it will turn into an ideological debate.

Your faction has been portrayed as the anti peace and constitution due to your constant demand for revolt and revolution? What is your say?

I think we have been portrayed incorrectly. Recently, we had protested the decision to handover the key, it was also misinterpreted and a disinformation campaign was launched against it. We have been portrayed as a force dead set against peace and constitution. However, we have never said that we do not want the completion of army integration, we have only demanded a scientific and respectful integration. Similarly, we have never said that we do not want constitution, we have only demanded a people’s federal republican constitution, which is not only the policy of our faction but also the policy of the party.

Why do you constantly raise the issue of people’s revolt?

The issue of people’s revolt has not been raised by us only. Six days strike in the past was also the part of the exercise for the people’s revolt under the policy adopted by the party. It was raised by the party as a whole. No one has ever said that there should not be people’s revolt. There is a strong need for people’s revolt as the aspirations of the people have not been met and none of their problems have been solved. The people want to see change in the field, which has not been fulfilled. Therefore there is a need of yet another movement. The transitional democratic republican system has turned out to be failure. So, the people’s movement has been essential to establish people’s federal republican system. Although other factions of the party speak of establishing federal republican system, they have failed to put it into practice. For instance, during the four point agreement inked with the Madhesi Front, the inclusive democratic republican is mentioned instead of people’s federal republican system. Therefore, the party leadership is turning reformist setting aside the path shown by yesterday’s revolution.

The famous Dhobighat alliance had helped Dr Baburam Bhattarai to be elected as the new Prime Minister of the country. However, the alliance has been broken and a new alliance with the leadership, against whom the Dhobighat alliance is formed. How do see this?

This is true that the Baburam Bhattarai’s faction have left the Dhobighat alliance and swayed towards a new alliance. Although that was an alliance within the party, he has now come close to the party chairman.

Then do you see that after Bhattari’s accent to the throne of prime minister, the practice of centralized leadership will resume in the party, against which Dhobighat alliance was formed ?

Yes, we again see the threat of party leadership being centralized and making hefty decision solitarily. Some recent activities has also indicated the same. For instance, the party had formed a seven member dialogue team to hold discussions with the Madhesi Morcha during the Prime Ministerial election. However, the four point deal was inked only by keeping remaining five members of the team in bay. Similarly, the decision to handover the key was also made by only two people in the party leadership. If they had to make the decision, they should have at least called the party official’s meeting and informed. Such meeting can be organized with in an hour but our leadership doesn’t bother to do so and handed over the key without the cosine of all party officials.

Recently there has been statements that those who does not want to stay in the party can leave the party which clearly reflects the conflict within. Isn’t there threat of party’s split?

Yes, there is threat of party’s split but not from us. The threat is there from those who are making such statements. They are the pro-splinters. We strongly condemn these ill-fated statements.

We have never asked anyone to leave the party but demanded the implementation of line endorsed by the party by all. Our demand to the leadership is to retransform themselves correcting their derailed activities.

What do you think is the procedure to resolve the contradiction and conflict emerged within the party?

There are so many procedure developed with in the international communist movement to resolve the conflict and contradiction and save the party from being split. In the present context, many issues of debates are not limited within the party. Therefore, there is a need of holding debate in external level also. Therefore, a healthy and well-managed debate should be continued both in internal level as well as external level to solve this intra-party struggle. Along with this, the party should be taken ahead unified. The issue of adding this procedure to solve the conflict has been raised but is yet to be implement. Probably, the next Central Committee meeting of the party will endorse this procedure as well.

It is said that after the economic and cultural disparity has amplified after the party’s induction in the peace and constitution writing process. Although many committees were formed to solve this, they have been effective were unsuccessful to manage this. Now, many say that this is slowly turning the revolutionary party into a bourgeoisie party. What do you think is its remedy?

Yes, it has been issue of concern in our party. Therefore, purification of the party is the best remedy to end this disparity. Purification here means to make those responsible admit their mistake, allow self-criticism and rectification and punish the guilty. The more effective procedure can be to take the whole party for struggle to complete the revolution which has been left in the middle. This include preparation for people’s revolt, awareness campaign and various movements. Therefore, the problem of economic and cultural disparity can be solved either through class struggle or purification within the party. The leadership has failed to provide any program for struggle, so how can the party purify. Moreover, the process of purification should be started from the top, but this is not happening. This is the main reason behind the failure of various committees as well.

You are constantly emphasizing on the need of people’s revolt but don’t you see the possibility of strong suppression over your movement in the present adverse global and national context?

No, I don’t think so because we have not said to begin any armed struggle or have plans to confront with the security forces. As already the nation has gone through a historic transformation and Monarchy already ousted, there is not need to fight with the security forces. If the movement for ensuring peace and constitution is suppressed then, it will only spark yet another people’s movement.

Is there any thing you would like to add?

We have been deliberately projected as the anti peace and constitutional force by various media when we are in fact demanding a scientific and respectful integration and people’s constitution. If your media portrays our reality, then it would be easy for the people to understand the ground reality.

Tactics of Compliance Will Never Lead to Revolution Article by Communist Party of India ML (Naxalbari) on Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist).

 

Text of an article written by com: Ajith in February 2011 for the Nepali revolutionary press, as a contribution to the two line struggle.

Sadak, sadan, sarkar – tactics of struggle or compliance?

by ajith

When a great revolution marks time the silence is all the more ominous. The humdrum routines of peacetime often dull one from sensing it. But, no matter what, swords are being sharpened. Will the 5 years of peace end up liquidating the gains made through 10 years of people's war or will it provide new resources for the revolution to once again rage on? Much depends on an accurate assessment of the present situation and tactics derived from it. This, obviously, is beyond the capacity of a spectator. But then, the outsider view is not without its benefits too. It allows a distancing, and its objectivity, denied to those on the stage. This is an opportunity for a broader view, a critiquing from outside. It also allows one to take liberties and indulge in wayward thinking. Having thus oiled my hands in anticipation of a sticky time (literally), let me get into the messy business of carving up the jackfruit.

Two cardinal principles of the Marxist understanding on tactics can be summarised as follows: (1) tactics should serve strategy; (2) they should address the concrete, specific demands of the given situation. As put by the master tactician Lenin, "Marxism requires of us a strictly exact and objectively verifiable analysis of the relations of classes and of the concrete features peculiar to each historical situation." ('Letter on Tactics') Between the two the former is most important. Tactics that violate or deviate from the correct strategic orientation of any specific stage are of no use; no matter how 'concrete' they may appear to be. Regarding the second principle, the question of identifying 'demands of the given situation' also requires the guidance of the correct strategic orientation. Identifying what exactly they are, defining the 'given situation' is no straightforward, simple matter. It depends very much on one's outlook. Moreover, the 'specific demands' of the situation must be grasped dynamically, focussed on the emerging aspect. In other words the concreteness of tactics should keep in mind, or address, not just the present but the emergent future too. This is how one ensures that tactics really serve strategy. Because the task of tactics is to promote objective and subjective factors that would assist in the fulfilment of strategic aims (or eliminate/weaken those that obstruct these aims). With this perspective, let's now get on to an examination of the 'sadak, sadan, sarkar' (‘street-legislature-government’) tactic advanced by the UCPN (Maoist). I will term it the 'SLG tactic'.

This tactic was first put forward in 2007. Though a lot has happened since then, it is still retained as the main tactics by the UCPN (Maoist). Its latest CC document states: "The party has adopted a clear-cut policy of mobilizing the people for the mass insurrection to establish people's federal republic or people's republic　through according priority to struggle from all fronts including the front of peace and constitution and the front of the government　with especial focus on the front of street struggle on the basis of four preparations and four bases." The context of the SLG tactic, in 2007, was the complexity of the Interim period leading to the Constituent Assembly. We need not get into all the details here. Reactionaries, domestic and foreign, were persistently trying to block the Maoists and subvert the revolution. The tactic of SLG was supposed to check this in an all-round manner. But could it really deliver?

First of all, though the idea of tackling the enemy at all levels looks quite attractive, its actual implication is a rather one-sided application. This is inevitable. One cannot mobilise the party or the masses for any meaningful fight in the streets while being in government. It is simply impossible to put up a real fight from the streets – 1. against one's own government and 2. against a power structure one is planning to join or continue in, even if temporarily. All that can be done is some stage-managed business where both the 'fighters' and the 'defenders' stick to their pre-set roles; throw in a few broken bones on both sides for 'effect'. In other words, though positioned at the end, getting into or hanging on in the 'sarkar' is the real center of this tactic. Sadak is meant to serve this center, a pressure point. The sadan part is an obvious corollary to sarkar.

One may object that this 'sadan' is qualitatively different since it is not the usual parliamentary pig-sty but a Constituent Assembly (CA). That much can certainly be admitted. But this is precisely where the SLG tactic is shown up at its worst. The alliance between the parliamentary parties and the Maoists continued in the form of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement and the Interim government even after the monarchical dictatorship was ended. But, objectively, while still under the common banner of Interim Setup and Constituent Assembly, the interests of the two sides within the alliance had started diverging sharply. The outstanding feature of the post-Jan Andolan 2 period is the urge of the broad masses to push ahead towards a new society, towards revolution. In opposition to this stand the conspiracies of domestic and foreign reactionaries to prevent revolution at all costs. So far as they were concerned, the matter of retaining or disposing of the monarchy was secondary to this. The matter of Constituent Assembly too is secondary for them. It is useful to them to the extent it can be used to carry out some reforms in the state structure, widening its social base and thus making it more capable of ensuring domination and exploitation. But if counter-revolution so demands, they will not hesitate to shut it down, democracy be dammed!

So what exactly was the SLG tactic addressing? Avoiding the concrete specificity of the situation, the contest of revolution and counter-revolution, it was restricting the revolutionary forces to a secondary issue, the matter of the Constituent Assembly. Instead of addressing and promoting the objective split in interests between the revolutionary and reactionary sections and making this the basis for new polarisation and mobilisation, it was papering over the split. What was needed was tactics to translate the division into a formal split from the ruling classes. Instead SLG offered the illusion of struggle, strictly within the boundaries set by the outmoded alliance. In essence it was a guideline for manoeuvres in power play, not struggle. Hence the big mobilisations and mass protests could not but end tamely in new compromises and deals. Whether conscious or not, a strategic shift from revolution to reform was underway. The Constituent Assembly (CA) elections and completion of the constitution-making process through the CA came to be seen as an unavoidably necessary step, an aim in its own right.

The shifting of the tactical issue of CA into a strategic aim is evidently linked quite closely with an absolutising of the abolition of the monarchy. The monarchy, as an institution of the state and as a hegemonic ideological apparatus, was indeed the main lynchpin of feudalism in Nepal, one which has a centuries old suffocating grip on Nepali society. But once Nepal came under British imperialist domination and became a semi-colony, it no longer represented feudalism alone. It became the lynchpin of all reaction. The class character of the king and court nobles itself changed. They were increasingly tied up directly with the growing bureaucrat capitalism. Distinguishing between feudal forces and the comprador-bureaucrat bourgeoisie and targeting the monarchy in order to tactically utilise the contradiction among these two parts of the ruling classes was correct. But viewing and presenting the monarchy solely in relation to feudal forces was wrong. The monarchy was only a form of the existing Nepali state, a state which serves all the ruling classes. Lack of clarity on this promoted the danger of absolutising the struggle to end the monarchy. The form of a republic with parliamentary democracy resulting from an abolishment of the monarchy could thus be presented as a means of realising ‘bourgeois democracy’. It could be offered as a 'realistic' target; for some as a substitute for the strenuous task of destroying the existing state and completing the NDR, for others as a transitional, but inevitable, goal.

Given the centuries old existence of the Nepalese monarchy, its abolishment was no doubt a significant achievement of the revolutionary process led by the Maoists. It considerably weakened the institutions of the reactionary state and deepened divisions within the ruling classes. But the ending of the monarchy did not mean the abolishment of the state. Moreover, the ending of the monarchy was something that could be utilised by the enemies also. And that is what they did. They claimed that the tasks set forth by the 2006 mass movement had been mainly accomplished and that there was no further justification for the Maoists’ separate agenda. This possibility was already seen during the 2007 political crisis when the Nepal Congress hastily declared in favour of a republic.

Nepal needs a new, revolutionary constitution that will ensure inclusive democracy for the people. But this can never be realised under the Interim setup. So long as dual power existed within it, de facto if not de jure, this setup could at best serve as a launchpad for revolution. As part of an immediate plan for organising the revolutionary seizure of power, constitution making could have been a tool for exposing the enemies and mobilising a broad mass movement. In the absence of such a concrete plan (not vague calls for insurrection) the Constituent Assembly is a trap that ties down the revolutionary party. That the UCPN(Maoist) does not have the required majority to push through its constitutional proposals is well known. But there is an even more basic issue. The principles of any constitution are only as weighty as the force that can be employed to ensure their implementation. This much is clear from the basic teachings of Marxism on the matter of the state, constitutions and government. In the situation of Nepal, the old state is yet to be destroyed. Dual power no longer exists. Therefore, no matter how progressive a constitution may be presented in the Constituent Assembly by the UCPN(Maoist), it will be a dead letter. One didn't have to wait for the results of the CA elections to come to this conclusion.

Our examination of tactics thus takes us to the realm of strategy. Revolution versus reform, this is the strategic issue at stake. Since reform, in the present world and geo-political context, will inevitably end up as service to Indian expansionism, this should be posed more precisely as revolution versus capitulation. It is self-explanatory that these opposing strategies cannot be served by the same set of tactics. There is a further problem. Rightism dressed up as realism, or for that matter centrism masquerading as cool-headed perseverance, invariably insist on sharing verbiage with revolution. The tactics of revolution must therefore shoulder the additional task of separating itself, even in words, from them. How is this being handled by the left in the two line struggle? The left has been crucial in keeping the prospects of revolution alive. If not for the determined fight it is putting up, (and the fortuitous dismissal of the Maoist led government!), things would have been in a very bad shape, revolution-wise. But has it really broken away from the premises of rightism and centrism?

The left has persistently argued the need for new tactics. But this is premised on the 'new situation' that emerged after the completion of the CA elections and abolishment of the monarchy. The separation from those who claim that the Chungwang process is not yet exhausted is evident. Yet doesn't this argument, with its premises, still remain within the perceptual frame of those it wants to oppose? It locates the need for new tactics in the post-monarchy, post-CA election situation. Thus these events are made the indices of the completion of the Chungwang process. But in doing so isn't it missing out the fact that the victory of Jan Andolan-2 had already inaugurated the completion of the Chungwang process by objectively causing a split in the immediate interests of the two sides in the anti-monarchy alliance? By taking the ending of monarchy and completion of the CA elections as indices it too acknowledges that they were essential. As a result, the shifting of tactical issues such as the CA and abolishment of monarchy into strategic aims, the role this has played in strengthening the grounds of ‘sub-stage’ views and promoting the deviation from the revolutionary road is missed.

New tactics had to be formulated, but premised on the reality that the Chungwang process was exhausted by mid-2007 itself. New tactics were needed; not because the CA elections are over and monarchy abolished, but because the party had made sufficient headway by 2007 in the tactical aims set by it in 2005, as part of preparing for the final assault for political power. After all, this was the declared aim of the Chungwang tactics. If this revolutionary frame of reference is not retaken, the left will not be able to break out of the frame set by rightism and centrism.

This apparently is the context of the continued support given by the left for going back to government and the SLG tactic as seen in the recent CC document. Inevitably, the distinction between the right and the left is blurred. The ranks of the party and the masses are left disarmed. Within the left, there is a strong tendency to see the abandoning of the ‘street’ part of SLG as the main error. It urges a ‘full’ application of the three pronged tactics. This begs the question, struggle for what? Rightists take to the streets when out of government. They need it ... to get back into government and enjoy the crumbs of power. We in India are quite familiar with such revisionist ‘street-government’ tactics. Can anything different be expected in Nepal? A series of mass struggles were launched by UCPN (Maoist) in the period following its dismissal from government. But they have not led to any decisive, qualitative change. All that energy was finally pooled into pushing the ruling class parties towards a new compromise (yet to be actualised) that will allow the UCPN (Maoist) into government.

The argument for continuing the SLG tactics is bound up with thinking, still influential even within the left that the CA process must be taken to its logical end. The crucial need today is to regain the revolutionary road. The SLG tactic will block this. What are needed are tactics and plan to break out of the existing Interim setup and advance towards completing the NDR. These tactics must help expose the hard reality that the CA and Interim setup have become tools in the hands of reactionaries. The masses must be educated to see how reaction is trying to dissipate and destroy the revolution by prolonging the CA/Interim process. Today, posing as the true defenders of the CA is self-defeating. To argue that the CA is fine but the NC-UML combine, tutored by India, is blocking its functioning is nothing but disarming the people. The truth must be told to the people that the existing CA has been made into a mockery, a trap of reaction, that it can never deliver what the people aspire. Nothing less will do. Insurrections are not known to drop out of clear blue skies, all primed and set to go. You need the brooding clouds, some thunder and lightning. Insurrections must be prepared.

The Maoists in Nepal have to advance in a very complex and challenging situation. In fact it is almost similar to a new initiation. But one that is more complex and challenging. At the time of the initiation of the people's war the party did not have to deal with diplomatic or other similar relations. Everything was a new beginning. But now it must handle a lot many more aspects and pay attention to properly handling their relations, so that the maximum gain can be retained while making the new leap. But what is decisive is the leap and gearing up the party to take it. Because, no matter how good a job is done in handling such complex relations and tasks, a restructuring of the present support base, the falling away of a substantial section particularly from among the middle classes, is inevitable. In fact this partial destruction is a necessary corollary to the leap. All this crucially hinges on the deepening of the line struggle and decisive rupture from rightism.

The Maoist movement in Nepal has a rich history of struggle against rightism. It has a powerful Marxist-Leninist-Maoist ideological tradition. Political power enjoyed by vast sections of masses for the first time in the country, oppressed sections and regions of society living a life of dignity, backward Nepal being transformed into a beacon for the whole world, daring thinking and initial steps towards building up a self-reliant Nepal - these glorious achievements of the people's war, realised through the sacrifice of innumerable martyrs, has added even more might to this heritage. The Nepali Maoists will surely succeed in drawing on it and regaining the revolutionary road.

Solidarity with Kevin "Rashid" Johnson - Escalation of Political Repression at Red Onion State Prison in Virginia - USA

Over the years long standing organizing efforts by class conscious prisoners in the Virgina state system’s two maximum security facilities (Red Onion and Wallens Ridge) have been met with systematic repression including beatings, assaults with electrical and chemical weapons, isolation in special segregation units, interdiction of communications and at least one shooting incident.

Most recently Kevin “Rashid” Johnson a founding organizer of the NABPP-PC (New African Black Panther Party-Prison Chapter) and author of the book “Defying the Tomb” has been subjected to an extremely restrictive communications regime including the suspension of all outgoing mail and deprivation of most telephone access.

This is being carried out within the context of a broader agenda on the part of the Virginia DOC to criminalize and smear prisoner organizing as “gang activity”.

According to a recent message from an outside supporter on Rashid’s current situation:

“Basically, they have stepped up their interference with his
communication network and also their efforts to
stigmatize him as a “gang-member.”

Under the direction of one M. Duke, a gang task-force
member who wears a T-shirt with the inscription GANG UNIT
(in very big letters), Rashid’s cell was raided and all of
his stamps were taken. While his cell was being ransacked
, Rashid questioned Duke, pointing out that the latter’s
insignia was like a signal to incite violence on the part
of the authorities. He explained to Duke that the NABPP
opposes gang behavior and asked why he was being
targeted. Duke’s only response was that he “just happened
to be there that day.”

All Rashid’s phone connections have been blocked…
He thinks that all his outgoing mail has been blocked.
He asks that protest be made to state officials. He holds
Tony Adams (an “investigator”) responsible for the
cutting off of his lines of communication.

Rashid wants “noise” to be made — to protest the
interference and also to protest the labeling of the NABPP
as a gang.”

From Georgia to California and access the country the prison struggle is a key link in the broader class confrontation today and we need to support those organizing on the front lines under conditions of maximum repression and control.

Please call Red Onion State Prison at (276) 796-7510 or mail a letter to ROSP, PO Box 1900, Pound, VA 24279 to politely express your concern about the ongoing political repression and forward and repost this information as widely as possible.

Visit the site of Comrade Kevin "Rashid"Johnson"s writings here :
http://rashidmod.com/

Pat's Justice "Innocent Criminal" Def Poetry

Demonstration At US Embassy London September 13th to Remember Attica Uprising and call for release of United States Political Prisoners

Demonstration at US Embassy London in memory of the Attica Prison Uprising in 1971 calling for release of United States Political Prisoners.

Organised by The Pan-Afrikan Voice and The Free Mumia Abu Jamal Campaign in United Kingdom.

The Demonstration will be between 5-7pm on the 13th September 2011



Attica Is All Of Us from Freedom Archives on Vimeo.

Press Statement on Nepal by Communist Party of India Marxist Leninist Naxalbari

On the current situation in Nepal and the challenge before the Maoists

Participation in the Constitutional Assembly process, and in government, in Nepal has been used by the UCPN (Maoist) leadership to liquidate the revolutionary nature of the party and sink it in the morass of parliamentarism. For quite some time now, this has been the concrete political manifestation of revisionism, of the derailment of the party from the path of New Democratic Revolution. It has now been taken to a new depth with the recent appointment of Dr. Baburam Bhattarrai as the Prime Minister of Nepal through a deal with the Madheshi parties, known agents of the Indian expansionists. Following a script already given by the reactionaries and endorsed by the UCPN (Maoist) leadership, the new government promptly handed over the keys of the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) stored weapons. Severely drained of its fighting qualities through the policies followed by the leadership of the UCPN(Maoist), it is now being prepared for formal elimination, to finish off the last remaining, and one of the most important, achievements of the 10 years of People’s War. Thus the people will have nothing to bank on and will be helplessly thrown back to the reactionary wolves.

10 years of heroic war of the masses and their immense sacrifices gave the tiny organisation CPN (Maoist) international fame and recognition. Once the emerging shining armour in the glorious history of the international communist movement, this party is now reduced to being ‘just another petty political party’, shamelessly bargaining for some space in the ruling class benches. Today the very leaders of this organisation are trading sacrifices and pains of the revolutionary masses for a few ministerial posts and recognition from the Indian expansionists, in the service of the imperialists. Every step taken by them is meant to prove to their aakkas (masters) that they are genuinely committed to abandoning the path of revolution.

When communists turn colour and rot the stench is far worse. The slogan ‘serve the masses’ is converted to ‘serve the imperialist-expansionist masters’. As the class nature of the party changes, it acquires the ‘most favoured status’ from the ruling classes. The veil of minimum bourgeois morality too is shorn off. Shameless degeneration, craving for consumer goods and luxuries replace communist plain living, revolutionary self-respect and modesty. Revisionists are the seeds of reactionaries and slaves of the imperialists in the revolutionary ranks. In no time they infect the whole organisation, decapitate its ideological strength and denude it of its revolutionary sheen. The first thing they do in order to liquidate a revolutionary organisation is by bringing in liberalism in place of firm and clear ideological position. They abhor Leninist party principles and convert the organisation into an open non-functional debating forum. Conspiracies and manipulations become the hallmark of functioning. All these features can now be seen in the UCPN (Maoist).

The Maoists had gained strategic advantage through the ten years of People’s War, which liberated vast regions of the country and established people’s power. The advance of revolution intensified the crisis within the ruling classes and pushed their imperialist, expansionist mentors into a quandary. This set the context for the Peace Accord of 2006 and the mass upheaval that eventually led to the ending of the hated Gyanendra monarchy. The Maoist party was propelled to a unique position of national leadership, gaining overwhelming support for the unfinished agenda of revolution. But instead of utilising these favourable factors and applying tactics suitable to the fulfilment of these aspirations of the people the leadership deviated from the strategic tasks of revolution. The ideological, political roots of this deviation, including the different trends contained in the turn to ‘peace tactics’, are already a matter of ideological struggle within the Nepalese and international Maoist movement. The views of our party on this matter, including correspondence with the UCPN (Maoist) leadership, can be seen in ‘Naxalbari’ No: 3 ( http://www.thenaxalbari.blogspot.com ).

This ideological struggle must be certainly deepened, most importantly by the Nepali Maoists themselves. But the immediate task before the Maoists and the revolutionary masses in Nepal is to raise the flag of open rebellion against the revisionist headquarters and thus initiate the reconstruction of the party on solid Marxist-Leninist-Maoist bases, firmly united with the masses. They must get out off the revisionist swamp of Constitutional Assembly politicking and retake the road of revolution. The revolutionary heritage of the Maoists in Nepal, much enriched by the heroic People’s War they led and the glorious sacrifices made by thousands of the valiant daughters and sons of Nepal, along with the boundless solidarity of people all over the world with the Nepali revolution provide the bedrock basis for taking up this challenge. As called for in the Political Resolution of the CCOMPOSA, “People all over the world look up to the Maoists in Nepal to break out of all domestic and external conspiracies and advance determinedly towards the completion of new democratic revolution.”

Krantipriya
Spokesperson,

6th September 2011

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The Issue is the Army - Integration and the Nepalese Army comments from Comrade Biplab

"They want to divide the PLA into two factions where most people are sent home, and a small number are integrated. We will not accept this plan.

We think the line that Prachanda has taken is right-revisionism. It will liquidate our forces and army. It will end the revolution. We do not accept it.

To integrate the PLA, two things must be solidified:

1.The majority of the PLA has to be integrated.

2.The PLA must lead its units, and the PLA must take leadership positions in the army.

We want free units and collective integration. They are denying these things, and the struggle is over these points".

Nepali Congress and UML oppose the bulk integration of PLA into Nepal Army.

KATHMANDU: A meeting between Nepali Congress and CPN-UML unanimously decided to oppose the bulk integration of the PLA combatants in the Nepal Army on Thursday.

The two-party meeting held in the Capital on Thursday also decided to oppose the integration of the PLA combatants who do not fulfill the established norms of Nepal Army.

Nepal Government agrees to form new unit for Madhesi in Nepal Army.

Kathmandu, Sep 9 (PTI)

The Maoists-led government today agreed to set up a new unit in the Nepal Army to facilitate en masse recruitment of the Indian-origin Madhesi people, a key part of a deal that helped Baburam Bhattarai win the support of five Terai-based parties in the Prime Ministerial election.

"As per the constitutional provision to develop Nepal Army as a democratic, national and inclusive institution, a fresh recruitment process would be initiated as part of the plan to form a separate unit for the identity of Madhesi people," Finance Minister Barsa Man Pun was quoted as saying by Kantipur online.

The government announced to set up the separate unit for "bulk integration" of Madhesi people in the army.Nepal's Terai plains are home to about half of the country's 30 million people, and the residents of the region, known as Madhesis, have long complained of discrimination by the country's hill communities.

The pro-Terai parties argue that people in the Madhesi-dominated southern plains have long been treated as second-class citizens in Nepal, where hill-origin elites dominate politics, the security forces and business.The United Democratic Madhesi Front (UDMF), the alliance of five Madhesi parties that is the fourth largest political force in parliament, and the UCPN (Maoist) had agreed on a deal to form the separate unit for the Madhesi community so as to develop the army as an inclusive institution.

The recruitment of 10,000 people from the Madhesi community living in the Terai-plains bordering India has been a long-standing demand of the UDMF, the main coalition partner of the Maoist-led government. PTI