JOE CAHILL, one of contemporary Republicanism's most famous names, suggested at this year's Sinn WORLD NEWS Fein Ard Fheis that the fulfilment of the Republican dream was 'close at hand'.
On the surface his optimism appears well founded. Gerry Ádams went to America and was treated like a superstar; Sinn Fein members can now be heard on Irish television and radio after twenty years; the party's deliberations are scrutinised as closely as those of a government; and it is surfing on a wave of cautious tolerance from the serious bourgeois press.
It may have to wait rather longer for a wave of enthusiasm. It seems to be setting the pace for the British government and the Irish bourgeoisie is treating it with unaccustomed deference. Things seem to be going its way.
There was an expectation before the conference, which the Republicans did nothing to discourage, that they would finally state their attitude to the Downing Street declaration.
The point for the bourgeois press was that they did not accept it. The point for anti-imperialist socialists is that they did not reject it. The Hume-Adams talks, references to the 'nationalist family, the attempts to identify themselves with the SDLP and Fianna Fail all signal the capitulation of the present Republican leadership to bourgeois nationalism.
Dividing line
A crucial dividing line has not been crossed. For Sinn Fein, Irish unity remains an immediate demand. For Albert Reynolds and John Hume it most definitely is not. Nevertheless the republican trajectory is obvious.
The Ard Fheis was a defeat for the Sinn Fein rank and file. A strong demand in the pre-conference discussions had been for the publication of the HumeAdams document.
This was not conceded, and so the party's supporters must back a process, the details of which they do not know. A gap is emerging between the base and the leadership.
The majority of the base is opposed to what it correctly sees as a possible sell-out in the making. But its only alternative is more armed struggle.
That is why no opposition current emerged which could force publication of the secret agreements nor offer perspectives to revitalise the struggle.
The Republicans continue to demand that the imperialists guities in the Downing Street document. These sort of word games have a precedent in Irish history.
The Treaty that created partition was accompanied by similar discussions.
Inability
Eamonn De Valera, who fought the British and the 26 county state created by the Treaty (before he became its President) used a lot of ink explaining how a Free State and a Republic were the same thing really.
They show nothing except an inability properly to understand or defeat imperialism. The Downing Street document, no matter how well it is clarified, leaves the border and imperialist domination of Ireland intact. It should be rejected, not clarified.
Those who meet him say that the man with the biggest smile in Irish politics at the moment is leader of the Official Unionist Party, James Molyneaux. its Westminster select committee, a long held ambition.
It enhances the link between the British Parliament and its Irish colony. Secretary of State Mayhew is constantly saying how he would like to unburden himself from the responsibilities of office and surrender them to local politicians.
A local assembly, son of Stormont, is also the dearest wish of both the major unionist parties and no anti-discrimination on earth will prevent these bigots from re-living their sectarian fantasies from the old Stormont.
The history of Irish republicanism is also the history of its capitulations. The biographies of Michael Collins and De Valera are instructive reading for anyone who seriously wants to understand modern Republicanism.
Yielding to bourgeois nationalism inevitably leads to a surrender to imperialism. We may be watching history repeat itself.
THE ELECTIONS taking place in South Africa on the 27th and 28th April open up the risk of important political battles during the few weeks of campaigning, reports PIERRE FRANÇOIS DESPITE the accord between the National Party and the ANC the political terrain remains volatile.
Of course there are some 'nostalgics' dreaming of the apartheid 'their fathers knew' who don't want even symbolic changes in the structures of power and who could derail the process.
In the middle of February, the white right-wing extremists, along with Inkatha, announced their refusal to participate in the elections.
The far-right is not the only cloud on the horizon. Danger also comes from the desire of the political and economic establishment of white South Africa to push the movement of Nelson Mandela into yet more compromises.
However, it is difficult to imagine what more concessions the ANC can make since they have capitulated on virtually everything, particularly in relation to the historical goals of the organisation.
Limited domocracy
It is no longer a question of 'majority ANAL rule'. Whatever the outcome of the April election the NP-ANC accords mean that the largest party has to include all parties which obtain more than 20% of the vote in the government.
In practice this will lead to an ANC. NP coalition government which will be in power for at least five years. Nor is it any longer a question of creating a unitary state.
The regions, now called "provinces' will have exclusive powers in a whole number of fields: notably agriculture, primary and secondary education, health, housing, local government and urban development, commerce and the police.
The central government will only have the power to lay down minimum 'standards' whilst the carrying out of them, including the important powers to raise the necessary taxes, are granted to the provinces.
The spokespersons of the NP have no worries about asserting that, in essence, their federalist vision has prevailed. The constitution, to be finalised after the April elections, will protect the power of the regions unless two thirds of the 400 MPs decide otherwise.
A 'necessary evil' It is in this context that the 'great compromise' with the white establishment is presented as a 'necessary evil' by, among others, Joe Slovo, the historic leader of the South African Communist party and Mandela's principal adviser.
According to the Communist Party leader, the Black liberation movement doesn't have the ability to overthrow the existing power structure.
Nor, according to Slovo, does it have the strength to confront this power, since a prolonged civil war could only result in leading the country into ruin.
The facts appear to support him. Since the "liberalisation' of 1990 killings have resulted in more than 9,000 deaths, according to the Human Rights Commission.
Whilst there had been a partial decline at the beginning of 1993, since July of that year violence has increased at an even greater rate, with an average of 18 political murders per day. This violence results from the almost total inaction of the ANC in defending the populations of the townships.
The guerrillas of Umkhonto we Sizwe, who returned to the country as heroes, now find themselves confronted by their own leadership which is determined, above anything else, to demobilise and neutralise them, under the pretext of reintegrating them into 'civilian life'.
Frankenstein's monster, South African style The threat from the far right is not an illusion. United under the banner of the 'Afrikaner Volksunie' and led by the former head of the South African Army Constand Viljoen they constitute, along with the Conservative Party (a Parliamentary party which acts as the 'official' opposition to the NP) a considerable force.
But this force depends, in the final analysis, on the evident complicity of the security apparatus. If the army doesn't move against the ultra-right it is because its inaction is, in a sense, part of the strategy of the ruling faction.
Since 1990, with the enticement of negotiations to determine the future of 'post apartheid' South Africa, the NP has skilfully manoeuvred to destabilise the ANC - with the full support of the white political and economic establishment. This destabilisation has largely been based on violence.
"It is no longer a question of 'majority rule'. Whatever the outcome of the April election, the largest party has to include all parties which obtain more than 20% of the vote in the Whilst this violence is not carried out by 'official' forces it is only made possible, indeed is reinforced, because of complicity by the state. Now that the AVU is threatening to prevent the holding of elections they are getting worried.
As in the story of Frankenstein the creator is at risk of losing control of his creation - hence the apparent and potentially violent split within the ranks of the Whites and between the government party on the one hand and Inkatha on the other.
The battle in Natal Inkatha is the other piece in the game. Buthelezi, who runs his Kwazulu fiefdom with an iron hand, is threatening to lead "his' province to secede unless the project endorsed by the ANC and NP is substantially amended.
The region of Natal-K wazulu contains more than 25 percent of the South African population; for that reason it is the main battleground. Moreover, in Natal the violence is at its worst, with 53 per cent of murders according to the Human Rights Commission.
Inkatha can count on a by no means negligible base of support, most notably in the rural areas where traditional structures and the persistence of a hierarchical power structure (represented by 'King' Goodwill Zwelthini) combine to impose the de facto single party state of Buthelezi.
Whilst Inkatha is in a relative minority in the urban areas it has been able to strengthen itself in the last few years by taking advantage of two new factors.
Firstly, the migrant workers who originate from Natal, especially those concentrated in the great mining and industrial centres of the Transvaal, have been 'captured' to a large extent by Inkatha as a result of serious conflicts that have erupted throughout these areas since 1990.
Dumped in 'hostels' and isolated from the surrounding communities these migrants, who were already socially ostracised, have become both the mercenaries of Buthelezi and the victims of attacks by young supporters of the ANC.
The conflicts in certain areas have become partially 'ethnic' in so far as massacres have created and aggravated polarisations between migrants and residents, between Zulus and non-Zulus.
In certain of the worst affected townships, notably Tokhoza (south-east of Johannesburg) the conflict has taken on the air of a sinister 'ethnic cleansing'.
It is in this context that Buthelezi is endeavouring to increase his military capabilities whilst trying to consolidate his political base.
Special training camps have been created in the north of the province to form "defence units'; several former officials of the police and South African army have taken part. If Buthelezi chose to follow the path of Jonas Savimbi he could seriously destabilise the country. But South Africa is not Angola!
The South African state, with its powerful army capable of rapid deployment into every region of the country, does not suffer the same vulnerability and could. if it wanted, eliminate all armed opposition.
To be concluded next issue
SOCIALIST OUTLOOK No. 58 12 March 1994, Page 13
Will it be limited democracy - or