After more than eight years of wrongful imprisonment, Satpal Ram has finally had his case referred back to the Court of Appeal.
The application for the appeal was entered in June 1993 but refused by the Home Secretary in September of that year.
Pressure from sustained campaigning by the Free Satpal Ram Campaign and from Satpal's many supporters across Britain and from abroad, combined with the impact of the High Court's judgement at Satpal's judicial review in December has forced Home Secretary, Michael Howard, to reverse his reckless decision.
The Free Satpal Campaign demands that the next step for this hapless, discredited minister must be to announce that the Home Office is not contesting the case for the Court of Appeal.
Satpal's actions were entirely in self-defence and he would never have been convicted of murder had it not been for the Inherent racism of the criminal system. Satpal is just one of many victims of a racist judicial system. An appeal Is no guarantee of justice. After years of campaigning the M25 Three lost their appeal. • Campaigners are calling for letters to be written to the Home Secretary, urging him not to contest the case. Contact the Campaign at 101 Villa Rd, Handsworth, Birmingham B19 1NH against racist attacks and police harassment, but also in fighting fascism politically, ideologically and physically.
The importance of this has been shown in the local elections last May and in the by-election last January. Despite the problems that NMP may have, it still remains an example of why we need groups like ours around the country, and that is what we should shape the National Assembly in practice.
ARA failed to mobilise a single demonstration against the British National Party. We need a movement that can mobilise both national and local events -and not just carnivals.
Of course we need trade union and parliamentary work, but we also need to mobilise a fight against racism and fascism, and against institutional racism.
We need the kind of anti-racist movement that can respond to a family that is being atSOCIALIST OUTLOOK No. 79, March 11 1995, Page 12.