Your Excellency, Hon. Mr. Edem Kodjo, Secretary-General of the OAU,
Honourable Ministers,
Your Excellencies,
Comrades representatives of the Liberation Movements,
Mr. Chairman,
My first duty is the pleasant one of conveying to this 40th Session of the OAU Coordinating Committee for the Liberation of Africa the greetings of all our people in South Africa, including especially the leaders and militants of our struggle who are being held in enemy prisons - leaders who, but for their capture, would be participating at this meeting.
Mr. Chairman,
Our meeting takes place at a critical time for our continent. We are at a moment in our history when a coincidence of circumstances has conspired to test our resolve to remain loyal to the objectives set by the founding fathers of the OAU and therefore of this august Committee. The current situation poses to all of us the question - do we have the determination to honour, in struggle, the memory of countless African patriots who sacrificed and perished for the accomplishment of their objectives. It demands that we ask ourselves whether our common determination to win is being translated into a victorious united offensive.
The continent of Africa today carries a primary responsibility to defend the enormous success it has achieved over the last two decades and beyond. The reality of those successes is not in doubt. We cannot forget that only a few decades ago, Africa was described in supercilious tones as the Dark Continent.
However through their heroic efforts, the people of Africa rent asunder the veil of darkness that colonial and imperialist domination had draped over the continent. Acting as self-confident and conscious makers of history, as liberators, we, the offsprings of the so-called Dark Continent, destroyed and buried an entire historical epoch that had been imposed on the peoples of the universe by the ruling classes of an allegedly enlightened Europe and North America. We who were described as backwards became the midwives of the new social reality of independent people, the reality of the collapse of the colonial system, and confounded those who, having invested themselves with an omnipotent and omniscient personality, had thought such a result impossible, undesirable and even inconceivable.
It is these victories that have so transformed the balance of forces in Africa as to render the total liberation of the continent an approaching reality.
Sincere tribute is due to this Committee, to its member countries and to the parent body - the Organisation of Africa Unity, as well as to Africa's allies, supporters and genuine friends beyond her borders, for the seminal role they have played to ensure these monumental victories.
Today, only two countries on our continent - Namibia and South Africa - remain under colonial and white minority domination. This has given rise to a strategic perspective which leaves no doubt but that the brilliant torch of freedom will soon light every single corner of our great motherland.
But precisely because the protracted struggle for the total decolonisation of the continent has reached its final stage, with Africa poised to place its total weight behind the struggle for the defeat of the Pretoria regime, the latter, supported by its imperialist allies, has mounted a multi-pronged counteroffensive, inspired by the belief that its survival lies in the military, economic and political subjugation and control of African independent and sovereign States, in the dismemberment of the OAU and the Non-Aligned Movement, the isolation of southern Africa from the rest of the continent and the international community, and resort to the tactics of bullying, blackmail and bribery - all this with the ultimate aim of crushing the liberation movement, halting the advance towards the total liberation of Africa, and then proceeding to reverse the historic gains of the African revolution.
This counteroffensive began to unfold in earnest with the accession of Ronald Reagan to the White House. Operating on a global scale, and driven by the same suicidal urge for world domination as was Adolf Hitler, Ronald Reagan set out with boundless vigour to organise a war against the national liberation movement, and against the rights of nations and peoples, especially in the non-aligned community, to choose their own course of development in the exercise of their right of self-determination and independence. The Reagan Administration attracted to its camp forces which included fascists, racists, colonialists, neo-Nazis and Zionists.
The South African regime became a strategic ally, precisely because it is a racist, colonialist, fascist regime; a confirmed enemy of black peoples, a brutal oppressor and exploiter which in three decades has killed, murdered and massacred more people in southern Africa than any other regime. It became an ally precisely because this apartheid regime is universally recognised as the perpetrator of a crime against humanity, and has a bloody record of hostility to the decolonisation of Africa. The alliance with such a regime, proudly proclaimed by Reagan, was an act of unmitigated hostility to Africa and an undeserved slap in the face of humanity.
On the other hand, the apartheid regime found in the Reagan Administration the kind of ally it has sought after for many years and which it now needed badly in the face of the tides of African freedom and independence which were pressing in and closing in upon it, especially as a result of the collapse of Portuguese colonialism, the independence of Zimbabwe, the growing might of SWAPO and the revolutionary upsurge within South Africa itself.
With the much-publicised political, military, economic, technological and moral support of the Reagan Administration, an undeclared war is now raging throughout southern Africa, unleashed by the racist regime against the people and countries of the region. The Pretoria regime is clearly using the period of Reagan's term of office as United States President to make the greatest possible advances in the implementation of its so-called "total strategy" for survival as a minority and colonial regime in Africa. Hence the ferocity of the onslaught on the southern region of Africa. In this war the Pretoria regime's objectives are to compel submission and surrender. This is clear in some of the demands which the Reagan Administration and the Pretoria regime are putting forward as their causa belli in southern Africa.
For example, the persistent demand for the withdrawal of Cuban troops seeks to secure fulfilment of the objectives of the 1975 South African invasion of the People's Republic of Angola. It is, in essence, a demand for the surrender of the sovereignty, which is backed by mounting armed aggression and the continuing occupation of the Angolan territory by South African fascist troops.
The objectives for Namibia are same: Botha has declared that there will be no independence for Namibia as long as there is any danger of a SWAPO election victory. Hence the futile attempt to ensure the liquidation of SWAPO as a condition precedent to the independence of Namibia in terms of Security Council Resolution 435.
It is not withdrawal of Cuban troops they want from the Angolan Government: it is Angola itself. It is not the independence of Namibia they do not want: it is Namibian independence without SWAPO - without the Namibian people, who are SWAPO.
But Africa must not permit or assist in the attempt to stand reality on its head: It is the South African invading and occupying troops which must be withdrawn from the People's Republic of Angola. It is the South African regime and its occupation army that must be withdrawn from Namibia. The South African troops are in Angola to murder, destroy towns and property, ruin the economy and destabilise the country. The Cuban troops are in Angola to protect life and property, and help build what has been destroyed. They are there at the request and with the will of an African independent and sovereign State.
Further, Mr. Chairman, Africa, which is the most interested party on the Namibian question, must not allow the South African regime and the United States Administration to keep the international community hopping from one diversionary issue to another.
In addition, Mr. Chairman, the independence of Namibia is also made conditional upon the prevalence of conditions of stability and "security" for the whole region of southern Africa. But this is seen as impossible without the extermination or expulsion of the ANC from the countries of southern Africa.
In this connection, racist Prime Minister Botha has announced that if African independent States refuse to expel the ANC, he will raid them. If they do not refuse but otherwise fail to remove the ANC, his assassins "will do it for them". Equally, if they refuse to sign a military pact with Pretoria, giving the regime the right to raid or invade whenever it feels entitled to do so, then the regime will use its armed forces to compel signature of such a pact. There is no limit to the number of pretexts for armed aggression by the regime, while it lasts, and no let up where there is no surrender.
The world of the Reagan-Botha racist alliance is a lawless world. It constitutes a problem that is at once regional, continental, and even international - a world in which aggression is constantly escalating. How do we deal with this problem?
The solution lies in the achievement of the objectives which have defined the mandate of this Committee since it was established 20 years ago. Hence the heavy responsibilities that rest on the shoulders of the leaders of Africa who are gathered here today. In particular, the solution lies in the eviction of the apartheid colonial regime from Namibia and its destruction within South Africa. Peace and stability are not possible in southern Africa, and indeed in other parts of Africa, while racist and colonial domination continues to hold sway in South Africa and Namibia.
The situation demands, as a matter of urgency, a greatly heightened offensive by the popular masses and PLAN and Umkhonto we Sizwe within Namibia and South Africa respectively. With the current intensification of armed attacks by SWAPO and the Namibian masses, the racists are beginning to find that while they busy themselves with the slaughter of Angolan women and children, their bases are burning in Namibia.
It is however also urgent and important that determined measures be adopted to strengthen the defensive capacity of the southern African independent States and enable them to repulse the aggression of the Pretoria regime.
Africa is pledged to the total liberation of our continent. Accordingly, she has an obligation to continue to mobilise the necessary political and material resources to ensure that this objective is achieved in Namibia and South Africa. The OAU, itself an eminent product of Africa's liberation, remains the one vehicle we have at our disposal to coordinate and mobilise this continental effort aimed at the completion of the task of finally expunging colonialism and racist domination from our continent, consolidating our independence and proceeding with our development programme.
Mr. Chairman,
I started by acknowledging the great victories won by the people of Africa. It is no exaggeration - it is not being alarmist, to say that those victories are now under serious threat, not least because Africa's own capacity to defend them has been seriously impaired by problems - in no way inseparable - which threaten the OAU with at least a partial paralysis. The situation in southern Africa, which has fundamental implications for the future of our continent and for its ability to contribute effectively to the solution of international problems, demands that the OAU must live. The OAU must be strong. It must remain a force with sufficient authority to lead Africa in a victorious assault upon the bastions of colonialism and war that are still entrenched in southern Africa. The OAU must have the capacity to face the future of our continent.
The responsibility to restore the OAU to state of combat-readiness rests on the leaders of our continent who are surely no less illustrious nor any less loyal to the African cause than those who, 20 years ago this year, assembled in Addis Ababa to register one of the greatest achievements in the history of Africa.
The political and military struggle within South Africa continues to grow in its scope and intensity. Ever-increasing numbers of our people are being drawn into active struggle around both local and national issues. Our popular army, Umkhonto we Sizwe, basing itself among, and being part and parcel of, these struggling masses, has established itself as a force equal to the challenges of our situation and much feared by racist Pretoria.
The black section of the working class retains its militancy, is becoming better organised and is growing in its operational capacity as a leading contingent of the liberation forces in South Africa.
Despite the gravely erroneous position recently taken by the "Coloured" Labour Party Congress, opposition to the so-called constitutional proposals is growing. We call for denunciation of these measures.
Details of the situation in South Africa are contained in reports already submitted and placed before this session by the ANC.
Mr. Chairman,
We pledge that the African National Congress, the oppressed and democratic masses in South Africa, will fight on, spear in hand, through thick, through thin, till victory is won for our country, for Africa, for humanity. And let this session of the Liberation Committee signal that the continent of Africa has crossed the Rubicon and has gone over to an uninterrupted offensive which will, within this decade, see the flags of liberation flying over Windhoek, and even over Pretoria.