National Delegate Conference 15-18 June
2010
I now have a million brothers and sisters - comrades too I hope...
by John Stevenson
It is always hard to write a report of Denis Goldberg speaking.
You can rush at it in the height of the emotion or you can wait
a bit and analyse.
We've waited a bit.
There must be something that has half of the Scotland delegation
unashamedly in tears. What is it?
Is it the straightforward honesty we treasure in Scotland, although
we tend to approach it with a tad more bluntness?
Is it the knowledge that you are listening to someone who has
given more to the cause than any of us will ever know?
Or is it because he speaks what we would love to see and love
to be? What is clear is that he never takes the easy way out.
"I've been a bit of a Bolshie all my life", he told Conference.
He was moved. You don't often see that. He choked briefly before
choosing the perfect words for the occasion of being granted honorary
UNISON membership.
"You have A Million Voices project. I have a million brothers
and sisters now", he said - but also added, "I hope it's also
a million comrades - because there's a little bit of a difference".
Warmth and the gentle political point.
He said he didn't hear the Palestine debate that took place before
his presentation. But he could almost have written it. "Can we
not attack Zionist policies without attacking all Jews?", he asked.
Of Israel, he added, "You have to find a way to tell the oppressor
that they have to be liberated too … they have to have the chance
to break away from their past and find a future."
This from a man who, just a few days after 9/11, had the courage
to speak at a meeting in support of Palestine in Edinburgh, while
all the confusion, anger and calls for retribution were at their
height.
He had the honesty to voice the unsayable that many of us had
been thinking. He said, "My first reaction was 'at last America
has got a bloody nose', adding quickly, "then I thought of the
thousands of innocent lives wasted. No excuse for that".
Freedom children
Denis spoke of his young country. A country where the 'freedom
children' born after apartheid have not yet left school.
All is not easy. After the years of struggle, the ANC had to
face the reality of power. ANC activists found themselves in government.
Denis returned home to become an adviser to the Water Minister.
Winning the vote was one thing. Building real equality was another.
How to turn around a country where the majority had lived under
years of brutalisation? How to engage a nation more used to powerlessness
than power? How do you address generations of enforced and structured
poverty?
We hear he had come in for a bit of criticism earlier about South
Africa's record on housing. There is no doubt that housing is
a challenge. To be fair however, the government has built 2.8
million homes in the last 15 years.
Of course there is still a lot to do. You can't roll back decades
of poverty and oppression overnight.
Our job should be to think first of supporting and understanding
the development process, before sniping.
That is not to say Denis is not critical of the political directions
and the behaviour of politicians in his homeland.
There is a fury that burns about politicians that do not respect
the privilege and responsibility of their role. A role they would
never have had without the sacrifices of Denis and his comrades.
But, as in all he does, he speaks with dignity, calmness and
certainty. Perhaps that comes from the discipline of progressive
communism through real life and death struggles. But I think the
biggest influence is a basic humanity that underpins everything.
We should not have heroes in this movement. We should not worship
the personality. But when we see an example of humanity and a
proven record of being prepared to sacrifice to change the world
for the better - albeit step by step in the new South Africa -
we should listen.
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