The Peoples' Forum in Mauritius [Part I]

Part II

Forthcoming Mauritius protests against US, 15 January 

(Lalit, the really excellent indepedent-left group in Mauritius, has been
busy. Their racy critique of the Washington NGO known as Breadcrumbs for the
World highlights the need -- and possibility -- for political quality
control amidst 'civil society'. Below that, find some of the toughest
anti-capitalist analysis I've ever seen. It looks like 2003 is off to a good
start in Africa!)

Dear Ray Almeida at BREAD for the WORLD (USA),

Thanks for the request for information on the Peoples' Forum in Mauritius.
Yesterday at a meeting of the organizations in the Peoples' Forum I was
given responsibility to send you any of our documents that might interest
Bread for the World (USA), and to fill you in on how we see the Africa
Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA) Forum to be held here next week.

We realise (and regret) that you are involved in the organization of the
supposed NGO AGOA Forum here, which, when not "American" and very
colonial/paternalist at best, is almost entirely "governmental". (We see
your name and that of another Bread for the World person, David Beckmann,
on the NGO program, and Mr. Beckmann also in the Business Forum program.) 
It would seem that words like "non-governmental" and "Africa" have become
rather elastic to include Governmental and America, respectively.

We should point out, in case you are unaware of these facts, that the
Official Program for the pseudo NGO Forum is very misleading. For example,
the Independent Commission Against Corruption in Mauritius is a State
Organ, not an NGO as its name might intimate. (You might also like to know 
that the ICAC was set up in a dark cloud after the present Government 
closed down the existing Economic Crime Office - ECO - at the very moment 
when Minister Cuttaree [the AGOA minister, ironically] was due for 
investigation by it. The Government had to change the Constitution and 
sack the person in charge, in order to save the Minister concerned from 
investigation. Then   the ICAC was set up when your speaker was photo-
graphed drinking cocktails   happily with the Prime Minister and Vice 
Prime Minister. All this is public knowledge.)

Another example of the misleading nature of the program is that Mrs.
Vidula Nabasing is billed as being from the "University of Mauritius". 
She is no longer there. But her real job is not mentioned. She is an 
advisor to the Vice Prime Minister, thus very "governmental"! The 
Mauritius Council for Social Services (MACOSS) President is billed to do 
the opening speech -- but the organizations in MACOSS that we are in 
contact with, know nothing about this. Presumably they might get informed 
when the organizers (American and/or Governmental) want them as "extras" 
to fill up a hall or something for bit-parts.

Strangely, COMESA, the African Union, and the SADC are all very active NGO
participants! They are all governmental organizations, as you know.

The Mauritian capitalists are of course formally represented as speakers.
The Joint Economic Council is the bosses organization, in case its name,
too, is misleading.

The "PA Bush" (No to Bush) Platform was set up towards the end of last
year -- following a number of multi-organization seminars held in
Mauritius in paralell to the WSSD in Johannesburg and the scheduled visit 
of the US President, who the AGOA says has to hold the Forum.

The Peoples' Forum now groups together 30 organizations, the quasi
totality of "civil society": the major trade union federations (Mauritius 
Labour Congress, Government Servants Association, General Workers' 
Federation, Federation des Travailleurs Unis, Federation of Civil Service 
Unions), two political parties, the oldest and largest national women's 
organization called the Muvman Liberasyon Fam, two of the main Church 
organizations in "civil society" (Ligue Ouviere Action Catholique and the 
Centre Diocese du Monde Ouvriere), five organizations of small planters/
farmers, the main workers' education organization (Ledikasyon pu Travayer), 
and other organizations like those for the Blind, health care activists, 
the homeless peoples' organization, and a federation of preschool playgroup
assocations, and naturally ecologists.

The Platform's aim is to organize three events (a Peoples' Forum against
conditions of AGOA and against Bush's politics, to be held on 15th
January, and a Peoples' Organizations' Seminar on AGOA Conditionalities 
to be held on 13th January, and a Peoples' Peaceful March against Bush's 
politics, planned for 15th January) and two international press conferences, 
one on 13th and one on 16th January. Basically, we have come together 
because we ALL oppose the conditions (technical, political and economic) 
of the AGOA which we consider colonial, anti-democratic and economically 
disastrous for Africa, and we also oppose ten points in Bush's politics 
(called "the Platform").

I am appending this Platform. All the things being organized are going ahead
as planned. With the exception of the Peoples' March, which is in suspense.
In Mauritius it is a tradition to hold peaceful marches. However, as we
feared, AGOA brings with it, repression. The Police Commissioner has
banned our planned march (and even sent a copy of his letter to us to the US
Embassy, talk about colonialism!). We immediately filed a Supreme Court
Writ against him. Delaying tactics in order to dampen organization (it is
illegal to advertise the march while the present banning lasts) are being 
used, at best, and pure repression, at worst, and tomorrow the Judge will 
start the case -- for a march planned in a week's time.

So, while a few US NGO's and some African governmental organizations are
holding the pseudo AGOA NGO Forum in Mauritius, what is being planned by
the quasi-entirety of active Mauritian "NGO's" (a word most of us don't use,
because it covers too many sins) is being banned. Our organizations and
our members are suffering repression, while you (US organizations and
Congressmen together with African Governmental organizations) will be
holding an "African" "NGO" Forum. This is why we call it "pseudo". It is
no exaggeration. None of our member-organizations have even been invited to
attend (not that we would be able to accept -- given the nature of the
AGOA law under which the NGO Forum is organized), let alone been involved in
organizing, the AGOA pseudo NGO Forum.

Please could you request Bread for the World's Board or Executive
Committee or whoever is in charge, to take note of the reality, and, in 
case you are not truly aware of its contents, to study the AGOA law 
(especially on the basic things like the imperative that African States 
follow US foreign policy, the imperative of privatizing even things that 
are still universally considered fundamental human rights under existing 
UN Conventions). We call on you to contemplate the predicament that your 
organization is in. We call on you to remember that our NGO activities are 
being repressed by the police, in order to make way for yours from the US 
to be held. We end by quoting from the letter the Police Commissioner sent 
us: "I wish to inform you that as the AGOA Conference will be in progress, 
no public gathering or procession will be allowed as the [police] Force 
will be fully taken up with the commitments in connection with the said 
conference."

Yours sincerely,
Lindsey Collen
for the Peoples' Forum Platform

PS The four attachmed files are
1) The Peoples' Forum Platform
2) A list of organizations in the Peoples' Forum Platform
3) An article on AGOA, by Rajni Lallah of Lalit
4) Another article on AGOA, by Ram Seegobin and Lindsey Collen of Lalit

---------------------------------------

PA- BUSH
(Platform Against Bush Politics)
Towards a Parallel Peoples'Forum Against AGOA Conditions

1. We oppose all the overt and hidden conditionalities  in the Africa Growth
and Opportunity Act which lead directly to increased poverty and social
inequality and which undermine social and economic human rights of our
people; the AGOA also represents a direct threat to Mauritian sovereignty,
and is a constant external undemocratic control on Mauritian foreign policy;
and we denounce the Mauritian Government for bowing down before these
conditions. We condemn the AGOA for offering US trade advantages to African
businessmen on such conditions.

2. We maintain our belief in the "Indian Ocean Zone of Peace" initiative,
and we accordingly call for the immediate demilitarization of Diego Garcia,
reparations for the people of Chagos, and the closing of the base, and the
re-unification of Mauritius.

3. We oppose US policy on the bombardment of Iraq, a policy that thinly
disguises the US businessmen's thirst for oil-control in the Middle East.

4. We abhor the USA continuing to finance and arm the State of Israel, its
gendarme which continues to defy UN Resolutions.

5. We denounce the USA for its failure to adhere to the UN Covenant on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and its failure to sign up to being
monitored under the UN Covenant on Political and Civil Rights. We also
denounce the USA for its failure to ratify most of the ILO Conventions. We
also denounce it for its failure to ratify the UN Declaration on the Rights
of the Child. We condemn the US for refusal to sign the International
Criminal Court, and for its sabotaging of this tribunal against war crimes,
by its forcing countries into bilateral treaties not to hand over US
military personnel wanted on charges of war crimes. We note that the US is
the only country in the world found guilty of "terrorism"; this was for its
acts of terror in Nicaragua. We strongly condemn the US for its recourse to
the death penalty, and in particular to the unacceptable practice of killing
people found guilty of offenses committed when they were minors, and of
executing the mentally ill. We also call for the release of the innocent
journalist, on death row, Mr. Abu Jamal Mumia.

6. We oppose the US for its leading role in imposing globalization
world-wide, in part through its own military force and in part through the
Washington-based international institutions, the IMF and World Bank, and its
domination of the WTO, which it runs to suit its own business interests.

7. We oppose the US for its sabotage of the UN Conference Against Racism in
2001 in Durban, and for its refusal to negotiate to pay reparations for
slavery.

8. We are both alarmed and angry at the US, whose companies produce one
quarter of the world's "hot house" gases, for its refusal to sign the Kyoto
Agreement on slowing down carbon emissions and Global Warming.

9. We oppose the US for its constant work to erode the sovereignty of other
states.

10. We oppose the US for its constant work to erode democracy of any
political content, not only in the US itself, but world-wide.

For all these reasons, we are joining the initiative to call for a Peoples'
Forum that will be held on Wednesday 15th January 2003, in parallel to the
AGOA Forum, and to call for a peaceful march to express our opinion freely.

Endorsing organisations:

1. General Workers' Federation (GWF)
2. Féderation des Syndicats de Corps Constuées (FSCC)
3. Planteurs du Nord
4. Muvman Liberasyon Fam (MLF)
5. Lalit
6. Amis de Chamarel
7. Ledikasyon pu Travayer (LPT)
8. Arts Jonction
9. Féderation des Travailleurs Unis (FTU)
10. Federation of Preschool Playgroups
11. Muvman Lakaz
12. Nouvo Lizour
13. Centre Diocesain du Monde Ouvriere(CDMO)
14. Association contre le 'Mind Control' et la Pensée Unique
15. ABAIM
16. Rodrigues Government Employees' Association (RGEA)
17. Comité pour l'Amerioration de Santé (CAS)
18. Ligue Ouvriere d'Action Catholique (LOAC)
19. Organisation pour L'Unite des Artisans (OUA)
20. Government Servants Association (GSA)
21. Institute of Environmental and Legal Studies
22. Mauritius Labour Congress (MLC)
23. Government Teachers' Union (GTU)
24. Small Farmers Association (Montagn Longue - Creve Coeur)
25. Small Planters Association (Petite Raffray)
26. Petit Planteurs de L'Ouest
27. Front du Centre (Association des Planteurs des Iles)
28. Grup Fangurin
29. Association Pour le Developpement Social
30. Federation of Civil Service Unions (FCSU)

***

Attention Friends and Colleagues in Africa and other countries.

We have the pleasure in sending you an essay on AGOA, written by Rajni
Lallah of Lalit, Mauritius, in the context of the AGOA Business and Head of
States Forum being held in Mauritius in January 2003. This essay is a must
for any thinking citizen wishing to understand AGOA outside the prism of
mainstream propaganda. The essay can be published or circulated to your
friends and contacts via emails.

This essay is from the newly launched book "Diego Garcia in Times of
Globalisation"  written by Lalit and published by LPT.

------------------------------------------------------------------

Welcomed by the bourgeoisie in South Africa and Mauritius
AGOA - an instrument of the US ruling class

The US African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) is directly linked to the
question of the US base on Diego Garcia. Mauritius is immediately brought to
heel, like a pet poodle, when its representative at the UN intimates that
Mauritius may not support the US resolution on Iraq. (B-2's and B-52's set
off from Diego Garcia for attacking Iraq.) The AGOA condition about
submitting to US foreign policy is quoted in the press here, as a reason for
cow towing.   Not only that, AGOA  is becoming an important link to all
kinds of events on the political and economic scene in Mauritius.
Privatisation, liberalisation, the government voting a "Prevention of
Terrorism Act", factory closures, delocalisation, all these events are
connected in one way or another to AGOA. This article explains how and why.

The US has acquired a new colonial device to get African States to submit to
US imperialist rule, with the active support of African ruling classes. The
US African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), enacted in the year 2000
(after literally years of trying to get it through) , gives President Bush
king-size powers to decide which African State he will open the US market
to, and which African State he will close the US market to. AGOA is ridden
with conditionalities that African States have to submit to in order for
President Bush to favour them by opening the US market to their capitalists'
goods and services. At least once every two years, under AGOA, President
Bush calls in African States that he deems "eligible" to an AGOA Forum  to
tell them what he thinks their political and economic agenda should be. This
colonial performance is what the Mauritian government is congratulating
itself on hosting in January 2003.

When President Bush announced he would not be at the World Summit on
Sustainable Development (WSSD) in South Africa, he also added that he was
planning a visit to Africa in January 2003. Clearly, President Bush believes
the AGOA forum to be more of a priority than world sustainable development.
An "AGOA business forum" is also being held at the same time as the official
"AGOA Forum" in January. At this second Forum US businessmen will be looking
for African "brokers" to facilitate their implantation in those African
States labelled "eligible" by President Bush. The Mauritian private sector
is eagerly offering itself as the African "broker" for US multinationals.
This is why the Mauritian ruling class has been tripping over its own feet
as it's in such a hurry to get the AGOA business forum going. The United
States Information Service (USIS) has been funding programs all over Africa
to explain how AGOA can be used to create "Public-Private Partnerships" (the
latest fashion in privatisation) in African countries. The USIS is also
explaining how to use AGOA for "matchmaking" (their term) between African
and American capitalists.

US business and African capitalists see in AGOA, growth and opportunity for
themselves, and are busy negotiating joint ventures in regions of Africa
where working people have less social and economic rights and where wages
are the lowest. In countries like Mauritius or South Africa, there are
massive delocalisation plans in process that will downslide wages, working
conditions, and social and economic conditions of all the peoples of Africa.

Where the US African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) comes from

AGOA has had many names. These last years, it has been called the Africa
Bill, the African Growth and Opportunity Bill, the Africa Act or the Trade
and Tariff Act. The voted version is now known as the African Growth and
Opportunity Act (AGOA)  and is part of a law called the Trade and
Development Act of 2000. It has had so many names partly because it was so
unpopular that each time it got defeated in the US Congress, it had to be
re-introduced by another name. It has taken several years for AGOA to be
enacted. The US ruling classes have been persistent in pushing through AGOA
because it is so central for the US imperialist strategy that dates from the
1990's.

In the 1990's, there was a major shift in US policy towards Africa. The US
decided to make Africa a new zone  for US capitalist implantation. This was
clearly announced by the late Commerce Secretary Ron Brown of the Clinton
administration in 1995 . The Clinton Administration Record  quotes  Ron
Brown: " the United States would no longer concede the African market to
former colonial powers."

Clinton's regime had two over-arching, long-term policy goals . Firstly, it
was  in favour of US business interests. What the US wanted was to implant
US multinationals in Africa for them to control the rich natural and mineral
resources including oil, gold, copper, diamonds, and for them to get a
larger share of the African market. The Clinton Record refers to this goal
in terms of accelerating Africa's "integration into the global economy"
which would "advance American commercial interests through an invigorated
emphasis on trade and investment". The second US policy goal was to get a
firmer military hold on Africa. The Clinton Record refers to this goal as
addressing "security threats" emanating from Africa. AGOA is based on both
these US long-term policy goals: it imposes conditionalities that dictate
economic policy in Africa so that US multinationals can operate lucratively
and at the same time, coerces African States into supporting US foreign
policy and "national security" interests. Ever since George W Bush was
installed as US President, AGOA has become an instrument that perfectly
addresses the needs of his regimes' aggressive military policies.

What does AGOA mean?

This law means that up till September 2008, the US President, just like a
King, can open the gates of the US market to African goods and services from
48 African States, but will do so only if they accept US conditionalities.
In AGOA, overt conditionalities are referred to as "eligibility
requirements".  Up to now, the US President has "declared" 36 African
countries "eligible". AGOA "eligibility requirements" are actually being
used by President Bush to close the US market to goods and services coming
from nine "non-eligible" African countries: Angola, Burkina Faso, Burundi,
the Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gambia, Liberia, Togo
and Zimbabwe.  Sudan, Somalia and the Comoros have not sought the
"eligibility" favour from the US President, so, they have escaped AGOA's
zone of influence. Since AGOA has been enacted, the US President has
presented two annual reports to the US Congress which actually includes a
country-by-country report on whether African States are observing  AGOA
conditionalities or not.

The United States government constantly harps on the need for the rest of
the world to give capitalism a free rein. It wants, in the long-run, to
transform everything, from goods to services, from water to the land, into
commodities that are bought and sold for profit, without taxes, without
regulations, without any public or democratic control. This is what it calls
the "free-market". When it comes to its own market, the United States is not
inclined to subscribe to "free-market" policy - it adopts protectionist
policies in the interest of US capitalists that do not want their profit
restrained by the entry of cheaper goods and services into the US market.

Supporters of AGOA acclaim it as being some kind of new "Lomé Convention"
for Africa. Strangely enough, these supporters refrain from mentioning that
"free" access of goods and services into the US market (as any other
market), without conditionalities being attached, is due very soon in any
case. The US is part of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and is supposed
to be committed, like other countries in the WTO, to opening its market
without any conditionalities being imposed. Other protectionist agreements
outside the WTO are also on the way out. The Multifibre Agreement, for
instance, is suppose to be phased out in 2004. So why do our Governments
accept all the conditionalities in AGOA, when the US market is supposed to
have no gates soon, anyway? We do not know.

There are many conditionalities. Some are overt ones called "eligibility"
requirements in AGOA, and others are covert ones, that are implied by the
AGOA law. Let us look at just a few of them.

AGOA says: "Accept the US President as your King"

AGOA transforms the US President into a King with an empire in Africa. It is
the US President who decides which African country to open or close the US
market to. It is the US President who decides whether African countries are
following AGOA conditionalities or not. It is the US President who orders
African Heads of States to an AGOA Forum at least once every two years. It
is he who decides when and where to call them to. It is the US President who
also decides which goods and services from which countries he will give
duty-free treatment to. If the US President decides that an African country
is not in line with AGOA conditionalities, he can close the US market to
that country.  The US Congress has given itself so much power that it can
now decide which African country is "poor" or not. The US Congress has just
amended AGOA (referred to as AGOA II), to give Botswana and Namibia "poor
country" status even though the US barometer used in the first version of
AGOA does not classify these two countries as being "poor".

Another important point concerning AGOA is the procedure used for its
establishment. AGOA is not a multilateral agreement negotiated between the
US and African countries. It was unilaterally imposed by the US. It was
proposed by the US President and voted in by the US Congress. This US law is
a kind of  "extra-territorial" legislation, as if Africa was a US colony.

Many African countries in Northern Africa (West Sahara, Algeria, Tunisia,
Morocco, Libya and Egypt) do not fall under the AGOA "zone of influence".
The colonial "carving up" of Africa lives on: the US can now, if it is not
stopped, establish its own "colonies" in Africa that will be governed by
AGOA.

AGOA says: "You must follow US foreign policy"

AGOA crudely states that African States, in order to fulfill requirements
for eligibility, must not "engage in activities that undermine United States
national security or foreign policy interests" . This "conditionality" is
real: it has already been used by President Bush. Burkina Faso has been
refused "eligibility" under AGOA partly because it does not submit to US
foreign policy. The US President's May 2002 AGOA report to the US Congress
specifically mentions this under the heading "US National Security and
Foreign Policy Interest". In this section, the US President states that
"Burkina Faso has played an unhelpful role regionally, undermining stability
and US foreign policy interests".

Already, Mauritius is feeling the weight of this conditionality. Since the
passing of AGOA, the Mauritian government has unconditionally  backed the US
attack on Afghanistan, has blindly followed the US lead in voting through
the Prevention of Terrorism Act, and is now shamelessly poised to support US
warlords in aggressing the people of Iraq.

As the US  pushed hard to get the UN Security Council to follow its
war-mongering lead, the Mauritian government took the decision to support
the key US resolution in the build-up towards attacking Iraq. This decision
was made, according to Raj Meetarbhan of L'Express , after Mauritian
Ambassador Koonjul in Washington signified the Mauritian government's
intention not to vote for the US resolution. It must be said that a few days
earlier, Le Mauricien  had reported Prime Minister Jugnauth as asserting, on
the question of Iraq, that he was "confident that a diplomatic way out is
still possible and that war can be averted." He was quoted from his message
on the occasion of the 57th anniversary of the United Nations.

After the government's new decision on the US resolution to be brought to
the UN Security Council, Foreign Affairs Minister Gayan was quoted by Raj
Meetarbhan as saying that the government must not "put the country's
interests in peril" . It is not the "country's" interests he is talking
about: he is talking about the interests of the Mauritian capitalist class
that wants juicy tidbits out of AGOA. Even if it means the loss of thousands
of lives in Iraq. Even if it means the dispossessing of peoples' means of
livelihood in Mauritius and all over Africa. Even if it means the loss of
peoples' basic fundamental rights. Typically, Raj Meetarbhan of L'Express,
true to his tradition of mouth-piecing for Mauritian capitalists and their
regime, qualified Ambassador Koonjul's resistance to savage US cowboy-style
intervention, a "diplomatic blunder".

It must also be said that ever since AGOA was still a Bill, the press in
Mauritius has persistently avoided commenting the fact that AGOA contains
stringent conditionalities. For the first time, as if conditionalities in
AGOA were the most normal thing, the press is now pointing to
conditionalities in AGOA. Raj Meetarbhan of  L'Express even quotes the
section in AGOA about how African countries must not go against US national
security policy and foreign policy.

AGOA says: "Protect US national security over security of peoples of Africa
and the rest of the world"

The Mauritian ruling class does not care a whit about Mauritian people's
real national security. It is willing to sacrifice this just to let people
like Mr. Vigier de la Tour sell a few T-shirts and shorts on the US market.
It has supported AGOA and lobbied intensively for other African countries to
accept all its conditionalities even though AGOA might imperil the struggle
to close down the US military base on Diego Garcia, part of the Republic of
Mauritius. Or even other bases in Africa such as the US military base in
Kenya. In Kenya, the US occupies an air base which was used in the attack
against Afghanistan after the 11th of September, 2001. In Mauritius, the
United States occupies a military base on Diego Garcia, an island illegally
dismembered from Mauritius by the United Kingdom during independence
negotiations in the 1960's. This island was "depopulated" by UK-US in order
to transform it into a military base. The Mauritian people living there were
forcibly removed to the main island of Mauritius and to the Seychelles. The
base has subsequently been used to bomb Iraq in 1991 during the "Gulf war",
to bomb people in Afghanistan last year, and is now to be the USA's main
launching pad to bomb people in Iraq yet again. AGOA, and new US policy in
Africa has very serious implications for the struggle to close down the US
base on Diego Garcia, other US bases in Africa and for the struggle to
demilitarise the whole African and Indian Ocean region.

AGOA and Diego Garcia

Since independence, the struggle for the closing-down of the US base on
Diego Garcia and the re-unification of the Chagos with the rest of Mauritius
has often been used by the Mauritian State as a negotiating point for
"trade" on behalf of the Mauritian capitalist class. This sordid deal has
now become "institutionalised" in AGOA: the Mauritian State's silence on the
closure of the US base in return for the entry of Mauritian capitalists'
goods and services into the US market. Mauritian capitalists and their State
were so eager to get AGOA passed by US congress, that they undertook to get
other African States in the region (through regional blocks such as COMESA ,
the SADC  and the now defunct OAU ), to lobby for support to encourage the
US Congress to pass AGOA with all its conditionalities.

AGOA can now be used as an instrument to keep the US base on Diego Garcia
intact for what the US would probably call its "national security or foreign
policy interests". Particularly in the interests of its multinationals in
the oil and armament business. The new Bush regime is aggressively using
AGOA to secure these interests through military means. In the first United
States-Sub-Saharan Africa Trade and Economic Cooperation Forum held in
October 2001, barely a month after the 11th of September, President Bush
made it quite clear what he thought African States' political priorities
should be: to follow the US lead in combating US-defined "terrorism"
including  providing "the basing and overflight rights (.) by African
countries", show commitment to "cracking down on terrorist financing", and
ratify the 1999 Algiers Convention Against Terrorism. Of course, President
Bush failed to mention that it is the US Government which is the only one
ever found guilty of "terrorism" by the World Court on Nicaragua.

President Bush also made it clear that African States should change their
stand after the WTO Conference in Seattle held in 1999. In the Seattle
Conference, African States, acting as a block, managed to oppose new rounds
that would have further entrenched the world into capitalist rule. This is
why President Bush was so concerned about getting African States to stop
this kind of resistance. He told African States represented at the 1st AGOA
Forum that they should become "a powerful voice for the launch of a new
round of global trade talks in Doha, due to begin next month." The
quasi-ultimatum of President Bush was hardly veiled; at this forum; he said
in very clear terms: "Every nation that adopts this vision will find in
America a trading partner, an investor, and a friend."  If they did not
accept the US vision, he would close the US market to them.

Of Oil, US militarisation and AGOA

There has been a growing interest by the US ruling class in African oil.
Africa already provides some 15% of US crude oil imports. This is likely to
increase still more through new production in West Africa and the
construction of a pipeline linking southern Chad to Atlantic ports. In
addition, there have been recently discovered offshore reserves on the West
African coast. Particularly after the 11th of September events, Africa has
become of key strategic importance to the US ruling class. The US no longer
wants to be dependent on countries like Saudi Arabia, an ally that is not
giving unconditional support to the US. The US wants to accentuate its
strategy to increase its oil supply from Africa as it prepares for a US
invasion of Iraq. At the same time, what US oil multinationals are
clamouring for, is for the US to step up pressure for African States to give
them "legally protected land ownership" i.e. to privatise land, and give US
multinationals the land titles. They also want the US military to secure
their operations in Africa. A New York Times article has made this public
knowledge. The article, explaining how Africa has become strategically
important for the US because of its oil, states quite clearly "There has
also been discussion in Congress and the Pentagon about increasing military
exchanges with West African countries and perhaps establishing a military
base in the region, possibly on São Tomé, an island nation in the Gulf of
Guinea".

The new US strategy for oil in Africa would also have the effect of breaking
up the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries  (OPEC), the Middle
East-centred oil cartel that has considerable control over oil production
and prices. The New York Times article mentions that Gabon was an OPEC
member but quit in 1995, and that now, Nigeria is considering quitting OPEC.
The hacking up of OPEC would greatly enhance US oil multinationals' power in
the oil industry.

There is a strong Israel-based lobby allied to the US oil industry lobby
that wants the US to use AGOA to open up West Africa to the US oil industry,
and to secure this hold by setting up a military base on Sao Tome and
Principe in West Africa. This lobby even has a name. It is called the
African Oil Policy Initiative Group. This working group grew out of a
symposium held in Washington, in January 2002, organised by the Institute
for Advanced Strategic & Political Studies (IASPS)) which describes itself
as a "Jerusalem-based think tank".

In a document produced by this "think-tank", they have quoted declarations
made by the Chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on
Africa, Ed Royce,  linking the US oil strategy to both  AGOA and also to the
New Economic Partnership for African Development (a plan generally known as
NEPAD, concocted by a few African Presidents to open up Africa to global
capitalism). Both AGOA and NEPAD are seen as being instruments to ensure US
control over African oil. Note that NEPAD is to be one of the main themes
discussed in the official AGOA Forum.

AGOA imposes economic dictatorship

One of the conditionalities in AGOA  is that African countries must have a
"market economy" in order to qualify for "eligibility". This means that the
whole economy must operate on a profit-basis. Even basic services such as
health, education, pensions, water, electricity, telecommunications,
transport, and other social services must be transformed into "commodities"
sold by capitalist business-operations. Measures to re-distribute wealth and
to restrict class inequality such as taxes on companies, on capitalists, on
business operations, must be gradually scrapped until they disappear
altogether. This is an AGOA condition. A completely "free-market", one where
democratic control does not exist, because everything is run by private
companies. In Mauritius, as in many African countries, there has been
intense resistance against such a system. In the 1970's, the IMF-WB
(International Monetary Fund - World Bank) tried to get the government to
impose such a system on Mauritius, but people opposed this so much, that the
government fortunately failed to impose key measures in the IMF-WB
programme. And strong opposition has continued in the trade union movement
until today, thus slowing down the move towards privatising everything.

AGOA says: "Sell off everything that is public-owned"

Another condition is that people cannot own and control anything
collectively. This is what the public sector was supposed to be: the people
owning, running and controlling sectors of the economy. In nationalised
sectors, public ownership and control was already far too limited in that it
was, in practice, governments and their bureaucrats who exercised control.
It was not, even at its best, workers and service-users who exercised
control. However limited this form of control, the possibility of people
organising and taking democratic control over the public sector remains an
open one. What privatisation does is to make it much more difficult to
regain any democratic control. It is a form of dispossessing of our
collective heritage.

In African countries, the public sector's expansion was a means of
decolonisation to stop foreign companies and their governments from
controlling strategic sectors of the economy, and whisking away all the
profits. Privatisation wipes away the historic progress in terms of
decolonisation and exposes African countries to re-colonisation.

AGOA says: "Remove subsidies"

Yet another condition is that African States must eliminate subsidies
altogether. This includes subsidies to ensure food security: subsidies on
basic food such as rice and flour, subsidies on medicine, on vaccines, on
contraception. Subsidies on agriculture for small-scale planters and
farmers, subsidies on fishing, on animal farming; subsidies that are vital
to the lives of many, many people in Africa will have to be wiped out.
Subsidies on export-oriented industry will have to be removed. The US ruling
class wants African States to eradicate subsidies stimulating local
production so as to decrease importation. It wants to remove all other
subsidies that were part of the de-colonisation process altogether.

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-------------------->> [Part II]