Africa and the Bush doctrine
By Monica Moorehead
Where does Africa fit in the scenario of the insane,
aggressive Bush doctrine?
A Sept. 18 New York Times article headlined "U.S. Moves
Commandos to East Africa to Pursue Al Qaeda in Yemen" reported
that hundreds of U.S. Special Operations forces have been
"quietly" stationed at a military base in Djibouti, a former
French colony located where the Red Sea intercepts the Gulf of
Aden. Along with these Special Forces, there is also a U.S.
assault ship, the Belleau Wood, off the Horn of Africa facing
Yemen to pursue whoever caused the blast on the USS Cole a few
years ago.
The following day the New York Times ran a front page
article headlined "In Quietly Courting Africa, U.S. Likes the
Dowry." And what might that dowry be? Oil, oil and more oil.
This outrageous admission cannot be separated from the growing
U.S. military presence in East Africa--which is an integral
part of the U.S. military build-up against Iraq--or from
Secretary of State Colin Powell's recent trip to Africa, where
he visited Angola and Gabon, two oil-producing countries. Nor
can it be separated from the recent announcement that Bush
plans a major visit to Africa next year.
Ever since Sept. 11, 2001, the Bush administration has
sought venues other than the Middle East for getting oil
reserves. This is based on the mounting social instability of
their puppet regimes, especially Saudi Arabia. And now, with
the United States just itching to invade Iraq, home to 10
percent of the world's oil reserves, Washington has once again
set its sights on Africa. The aim is not only to get their
hands on more oil but to expand their oil-importing
markets.
Thirty-three out of the 41 countries categorized by the
World Bank as "Heavy Indebted Poor Countries" are in Africa.
The total African debt owed to the International Monetary Fund
and World Bank is an estimated $350 billion. One-fourth of
Africa's export earnings go to pay off the debt.
There is a debt owed not by the African people but by the
banks and imperialism. They owe a long overdue debt to the
African people. The $350 billion, with no political strings
attached, should go toward rebuilding Africa--including health
care, education, housing, food production, transportation,
etc.
African women are playing a leadership role in forwarding
the class struggle. Women have been in the forefront of the
national liberation movements and the struggle for socialism
from the Russian Revolution to the revolutions in Vietnam, Cuba
and China--and Africa is no exception.
Nigeria is the world's sixth-largest exporter of oil, the
fifth-largest supplier of oil to the United States. Imperialism
has intervened many times in "regime changes" in Africa by
"Balkanization"--breaking up bigger countries into weaker,
smaller states. During the 1960s the United States provoked a
civil war that led to a breakaway of the mineral-rich Biafra
region.
During this past summer, hundreds of indigent Nigerian women
took hostages including management for weeks at Chevron-Texaco
oil facilities to demand jobs for their sons, paving of roads,
and construction of hospitals and schools. These heroic
takeovers showed the importance of direct action and exposed
the intolerable conditions that African people, especially
women, are forced to endure. Those affected most severely by
poverty and the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa are women.
On the cover of the Sept. 16 New York Times Magazine there
was a picture of a top government official in Rwanda who
happens to be the first woman to face charges in an
international court for inciting genocide against the Tutsi
people in 1994. The Times described this official as the
"Minister of Rape." To say that this is blatant racism and
sexism is an understatement. The Nigerian women helped to
expose who the real rapists and plunderers of the African
peoples and continent are: imperialism, dating back to the
trans-Atlantic slave trade in the 16th century and up to the
current role of the IMF, World Bank and transnational
corporations. The Times Magazine piece was an attempt to incite
further imperialist intervention--and to divert attention away
from the real issues, which are rooted in the
divide-and-conquer legacy of colonialism and neo-colonialism
that has cost the lives of hundreds of millions of African
people.
If we want to show our solidarity with Africa as well as
with Latin America, the Middle East, Asia, the Caribbean and
elsewhere, we must do everything that we can to defeat
imperialism in the belly of the beast--by instilling class
consciousness among all sectors of the workers and oppressed,
including bringing out as many people as possible on Oct. 26 to
stop the war against Iraq. U.S. out of Africa! Cancel the debt!
Reparations for the African people!
Moorehead is a member of the Secretariat of Workers World
Party.
Reprinted from the Oct. 3, 2002, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyrighted
under a Creative
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