Letter: Civil War in Uganda (2006)

Letter to the Editors from the August 2006 issue of the Socialist Standard

Civil War in Uganda

Dear Editors,

There is a war which has been going on the Northern part of Uganda for now 20 years. This is a war between the Ugandan Government and the Lord’s Resistance Army rebel armed forces led by one Joseph Kony. It is clear that any solution resulting from violence or confrontation is not lasting. It is only through peaceful means that we can develop better understanding between ourselves.

Though lies and falsehood may deceive people temporarily and the use of force may control human beings physically, it is only through proper understanding, fairness and mutual respect that human beings can be genuinely convinced and satisfied.

 There is one world and we exist as one people in need of each other and with the same basic needs. There is far more that unites us than can ever divide us along cultural, nationalistic or religious lines.

Together we can create a civilization worth living in, but before that happens we need the conscious cooperation of ordinary people across the world, united in one common cause-to create a world in which each person has free access to the benefits of civilization, a world without frontiers or borders ,social classes or leaders and a world in which production is at last freed from the shackles of artificial constraints of profit and used for the good of humanity.

War is not about our interests, but those of the bosses who rob us so that they can be rich and powerful. War is about the competition between capitalists. If we are to die it will be for them. Think about that as the masters of war ask for your support in the prevailing wars. Why should we die defending what is not ours and which we will never benefit from?

On the contrary our object is to obtain what is not now the possession of our class, the earth and its natural and industrial resources. The class war between the parasites who possess and the workers who produce-is the real struggle that need concern us. And to win that war we need not initiate the violence which is characteristic of capitalism’s wars. The war we should advocate is that which has to be waged on the battle of ideas-for the hearts and minds of the world’s people. And once we unite there will be no force that will stop us taking the earth into our common possession. There is nothing natural about war. Are we born with a desire to kill people who speak a different language or who have a different skin colour?

No! In fact peaceful cooperation is more fitting for human beings who are potentially rational human beings.

Once we live in a world of common ownership and democratic control of resources, there will simply be no reason to kill one another. No empires to build or markets to expand or profits to increase.

Weijagye Justus, 

Kabale, Uganda

The Life of a Common Ugandan (2001)

From the June 2001 issue of the Socialist Standard

The treatment of diseases is by native and modern medicine. The native medicine involves drugs extracted from parts of plants and or animals. They are in powder, liquid or cream forms and can be applied externally or taken orally. Most common diseases here are infectious diseases such as dysentery, malaria and typhoid. Others include pulmonary tuberculosis and cholera. The prevention is not successful, because of lack of information and education involving the diseases, lack of proper hygiene.

When such cases appear, patients are either taken to local herbalists or to health units. The patients are carried on stretchers made locally. For cases of pregnant women, some complications are always encountered at birth such as excessive bleeding or “stillbirth” due to delayed surgical operations on the expectant mother. People have fear of undergoing operations for fear of dying during the operation from technical, operational or surgical problems.

Treatment is not always easily accessible by the poor who have problems of payment of the medical fees that are now charged in all health institutes be they private or public. In the public health institutes it is charged in the name of cost-sharing. Some get the medical bills when it is already too late for their ailments to be handled and consequently death follows. Some of these ailments come from poor diets and feeding habits. It is common to find people eating and drinking from the same utensils. Drinking local brews using natural straws which are shared being an example of one of the causes of TB.

Few people have a reasonable education say beyond primary level and this renders them unable to read or listen to educational materials and programmes. Income is on average about 50 pence per day per adult person. Also there are poor or no communication facilities to deliver urgent information in case of emergencies. People have to travel long distances (say 12km) on foot before they can reach the nearest health facilities. This is because there are either no transport facilities (with no roads) or the person involved is unable to pay for them.

In some cases such poor people are facilitated by paying in kind by way of doing manual work at the health institutes when they have completely recovered or it can be done by their friends or relatives on their (patients’) behalf.

Women are commonly seen having over eight children as they rarely apply family planning methods or due to religious indoctrination, especially the catholics and the moslems.

Because families are always big they end up being overcrowded in their grass-thatched houses built out of mud and wood. There is rarely any ventilation. This accelerates health problems.

Because of poverty doctors are compelled to sometimes only handle the symptoms of the disease not the disease itself for the patient may be able only to afford payment of the former rather than the latter.

It is also common to find people living with domestic animals such as goats, sheep, rabbits and hens.

High blood pressure, diabetes and cancer are referred to as the diseases of the rich. This is not because they only involve in rich people but because the poor die of them without ever having them diagnosed because of the expenses involved.

Pit latrines are used to substitute toilets and in overcrowded villages and town slums, such latrines are used by more than one family. Consequently there arises associated sanitation problems and rarely do such families co-operate successfully to maintain such facilities. Water to drink and for household use is always fetched from running streams and wells which also serve domestic animals.

Such water is always drunk without even being boiled because of fuel problems as firewood, which is the main fuel source, is becoming scarce.

As most houses are not cemented there is an infinite scourge of dust, which contributes to respiratory problems. With this dust there is the associated problems of jiggers (sand fleas). In fact recent press reports had it that from one individual over 400 jiggers were extracted from his extremities.

Notwithstanding all these health evils, there’s also the AIDS scourge that is “harvesting” the population in its thousands. AIDS has also affected the social-economic situation of the common Ugandan in that there are orphans who end up in towns as street kids. Also the number of widows and widowers there are has increased and people are burdened by the attention and care given to their terminally-ill friends and relatives.

Rarely do people undergo any medical examinations except only when they are compelled to do so, when say going abroad, so as to know their medical status.

Weijagye Justus, 

Uganda

Letter: Bad news (2002)

Letter to the Editors from the June 2002 issue of the Socialist Standard

Bad news

Dear Editors

Capitalism is the one killing us. When one turns on the radio, television or reads newspapers, there is always repeated similar headlines.

What makes the news “worth” reading has to do with some death somewhere, a death which in sane conditions would have not taken place. The news could also be about war, crime, accidents, poverty and/or some other sort of evil. You could hear, for example, that terrorists have attacked and that thousands of people including children and the disabled are reported to be missing (to void the “impolite” language of saying are reported to have died). “The army in X has overthrown the government and so and so many people are expected to be displaced or dead”. “The war in Y has left many dead, thousands of houses and other property destroyed and many thousands of people are displaced and homeless and are in need of relief food and other basic needs, and an impending disaster is likely due to the overcrowding and lack of sanitation”.

What presently makes news worth listening to or reading is always bad news. Many print and electronic media profit heavily from such headlines. There are individuals, groups and governments who are quick to sponsor and fund war and crime because in the insane capitalistic present society crime and war pay. The arms and ammunition industry (if at all it is an industry anyway) profit from the sale of weapons that are meant for human destruction. Most governments especially in poor and developing countries spend much of their resources and borrowed funds on strengthening their defence and protections at the expense of their citizens.

The physical and mental energy, the financial and material resources that are spent in countering the effects of capitalism by charity groups could be wisely and usefully spent in giving the world’s population scientific socialist education, the only education that opens the minds of people and gives them an understanding of the world we live on. It is this scientific socialist education that is the only intellectual energy that will end capitalism (and with it the evils mentioned earlier).

Weijagye Justus, 

Uganda

Party News: Uganda (2003)

Party News from the December 2003 issue of the Socialist Standard

On 26 October the Kabale Socialist Club in Uganda held a meeting with people who had been reading socialist literature. They have sent the following report on the meeting :

Ariiho Geoffrey thanked the visitors, who had been reading Socialist literature lent to them by members of the club, for such an attendance. Mwebaze Jimmy as one of the old members of the club explained to the visitors how the club was formed, its objectives and activities - which most of the visitors agreed to have knowledge of. The discussion was mainly otherwise based on exchange of views including participation of the visitors. However almost all the visitors expressed the confusion and not understanding the "Religious Issue/question". All the visitors come from religious families and at most of them still show a lot of religious tendencies and beliefs. Comrades Mwebaze.Weijagye and Ariiho each explained the religious issue at length. However still most of the visitors showed dissatisfaction with the explanations in relation to how capitalism operates and how socialism will work. A leaflet 'Questions and Answers about Socialism* were distributed to the visitors. Also given out were the October-December African Socialist magazine (which had arrived a few days before) to all including the members present. Those who had not yet come across the July-September Issue also got from what had arrived. Weijagye informed the visitors that we have books, although some not written by Socialists, which explained the issue of Religion. The books include : Three photocopies of the Age of Reason (two of which were lent out). The Jesus Mysteries, The World without Wages, The Evolution of the Idea of God and Gibbon on Christianity. He also explained that we are expecting a pamphlet (which was presently out of stock): How the Gods were made.

Letters :The war goes on (2001)

Letters to the Editors from the December 2001 issue of the Socialist Standard

The war goes on

Dear Editors,

The action of terrorists on America’s twin towers and Pentagon on 11 September and the subsequent bombing of Afghanistan by the USA and its allies is proof (if any was necessary) that there is no civilisation or democracy in this world.

As he accepted his Presidential nomination in 1988, George Bush (senior) had this to say, “This has been called the American century because in it we were the dominant force for good in the world. Now we are on the verge of a new century, and what country’s name will it bear? I say it will be anther American century.” However, there is one world and we exist as one people in need of each other and with the same basic needs.

As long as we live under the market system, the conditions that give rise to wars will always exist. War in the modern world has the potential for destruction of the whole human race. The working class – the propertyless majority – have no interest at stake in supporting any war at any time for any reason. Terrorism will only go with the collapse of capitalism and the coming of a new era – socialism.

It is clear that any solution resulting from violence or confrontation is not lasting. It is only through peaceful means that we can develop better understanding between peoples. Though lies and “spin” may deceive people temporarily and the use of force may control human beings physically, it is only through proper understanding, fairness and mutual respect that they can be genuinely satisfied and creative.

Human beings are capable of co-operating – the development of the human race has depended upon it. There are numerous examples of selfless behaviour and kindliness. But a system motivated by the quest for profit is bound to be competitive and ruthless. Otherwise how and why would people who are kind and caring support and even take part in deliberately causing death and destruction to strangers they have never met? The wheels of capitalism are oiled by human blood.

There are no bombs or bullets that select the guilty and spare the innocent. The pacifist is just as likely to get killed as the soldier. This is what is happening in Afghanistan and in all parts of the world that are ravaged by war. Though human life cannot be recovered, the energy and resources that are being put into the destruction of Afghanistan could be used to rebuild the destroyed twin towers. Destroying life and wealth in Afghanistan is not a solution – it will only aggravate the situation. Two wrongs cannot make a right. The USA is using misfortune to show the world its military might, using equipment sold to destroy human life elsewhere.

Socialists can only continue with propagating our case against capitalism. Sometimes we have to be careful not to provoke the sword of ignorance purposelessly. But to give up, to concede defeat, would be to allow the present disastrous and insane system to triumph.

To quote the words of a great scientist, Albert Einstein, “The significant problems we face cannot be resolved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them.”

Justus Weijagye, 

Uganda

The Bilderberg Group

Dear Editors

Just a short comment on the clarification on p. 18 of the November Socialist Standard.

The Bilderberg group may be “semi-mythological”, but there’s no doubt that such groupings do exist. For instance, in Captive State, George Monbiot discusses the European Round Table of Industrialists (ERT), an association of the bosses of forty-six of the biggest companies in Europe. They have long advocated the creation of a single market in Western Europe, and called for the improvement of transport links – including the building of the Channel Tunnel. The ERT does not control governments, but it certainly influences them.

Paul Bennett, 

Manchester

Uganda’s politics of alcohol, soap, salt and sugar (2001)

From the October 2001 issue of the Socialist Standard

At last, like the presidential elections, the parliamentary elections are over. This was a month of violence, harassment, intimidation and torture on one side and merrymaking (in a form of “gifts”—alcohol, salt pieces of soap, sugar and cash in exchange for votes) on the other hand. The campaigns attracted many people, especially the rallies of those candidates who were well and easy on their pockets. Here, like anywhere else, the standard by which men and women are judged is their material possessions. Even if you have ideas or initiative, if you are broke you must go without. Those without money dwell in the darkness of inescapable poverty (despite being in the midst of potential plenty), ever wrestling with the torment of survival in a world dominated by the fast buck. So it would have appeared a miracle for a poor but reasonable person to sail through and make it to parliament.

On the other hand, there was controversy when the president turned out and started campaigning in favour of some candidate and campaigning against some others on grounds that the favoured ones were “pro-movement”. In some parts of the country the electoral process was militarised. This was mostly in places where supporters of multiparty politics were contesting along with the historicals of president’s movement system and/or his personal friends. This resulted in violence where some people lost their lives.

Most contestants bribed voters to the extend of buying the poor needy voters, blankets, mattresses, bicycles and hoes, in the expectation that out of which excitement the poor voters would eventually not resist voting for such candidates even if it was clear that the candidate was a non-performer. This is not surprising given that recently Transparency International ranked Uganda as the third most corrupt country in the world. In fact some candidates went as far as spending over U shs 900 millions (£360,000).

Most manifestos centred on poverty, as if the contestants had a formula to eliminate it or as if they had just realised that they were living with poor people. Their opportunity was to capitalise on this biting poverty in most Uganda’s homes. Their elaboration of how poverty could be eliminated was insincere on the candidates’ part, given that poverty cannot be eliminated under capitalism and especially in a country like Uganda where a majority don’t have enough and the right education and civilisation.

There was talk about health programmes, education, security and peace yet in some places these rallies could not take place because of insecurity – due to rebel activities. The candidates came with programmes for bringing health to all yet since about twenty years ago the Ministry of Health has been running an advert in the name of “Health for all by the year 2000”. This is 2001 and most people here in Uganda are still dying of curable diseases such as typhoid, dysentery and malaria.

So their manifestos seem to be disabled ones.

Then we come to voting day. Most of the candidates and their supporters saw this as a day determining between life and death. They became aggressive so as to win the election. Winning indeed would be the only way by which they could recover the money used in bribing voters. Once elected they could get access to public funds and embezzle it. They could, as well, get high salaries and allowances. On polling day voters who supported poor candidates and those candidates who were not favoured by the president were harassed and intimidated. Some were even refused voting but the supporters of the favoured and rich candidates were allowed to vote more than once, to vote in other people’s names – the dead and the absent.

Uganda is a country that has been infested with wars before and after the so-called independence. It seems here the needs of democracy are planted on unfertile grounds. Most folk here don’t have a proper understanding and education of the world we live in, capitalistic society based on profit and competition, and the next stage of society—socialism that will depend on contribution to society by individuals based on individuals’ ability and where individuals take from society according to their self-determined needs. No ruler and no ruled, then and only then would be true democracy, a proper voting process and would there be value of the vote.

Weijagye Justus

Letters: Karl Marx and Russia (2003)

Letters to the Editors from the April 2003 issue of the Socialist Standard

Karl Marx and Russia

Dear Editors,

I would like to discuss the issue of “the necessity for capitalism to have been achieved for socialism to occur” (“Desai on Marx”, Socialist Standard, November 2002).

Desai suggests that Russian Communism was wrong to use the principles of Marx being as Russia was a backward country. Then he goes on to suggest that Russian Communism developed a capitalist economic model as it developed the Russian economy and industries. What could be wrong about the development of a backward country under socialist principles? What would socialism look like if it only ever occurred in capitalist countries?

Desai appears to suggest that only an economically wealthy country, developed through capitalism can support a socialist system. Does he mean to say that socialism, should it succeed, should stagnate and decay as it devours the capitalist system of economics of its predecessors. A progressive, organised socialist party should enable economic growth to sustain socialism within one country but also to develop new industry and technology under its guiding principles. How is it possible to totally eradicate capitalist consciousness when socialism is developed that relies heavily on its economic principles for stability?

Socialist policies should inform the new methods of economics and seek to build a set of new socialist methods of production, in short a socialist economy based on Marx. This is not merely a question of graduated taxes, but a fairer system with a socialist aim, and cultural and aesthetic values that reflect the working class and encapsulates socialism.

Marx states that socialism should occur out of a capitalist economy because he thought that the working class were the intrinsic factor in a communist revolution; and the working class were common to developed countries under capitalism.

If socialism is to succeed, the party must win the support of the working class who desire to see an end to the current ideology of world capitalism.

In order to eradicate capitalism completely the Socialist Party must have a firm vision fixed in its mind, that by adhering to its principles, must revolutionise the consciousness of the people in areas of politics such as: economics, the environment, foreign policy and culture; in order to achieve power, not for a bureaucratic system (the fault of Russian Communism) but to achieve equality and fraternity among the working class.

G. Cubbage, 

Bolton, Lancs

Reply:

We define socialism as a society without private property, money, wages, nation states, where production is for use, not profit. In order for socialism to be successfully established, capitalism would need to develop industry to the point where a society of common ownership would be possible. Along with this, a modern working class would need to emerge that understands and desires socialism. It is clear that neither was the case in Russia in 1917. It was a predominantly agrarian country where the industrial working class were in a minority of the population.

It is true that Marx and Engels in the introduction of the 1882 Russian edition of the Communist Manifesto raised the possibility that Russia could, through an old system of common ownership of land maintained by the peasantry known as the Obshchina that existed in Russia at that time, could pass directly to socialism, without the necessity of developing the capitalist mode of production. However this could only be possible if the Russian revolution ignited a revolution in the West. This did not happen in 1917. Although working class uprisings did occur in the West, such as in Germany, they were more expressions of discontent arising from the First World War than a conscious desire to bring about socialism.

The Bolsheviks did not rise to power on a programme of genuine socialism, but to provide relief to a war-weary population and distribute land away from the large landowners to the peasantry. In fact, Lenin admitted that only state capitalism could be established in Russia at that time. As he wrote in The Chief Tasks of Our Times: “Reality says that State Capitalism would be a step forward for us; if we were able to bring about State Capitalism in a short time it would be a victory for us”. We also believe that the Leninist theories of the Bolshevik Party are prescriptions for state capitalism: the belief that socialism can only be brought about by a party of professional revolutionaries leading the working class and the establishment of a centralised state under the theory of so-called democratic centralism. We insist that the establishment of Socialism require the political actions of a socialist conscious working class without leaders.

Therefore, we agree with Lord Desai that only state capitalism could have emerged from the Russian Revolution. However, we part company with him when he insists that we need many more years of private capitalism to raise the level of society’s productive forces. We maintain that globally the size of society’s productive forces today would allow for the establishment of socialism.

Our definition of socialism above implies that it can only be established on a world-wide basis. Clearly a society where there is common ownership, money has been abolished and production is for human use cannot co-exist with countries where there is still private property, buying and selling and production for profit. Many of the measures that Marx and Engels outlined in the Communist Manifesto, including the call for graduated taxes, were based on the assumption that the working class would take power in Marx and Engels lifetimes. They would be necessary to develop the means of production to levels required for the establishment of socialism. However, since then, capitalism has done the job for us and there is no longer any need for these measures.

We can only agree with the last two paragraphs of your letter. If you study our object and declaration of principles, we hope that you agree that the Socialist Party fits the bill–Editors.

 

The urgent need for Socialism

Dear Editors,

Here we are, having finished the twentieth century which saw many advances in science and technology. Yet despite the potential to satisfy world-wide human need, there are still millions of people suffering from hunger and human misery. Unhappily our social organization has not changed in a way that would enable the human race to reap the full benefits of the useful advances—and abandon the harmful ones. Instead science and technology are commodities produced for sale and profit—they serve the needs of the market system. Presently the only access to the means of life is through money and for the majority this means employment of some kind. However, jobs only come when there is the prospect of profit. Also the standard by which men and women are judged is their material possessions. In every country a minority win out at the expense of the majority. Oh how apparent is the most urgent need for the Earth to belong to its entire people! Then, freed from the shackles which sale and profit places on human endeavour, there will be sufficient resources for everyone to have a satisfying way of life.

Justus Weijagye, 

Kabale, Uganda

 

Castle Breweries Kenya Limited

Dear Editors,

It was June last year when Castle Breweries Kenya Limited ceased its operations in the country. The company had been in operation in Kenya for only five years. A total of 1015 employees were affected by the closure. They, their children, families and relatives were left without any means of earning their daily what is famously called “bread”.

What led to the closure of the company is perhaps illustrative of how capitalism works. Castle Breweries had only one competitor—Kenya Breweries Limited. The South African company thus found it easy going at first but not so during the subsequent years.

Barley, an important ingredient in the manufacture of bee, is grown by a clique of farmers who are contracted by Kenya Breweries for their beer. Most of these farmers are either relatives or associates of senior officials of Kenya Breweries Limited. And thus any other person, or brewer for that matter, had to buy the barley at a higher cost. The only alternative is to import the barley. And this is what Castle Breweries used to do.

Since in its inception in Kenya, their idea or main motive was for profit making, Castle Breweries found it uneconomical to brew and sell its beer at the same price as the competitor, so the company vigorously campaigned for a tax waiver from the authorities.

Kenya Breweries, who had enjoyed monopoly for more than 70 years, found their existence being threatened and thus had to bribe the then President, Daniel Arap Moi. There was to be no tax waiver and in fact in his budget speech, the then Finance Minister Chris Obure increased the taxes on beer from 25 percent to 30 percent.

And thus Kenya Castle Breweries closed its brewing factory at Thika in June 2002 and went ahead at the same time to open others in the USA. The whole thing is Castle Breweries Limited had no intention of remaining in Kenya as long as there were no profits to be made. The welfare of the company’s 1015 employees was far from the concern of Castle’s ‘Bosses’.

The world will continue to witness cases of such nature as long as the so-called investors have only one goal when they are establishing their investments—profits. They go to any lengths to maximise profits and leave the conditions of those making the profits to be the same—Judas wages and salaries and slavery conditions of work.

We, the workers of the world, need to understand that no matter how much money you are paid, you’ll not be able to make ends meet because the wages or salaries are never commensurate to the profits made by the company, organisation or group you are working for. We need to know that the amount of time spent working for profits could be utilised elsewhere working for the welfare of the whole society. Our unity is vital and the capitalist way of doing things will end once we organise and work for the good of all. This will entail us going for political power and make it easy for capitalism to be replaced. Let’s unite to establish the system that caters for the needs of all the members of the society—Socialism.

Patrick W. Ndege,

Nairobi, Kenya

Religious fanaticism kills in Uganda (2000)

From the July 2000 issue of the Socialist Standard

The tragedy that befell Uganda in the month of March this year is worth analysing and talking about. This was in South Western Uganda in the village of Kanungu. Over 500 religious believers, belonging to a sect (cult) called The Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God, set themselves ablaze and all perished in the inferno. Worse still, as police continue to search, mass graves of believers of the same cult were found in different places in the homes of the followers’ leaders and elsewhere.

The impact of religion on people especially in Africa is that of doom. The principles of religion are all similar and only differ on the surface. First, there is a belief in supernatural power. Second, there are prayers and rituals. And third, there is a belief in life after death.

The belief in supernatural powers, a god and a spirit world arose out of people’s lack of understanding of the universe and their own particular limited environment. This was coupled with their own curiosity, desires and needs. Humans have been the creator and inventor of God in their own image. In fact, it’s not a case of God creating Man but of Man creating God. God and all gods exist in people’s minds only.

The Kanungu incident is a case of religious fanatics whose leaders had predicted the end of the world come December 31 1999; they believed that there was not to be a year 2000 with the old generation but a new generation with they, believers of this cult, going to heaven. So they made their heaven.

Their mass graves at Kangunu, like any other graves, are an indication that there is no life after death. There is only death after life. Their testimony was based on biblical extracts. However, as usual, false testimony always testifies against itself. It is an easy thing to tell a lie but it’s difficult to support a lie after it has been told.

By extracting verses from the bible and relying on them in addition to trying to put them into practice, some religious groups have gone as far as destroying fruit trees, having free sex and not accepting family planning methods, refusing medical treatment, and selling their possessions.

Christians marching ‘the way of the cross’ in Uganda

The bible, which claims to be a holy creation and the foundation for christianity and several other religions, was of course a human creation and there is still a minority today who would accept it word for word. Yet it is inconsistent and self-contradicting. In fact it would stand no favour had it to face a court of law. It’s a book of lies. Today numbers of “educated” and “artistic” people are employed to blend truth and lies in whatever proportion they calculate is most effective in misleading the public. The big lie being that people should be contented with the life which the market system imposes on us while waiting for “a paradise life” after this life.

From childhood people are mentally conditioned into religious beliefs, superstitions and the like. And as people sense a lack of control in an increasingly complex and alienating world, they are more susceptible to beliefs in the supernatural whether religion, magic, dreams, creatures from other planets or whatever. People who have religious beliefs replace faith for reason and logic.

We live in a harsh, competitive society where everyone’s hand is turned against everyone else. Yet human beings need social contact and companionship. The harsher the reality the more fantastic the solace offered by religion. It is no accident that early christianity spread amongst the slaves of the Roman empire, nor that in Africa and Asia where poverty is so harsh, we have the devout religious zealots.

The religious view sees workers as incapable of solving the problems that confront them. The consolation they offer is one beyond the grave. They believe that human beings should adapt a slavish attitude, be humble, be grateful and not attempt to abolish the ills that afflict them.

We socialists see humans as an animal species that has succeeded in adapting the natural world to meet its needs. We view with wonder and astonishment its magnificent accomplishments in the fields of science, medicine, agriculture and advanced technology. We place our faith not in gods and supernatural forces, but in the intelligence and knowledge of the working class.

The transformation of society will not be brought about by the action of gods, but by real men and women determined to end capitalism and establish socialism.

Weijagye Justus 

(Uganda)