RIP Baby Jake Matlala

South Africa lost another hero with the death of Madela's favourite boxer the great Baby Jake Matlala. A fine tribute from Steve Bunce in The Independent.
http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/general/others/steve-bunce-as-nelson-mandelas-favourite-fighter-baby-jake-matlala-who-also-died-last-week-gave-hope-to-postapartheid-south-africa-8999011.html

Cops off campus - and take the religious nutters with you.

Students are revolting, but they are not revolting half as much as they should be. Over the past couple of days two important protests have taken place. Today London students marched against police presence on campus, the court injunction against student protest on campus and the intimidatory tactics of the Met. All well and good. "The pensioners support the students!" and so on.  But perhaps more important, but more difficult for the left to cope with, was yesterday's protest against university authorities rolling over and allowing gender segregated meetings on university property. Such is the fear of being perceived as "racist" or "Islamophobic" that many on the left will turn a blind eye to this attack on everything that might be termed progressive, let alone libertarian socialist. Gender segregation is wrong and if saying that offends Islam then so be it. But don't take any notice of me. What do I know? You might however listen to these good folk.
Also -
https://secure.avaaz.org/en/petition/Universities_UK_Rescind_endorsement_of_sex_segregation_at_UK_Universities/

Mandela.

Mandela has gone. That he was a good man, and probably a great one, seems beyond dispute and humanity will be the poorer for his departing. Now may not be the time to draw attention to the failings of the ANC and the continuing gross economic inequality of South Africa but one thing is for sure. During the next few days, alongside the very genuine grieving and sense of loss,  there will also be an unprecedented outpouring of hypocrisy and nowhere more so than in this country. Flowery tributes for the man will be mouthed by those who felt that apartheid was the natural order of things and that South Africa would have been a better place had Mandela and his comrades hanged. Others will praise Mandela and heap scorn on the Afrikaners safe in the knowledge that for the  wealthy, ANC South Africa is open for business as usual. As Mandela's old comrade Denis Goldberg was quick to point out this morning, the gains for the South African working class have been minimal. Meanwhile, the North London Guardian reading middle class will bow their heads, hum Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrica and move heaven and earth to ensure that their kids don't have to go to a school with a large proportion of black pupils. It is for all of that, as well as for the loss of Mandela, that I grieve.

Worst flood threat for sixty years.

In the early hours of tomorrow morning the East Coast and Thames Estuary may experience the worst tidal surge since the devastating floods of January 1953. Part of the problem then was the lack of preparedness and adequate communication. Times have changed and flood defence today bears no comparison to that night when as an excited young boy I was evacuated from Canvey Island. The conditions are the same; a spring tide, low atmospheric pressure and a Northerly gale combining to force a "hump" of water down into the bottleneck the Southern North Sea. But with modern communications and a far better understanding of how to deal with this kind of emergency, we could, with a bit of luck come through this with no loss of life at all. A stark contrast to the three hundred lives lost that one night in 1953. Learn more about those floods here.

Class War election statement of intent.

Reblogged from Ian Bone.
There is a class war waging and we are losing it. The rich are getting richer and the gilded elite who have ruled us since Norman times remain in power and dominate land ownership just as they did when they first robbed it. We live in a feudal society dominated by an oligarchy of privately and Oxbridge educated toffs who run not just the government, banks, diplomacy but the media, music. comedy and even the opposition. We see no difference between any of the parties – we oppose Tristram Hunt with the same venom we hate Zac Goldsmith. . We don’t want to kick the tories out to replace them with Labour or any variety of failed Trots. We don’t want to kick them out at all – we want to kick them in! Started in 1982 CLASS WAR was first a combative, funny, populist anarchist newspaper then mutated into a similar political organisation. We are proud of our past. But 30 years later the same approaches do not work. Endless photos of overseas riots and balaclaved anarchists bring no movement here. The same old same old is getting us nowhere. Time to think and do the unthinkable, to cross the Rubicon.

We are standing Class War candidates in the general election on May 7th 2015. We are doing this to launch a furious and co-ordinated political offensive against the ruling class with the opportunity an election gives us to talk politics to our class. We in no way see the election as an alternative to direct action. By the brick and the ballot.

We are not talking community politics here. It’s too late for a patient slowbuild like the IWCA. The ruling class have us by the throat -they need a short sharp kick in the bollocks. Our election campaign will use any means necessary. we won’t be ushered away by PR minders – we will make ourselves central to the campaign in a funny, rumbustious combative and imaginative way. We will be on the streets and in their faces.

Comrades whatever our yesterdays you are welcome now. join in. reject cynicism. have fun.

Why Oh why can't we be more Korean?

Why are we so crap? Our national football team is a waste of space, cricket wise we are being shafted by the Aussies and now we find that our kids are worse than useless when it comes to very hard long division. A new OECD ( Yes, I thought it meant not being able to stop cleaning the karsi as well but apparently it's something to do with economic development.) report just released shows UK kids come well down the international league table for exam results. Shanghai is world leader but the Far East in general shows a steely determination for their kids to obtain top marks. South Korean children are slaving away from early morning until late at night and the exam results are impressive as is the teenage suicide rate - highest in the world I believe. It can only be a matter hours before The Alien Gove and his grim crew start calling for British education to be modelled more along Korean lines. Fewer teenage pregnancies and more teenage suicides is clearly the way to go if we wish to keep a seat at the top table.To refer to the likes of Gove as a wanker really is to do an injustice to that most benign of pastimes.
For an interesting but very different look at education I recommend Adam Ramsay's article in the current issue of Strike on the reality (and benefit) of public school. Ramsay points out that, " There is a bizarre belief held by many that success in Britain correlates to intelligence and hard work. This is a very middle class concept. What the upper class understand is that success stems from two things: community and the appearance of confidence."   The trick of course is to make all of that available to everyone and not just a privileged elite.

Time For Outrage.

Someone gave me a copy of Stephane Hessel's little pamphlet. It escaped me when it was first published but is credited with being a prime motivator for the Occupy Movement. Hessler was 93 when he wrote this and had had what you might call a full life. A true hero of the Resistance he twice escaped from the Nazis having endured torture and the dreadful conditions of Buchenwald.  After the war Hessel was involved in the drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and throughout his long life remained an outspoken defender of the oppressed. What surprised me about Time For Outrage was not that this old fighter was able to so eloquently equate today's anti-capitalism with the struggles of the Resistance or that Hessel in his advanced years could still proclaim , "To create is to resist - To resist is to create". No, what amazes me is that this little pamphlet should have topped the bestseller list in France. I fear that a UK equivalent would have sold a couple of hundred with the rest of the print run gathering dust in Houseman's. C'est la vie.