Where will the “Peace Process” lead us? Lessons from Palestine and Africa

Republican leaders have made it very easy to decide whether their “peace process” will lead to justice and freedom, and therefore whether we should support it. They have pointed to South Africa and Palestine as examples of how peace can be successfully brought about, so if we look at these countries we can see the truth.

### SOUTH AFRICA

In South Africa winning the vote for Black people was a great victory, but nationalists in Lreland know that being able to vote doesn't guarantee democracy. The Aprilelections inSouth Africa were clearly rigged to prevent the ANC from getting the majority required to change the constitution.

The ANC supported this rigging in order to help justify their compromise with the hated Apartheid regime. The new constitution clearly prevents majority rule and enshrines a white veto over any real change. This is the important point. Black people supported the ANC because they wanted real change in their wretched conditions. The compromises of the ANC have left all the levers of political and economic power in the hands of the mainly white capitalist class, ensuring that their will be no end to the massive unemployment and poverty suffered by black people.

The only group to benefit is a rising black middle class. ANC MP's earn twelve times the salary of an average black worker. In Ireland, after 25 years of struggle, it is mainly the growing Catholic middle and business class which has gained.

The new ANC government has promised to respect the wishes of the International Monetary fund and other imperialist bodies. It has even taken the bizarre step of re-joining the commonwealth and linking itself politically to the feudal institutions of the British monarscale of the task and the second its nature, the third gives us hope that it can be achieved. British rule in the North will remain unstable even if republicans end armed activity and accept the politics, if not the letter, of the Downing street declaration. This is because the greatest victory of the 25 years of struggle - the smashing of Stormont - is very far from being reversed.

The British have found it necessary to build up the Catholic middle class in the North and draft in Dublin to support a partition solution. It didn’t need these props 25 years ago and the need for them today makes it harder to continue its reliance on unionism, which recognises only its own sectarianism as the basis for a solution.

Creating a stable compound out of this mixture, while many nationalist workers remain unreconciled to British rule is not a recipe for stability. There is little chance of a return to the calm of the early 1960's.

In the 26 counties the working class, despite emigration and unemployment, is not totally demoralised and retains the capacity for struggle.

The recent European elections, with increased votes for the Greens and the reduction of the Fianna Fail vote to 20% in the capital. demonstrated the fragility of the existing political system.

The republican movement, after 25 years of struggle, is about to commit political suicide. British imperialism and Irish capitalism stand with draggers drawn above the body but they too are weakened and confused without a really credible strategy for the pacification of Ireland. The weapon to defeat them, the Lrish working class, is already in motion to defend itself. The task today is to reorganise and build the independent programme and self-organisation of that class