privatization rush slows

Patrick Bond pbond at wn.apc.org
Sun Nov 25 01:56:10 PST 2001


----- Original Message ----- From: "Alexandre Fenelon" <afenelon at zaz.com.br>
> -The trouble with privatization is that it can be slowed but not
> -stopped. It seems that to sell an enterprise is easier than
> -nationalize it.....

Last week in South Africa, the ANC's largest privatisation -- a 20% share in South African Airways bought a couple of years ago by SwissAir (bankrupt after 9/11) -- was renationalised. If it wasn't so unwieldy, we'd be talking lots more about "remunicipalisation" of the many screwed-up water, rubbish and electricity privatisations that have been foolishly sold off by the late-apartheid and ANC regimes... (http://www.queensu.ca/msp )

But aside from internal capitalist contradictions and academic critiques, class struggle continues. As that Washington Post article demonstrated, the masses in the streets of Soweto are doing a very very good job at making the parastatal service suppliers as unattractive as possible for future privatisers. I gather they featured on CNN last week too, as well as being the subject of a national SA Broadcasting Corporation special investigation the week before.



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