Support the hunger strikers. OF GAMBIA!
Socialist Organiser1981 1981-08-13Read it in the scan (PDF), scan page 16 →
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tant to take a stand against the government's brutal policies of repression in Ireland.
Ruthless
Duffy and other union leaders move ruthlessly against workers at Plansee, Laurence Scott and Lee Jeans who take action in defence of jobs: likewise the TUC and Labour leaders join the Tory onslaught on the republican militants who fight to rid their country of British troops.
But in Ireland the support for the hunger strikers remains solid: it is even making political advances.
Last week saw a successful lobby. of. the SDLP constituency party in Fer civil rights"
Meanwhile claims by the British government that the hunger strikers and their families are acting under threat from the republican movement were movingly and effectively refuted by a meeting of over 300 relatives of the prisoners on hunger strike and the long list who have volunteered to take the places of their dead comrades.
The meeting was unanimous in its support for the prisoners' stand.
How long must it be before the British labour movement rallies to support this courageous struggle?
We urge all readers who have not yet done so to fight within their union branches, AT THE end of July there was a left-wing coup in the Gambia. Britain's response was: send in the SAS.
The SAS intervention -probably arranged while ousted president Dawda Jawara was in London for the Royal Wedding -helped troops from neighbouring Senegal to rescue hostages and put down the rebellion. A former SAS major was already in the Gambia, serving as a military instructor.
Now the Senegalese/SAS invasion has reconquered the Gambia for Jawara, one of imperialism's most reliable allies in Africa. It has also kept the groundnut plantations, backbone of Gambia's economy, safe for Unilever.
The SAS and the Senegalese have no more right to be in the Gambia than the Americans in Vietnam, Iran, or El Salvador, the French in Zaire... or the SAS in Ireland.
But meanwhile, last week, Timothy Creasey, chief of the British Army in Northern Ireland, was discreetly transferred to Oman, where he will command the Sultan's forces in their war against left-wing rebels. The SAS has already been active in Oman, helping to keep the oil supplies from the Gulf safe for imperialism.