Dear Comrades, Revolutionary greetings and solidarity to you all.
We write to you on the occassion of the Socialist Party’s attainment of one year of legal existence; having been registered on 16th October last year
It is with tremendous revolutionary joy that we write to congratulate you on the achievements attained over the past 12 months; but also to draw lessons from the challenges faced during the same period. Ours is a struggle waged under a very hostile environment with a diminishing democratic space. However, we also notice how your individual and collective resolve to push for a revolutionary outcome for the Zambian working masses grows stronger each day.
Being a year old, your Party is relatively new. The strengthening of its ideological direction and buidling of grassroots structures are crucial in its sustained growth. These two tasks therefore constitute the most urgent revolutionary assignments for each one of us:
(I) Let us look at the ideological direction in some detail. It is your duty and responsibility to read, understand and interpret your Party constitution, JEP document plus the script on Introduction to Socialism and Marxism. This is in addition to reading all your notes from the 8-hour sessions. You are also expected to acquaint yourself with the basics of the classical literature from Marx, Lenin and many other socialist writers.
(II) The buiding of branches is and will reamanin an imporatnt task. Please read the the Memo on Branch Formation before embarking on the formation of branches. The initial target is for you to set up at least a branch around each poling station. Allow the branches sometime to function before holding a comgress to form a Ward. We envisage the formation of several Branches in the areas with intesive political education training especially during the period from December to February. March to April should see the elections of Constituency Committees conducted by the Wards. Provincial Committees will start emerging around May. This will then take us to the National Congress where the central Committee will be elected by September 2019. Yours is a Party being built from the grassroots to the top – not the other way round. From October 2019, our voices will be heard and our membership will be seen across all the corners of Zambia. This approach towards Party building is also about being honest with ourselves that being a new party, we need time to prepare adequately. We are strategically building a party for the Zambian workers and other working masses. One that they will organise and lead for generations to come.These two priority assignments are enormous. They require the highest level of revolutionary commitment from each one of us. They require a lot of humility to learn from each other and from the masses we daily interact with. They require voluntary work for a just, equaitable and
peaceful Zambia. What other political parties achieve with stolen money and ill-begotten wealth, you will achieve with commitment and the revolutionary passion for the Zambian
people. We are therefore constructing a socialist political party never seen before in the history of post-independence Zambia. We are all proud learners and teachers at the same time.
After the official launch in March this year, our visibility skyrocketed. However, we had the Cuban Ambassador being withdrawn. Some of our visitors were detained at the airport and not allowed entry into the country. Not only that, we had some of our activities disturbed. We were trying to set up branches and train our people. Those meetings were raided, people were arrested and harassed. We could not continue on that path. We needed the space to train our members and set up branches.
However, your hard work is finally paying off. Over the past five weeks, we have picked up encouraging pace – especially around Lusaka and the Copperbelt with regard to the formation of branches. This presents us with a concerete platform for enhancing visibility. We will build on this progress to communicate more directly to the Zambian massess that SP and its Presidential candidate, Comrade Fred M’membe, is the only alternative for a better Zambia. We envisage more visibity in this regard from now on.
Comrades, we look forward to greater revolutionary strides over the next 12 months. The Zambian massess are increasingly seeing SP and the prospects for socialism as the only way out of capitalist desitution and poverty. It is for you to work towards winning the 2021 elections and attaining JUSTICE, EQUITY and PEACE for our homeland.
Written by By: Comrade Cosmas Musumali/On Behalf of the Politburo