AROUND THE WORLD
1) To establish a Technical Secretariat with maintaining between the participating organizations;
2) To make contact with political parties, associations, mass democratic organizations and personalities who share the Pan-African ideal.
Signatories to the declaration includthe Gambian Anti-Apartheid Movement; the Uganda National Lib-
(Anti-Dictatorship); Consciousness for a Democratic Alternative (Burkina Faso); Party for the Liberation of Labour (PLT-Niger); Nigerian Party for Democracy Socialism; the Regroupment of the People of Guinea; the Ivorian Popular Front; The Ivorian Workers Party; the
Social Democrats Coast); the Cameroon Popular Front; The Front of Resistance for Unity, Independence and Democracy in Mauritania; the Alliance for Democracy and Progress (ADP-Benin); And Jëf/ African Party for Democracy and Socialism (Senegal); Movement for Socialism and Unity (Senegal). The Pan-African Forum can be contacted through PADS, Gibraltar 1, Numéro 168, Dakar, Senegal. * ANTILLES
Obituary - Vincent Placoly THE continent is in a critical situation. VINCENT Placoly, well known West Indian poet Despite its enormous wealth, Africa car- and writer and militant of the Fourth International, ries a derisory weight in the affairs of the died at the beginning of January after a long ill-
On the political, as well as on the eco- Vincent was a founder and leader of the Groupe nomic and commercial levels, Africa is Révolution Socialiste (GRS), the organization of subject to the whims of foreign powers supporters of the Fourth International in Martiand multinationals. Its economy nique and Guadeloupe. He was 45 years old. ruined, weighed down by payment of the Born in Martinique, Vincent was politically and heavy foreign debt burden contracted in culturally active since his schooldays. While still a the name of the African peoples, but student, he was involved in the launching of the which has only served to enrich the bour- anti-colonialist political and cultural magazine geoisies and the ruling dictatorships.
These foreign powers and multination- Later, in Paris, Vincent was a student activist als imposed dictatorial regimes on the and became involved with dissident members of African countries at the time of indepen- the Union of Young Communists (the student dence and are now trying to hi-jack the organization of the French Communist Party). developing democratic movement. Afri- Returning to Martinique, he was instrumental in ca must remind the entire world that it the foundation of the GRS in the early 1970s. owes its current bankruptcy primarily to Now enjoying literary acclaim, he remained at the capitalism (the market). Africa's failure forefront of the activities of the GRS and was a is the failure of the political-bureaucratic candidate at the 1978 legislative elections. On bourgeoisies supported by the West January 10, more than 2,000 people accompawhich have pillaged the continent and nied Vincent's funeral procession, representing transferred colossal fortunes to Swiss and political parties, associations and institutions as other Western banks. well as ordinary people. Prominent French West
Indian writers (including Edouard Glissant and
The winds of change which are blow- Aimé Césaire) were also present. ing across the continent could be without On January 13, the GRS organized a final eveeffect if new bureaucratic regimes sucning of tribute to their comrade at which numerceed the parasitic bourgeoisies which have, until now, presided over the destiny of Africa; and if the questions of much importance to the problems of internal integration of the states as to regional or continental integration.
Only then will it be possible to go beyond the logic of the frontiers inherited from colonization and replace it with the logic of peoples and grass roots communities, which could promote an African unity which is neither bureaucratic nor authoritarian, an African unity freely consented to by the peoples, which alone is capable of promoting the new behaviand the comprehensive changes that the state of our continent and of the world demands from us.
The Pan-African Forum of progressive parties, mass democratic organizations and associations which met in Dakar on December 15, 1991, constitutes a first step in this new direction.
Consequently, the Forum decides:
Pigments in 1963.
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