~ World

Jackson campaign a
‘People’s Alternative’

By WENDY JOHNSTONE
urprise at Jesse Jackson’s showing in
the U.S. primary race has been almost uni-
versal,

For right-wing Reagan Republicans who
have dominated the political scene for seven
years, a Black American running on a peace
and justice program and winning support
from all colours of the rainbow is the stuff of
their worst nightmares.

For conservative Democrats, the wide
attraction of Jackson’s program represents
a strong challenge to their goal of molding
the Democratic Party into a Republican
look-alike for the 1988 campaign.

_ The U.S. media’s surprise, however, is a
little hard to take, given their cynical and
Tacist manipulation of election coverage.
After virtually ignoring Jackson’s cam-
paign until the southern primaries, the
media recovered enough to start playing
Tacist “hardball” with Jackson. Skirting his
Program and playing on his “unelectabil-
ity,” the media is digging deep down to
discredit Jackson’s candidacy and impact.

The surprise of progressives has a differ-
ent character. After seven years of hard
Struggles and numerous obstacles, many
Progressives had adjusted their predictions
to a more realistic long-term view. Jack-
son’s showing so far — tripling and quad-
rupling his 1984 results — is beyond
virtually every expectation, providing some
welcome re-invigoration for all progressive
movements.

‘What has happened since 1984 to explain
Jackson’s campaign?

Reaganism’s all-sided assault on working
America is the predominant factor. While
most backing for Jackson’s 1984 campaign
came from Black voters, support has now
spread among Latinos, white workers,
white liberals and to other special interest
sectors,

Jackson’s program presents a clear Peo-
ple’s Alternative — introducing something
clearly beyond the usual Tweedledee and
Tweedledum of U.S. elections. At home he
focuses on the “economic common ground”
shared by workers and farmers of all
colours. He stresses job creation and social
Programs such as a national health care
program, a Worker’s Bill of Rights and the
creation of affordable housing.

He has gone out of his way to associate
with many different sectors, from address-
ing farmers’ concerns and the plight of mil-
lions of homeless to being the only
candidate to attend the 1987 march on
Washington for gay and lesbian rights.

Jackson’s foreign policy emphasizes
peace and non-intervention and calls for no
contra aid, a withdrawal of U.S. backing for
repressive regimes, greater efforts toward
disarmament and a homeland for the Pales-
tinian people.

The Rainbow Coalition has been busy
since 1984 consolidating support in the
Black community to - virtual unanimity,
reaching out to “other stripes in the rain-
bow,” not simply toward the 1988 presiden-
tial race, but with the aim of building a
broad people’s coalition inside and outside
the electoral framework.

Other factors have aided the process: the
1988 roster of Democratic hopefuls is par-
ticularly anemic, with no candidate to date,
unlike 1984, receiving official endorsement
from key organizations like the AFL-CIO
or the National Organization of Women.
This has favoured support for Jackson
among many unions and has led to an over-
all situation where Jackson’s campaign has
_ become the focus for virtually all progres-

sive sectors of American society in political
motion against Reaganism. The Commu-
nist Party, for example, for the first time in
many years, will not contest the presidential
ticket.

This political realignment is what is fun-
damental about this election campaign,
whether or not Jackson wins the Demo-

éAfter virtually ignoring Jackson’s
campaign until the southern
primaries, the media recovered
enough to start playing racist
hardball.s

cratic nomination.

In the April 19 New York primary, Jack-
son’s support was expected to top 30. per
cent, keeping his campaign in high gear.
Some polls have shown a Dukakis-Jackson
ticket could beat the Republicans, but
whether Democratic Party brass can over-
come their conservative and racist hesita-

tions is the $64 question.

But even if Jackson is not a candidate, the
momentum and inspiration the Rainbow
Coalition campaign has injected into U.S.
politics and the important steps taken
toward building a people’s coalition are
enduring accomplishments that will affect
the American political profile from now on.

Toxic dumping in Caribbean fought

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados — Environ-
mental groups in the islands are putting
pressure on administrations to stop the
practice of North American firms trying to
dump garbage and toxic waste in the Carib-
bean. Incidents include the dumping of sev-
eral tons of municipal garbage from
Philadelphia at a dockside in a Haitian port.

Fortunately, opposition from a growing
regional ecological movement has led to the
turning away of at least one barge loaded
with similar waste from several Caribbean
ports.

Appeals from environmental groups like
the Barbados-based Caribbean Conserva-
tion Association (CCA) received added sig-
nificance late last year when news broke
that some 3,000 tonnes of a 13,000-tonne
cargo of waste from Philadelphia had been
unceremoniously thrown onto the docks in
the Haitian port of Genaives from the
Liberian-flagged freighter Khian Sea. Before
authorities could react, the ship had high-
tailed it out of port.

Earlier, a similar shipment of garbage,
this time in a barge towed by a tug, found
doors shut at several regional ports, includ-
ing Haiti.

Speaking to the media here, CCA presi-
dent Yves Renard said regional govern-
ments need to be wary of North American
corporations finding other ways to bring
waste into the islands, pointing out that
there have been instances of local manufac-
turers getting requests that chemical waste
from overseas be “recycled” for inclusion

into their products.

In Jamaica, for example, an environmen-
tal body disclosed it had turned thumbs
down on a request by a Jamaican busi-
nessman to use such waste at his paint fac-
tory.

However, in Guyana, a group of Califor-
nia businessmen were more successful. The
Desmond Hoyte government has gone into
partnership with two California firms, Pott
Industries and Teixeira Farms Interna-
tional, to import what is described as “liq-

uid industrial by-products.” The idea is to
recycle chemical waste into fuel which could
be sold to the problem-plagued Guyana
Electricity Corporation, as well as used for
making cement and asphalt.

Opposition groups, like the People’s
Progressive Party and the Working People’s
Alliance, have condemned the move, argu-
ing the country’s fragile ecology will suffer.

Ecologists like Renard also point to the
fact that island ecologies, already harmed
by uncontrolled build-up of hotels and
industrial plants in the 1960s and 1970s
along the coasts, can only incur more dam-

From the
Caribbean

Norman Faria

age from the influx of new waste into the
Caribbean.

In an interview with Eastern Caribbean
News, Dr. Naresh Singh of the Caribbean
Environmental Health Institute, a CARI-
COM body doing research and monitoring,
warned that “the small islands support very
fragile ecosystems and, in the long term, the
damage can and will be bad enough to
outweigh whatever economic benefits may
arise from the deals being offered to
governments.” And, he added: ““We are not
being told the exact composition of the
waste and, even if told, we don’t have the
necessary equipment to measure the effect
or potential effect on citizens’ health or the
environment.”

Meanwhile, the related question of visits
to regional ports by nuclear-powered and
armed warships has been raised by very few
ecological groups. Although the issue is
being raised by North American groups and
action taken by such Pacific area adminis-
trations as in the Solomon Islands and New
Zealand, nuclear-armed vessels roam at will
in ports throughout the Caribbean.

Two groups which have taken a stand are
the Puerto Rican-based Caribbean Project
for Justice and Peace and the Barbados
branch of the National Union of Seamen.

“Not only do the visits of such ships raise
the question of health problems for island-
ers,” the NUS secretary told the Tribune.
“they also go against the spirit of the
movement to make the Caribbean a zone of
peace.”

Pacific Tribune, April 20. 1988 « 9

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