AROUND THE WORLD
### SENEGAL
HAVING brutally aggravated the living conditiond of the population, the devaluation of the CFA franc has led to popular protest in a number of countries. In Gabon, the opposition to the Bongo regime and the trade union movement have called for a general strike. In Senegal, the opposition organised a rally for 16 February.
In both cases, the government responded with violence. There were several deaths in Libreville, the Gabonese capital, and bloody confrontations in Dakar, where several people were killed, including policemen. In both cases, opposition forces have denounced government provocations, the restricting of trade union rights and the right to demonstrate, and its confrontational approach.
In Senegal, the Abdou Diouf government has once again hit out against opposition leaders. It has arrested and charged several deputies, including Abdoulaye Wade - leader of the liberal Senegalese Democratic Party (PDS) - and Landing Savané, leader of the African Party for Democracy and Socialism (PADS).
### Heavy sentences
Without even lifting these deputies' parliamentary immunity, the government is trying to hold these two responsible for the violence that it orchestrated itself. There could be heavy sentences, and aim above all to distance the two deputies from the Assembly and the platform it offers to their parties.
This never-ending harassment of the political and trade union opposition reduces to an empty shell the constitutional freedoms the country boasts. Overcome by popular discontent, undermined by the economic crisis, the government of Senegal owes its survival to its various friends in Paris, in the liberal right-wing as in the Socialist Party, who cover for it and support it.
International solidarity is beginning to be organised for Landing Savané and all political prisoners. Appeals should be sent to: Président de la République du Sénégal, avenue Roume, Dakar, Sénégal.
Faxes to: (221) 25 80 54. *
Out now!
İNTERNATIANAL
MARXISTREVIEW
No. 15
Spring 1994
£2.50/$5
Capitalism's new economic order —
Restructuring the labour process
• Maxime Durand introduces the issue with the political economy of
"Lean Production"
• Claude Gabriel on the European Union and economic "globalisation"
• Keith Mann explores class struggle, skill and the productive process today
• Tony Richardson and Andy Kilmister describe the British experience of New
Management Techniques
• and Eugenio Preo documents industrial transformation and the employers' offensive in Italy
Avialable from IMR/PECI, BP 85, 75522 Paris, CEDEX 11, France.
This edition of International Marxist Review will be the last in its current format. A discussion has begun, the aim of which will be to decide on a better format for the presentation of the Fourth International's theoretical views. Details will be published here in International Viewpoint. O
Choi II-Bung
The South Korean socialist publisher, Choi Il-Bung, has been released by the government after serving just over a year in gaol.
He was imprisoned for publishing books by a number of diverse socialist authors (see International
Viewpoint, no. 243, March 1993).
Choi had earlier been forced into a hunger strike to protest against the authorities withholding his mail. Amnesty Interational had adopted him as a prisoner of conscience.
However, his release on parole is only a partial amnesty and he continues to remain under tight surveilance and deprived of any civil rights until May 1998
We hope to report further details when they are available. ©
36
International Viewpoint #254 March 1994