Today our people celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the brutal assassination  of the late Secretary General of the South African Communist Party, Cde Chris Thembisile Hani. It was on this fateful day of the 10th of April 1993 that a bullet from the hand of an imperialist sponsored mercenary robbed our people this most finest and illustrious leader of the South African working class movement.

We lower the banner of our Red flag in honour and memory of this legendary revolutionary freedom fighter and the leader of our national democratic revolution, whose image and tenacity have become the symbol of courage to the worldwide struggles led by our people against imperialism and colonial domination. The brutal assassination of our late Secretary General has germinated growing seeds of revolutionary ideas planted amongst our people, to take forward the struggles for the building of socialism as the future for humanity.

He led the South African working class into understanding that the main task of the South African national democratic revolution is the conquest of political and economic power. He led them understand the fundamental question that unity and cohesion is the only precondition for the victory of the struggles of our people against imperialism and colonialism.

He led them understand that theory and practice is the prelude for the success of our national liberation struggles and our ultimate goal for the establishment of the future socialist republic. He led them understand the role of the South African Communist party as the vanguard party of the working class.

We celebrate the life of a revolutionary leader of our people who contributed immensely to advance the noble cause of our struggles against colonialism of a special type.  His was an entire life of an indomitable contribution to cause of the struggles of the working people of the world against imperialism and colonialism. He occupied the forefront trenches of our struggles for the freedom and dignity of the people of our country and the world against oppression and exploitation. 

He was first and foremost the most humbled servant of the people, a leader of our national liberation movement, a communist, trade unionist, an internationalist, the most organic intellectual of our times, and an extraordinary and magnificent revolutionary fighter and Commander of our glorious army of our people, Mkhonto we Ziswe. He has proven himself to be a rare and all round revolutionary, capable of taking forward the tasks of our national democratic revolution.

We pay tribute to the living memories of this heroic leader few days after our people and world celebrated the hundred years anniversary of the birth of our national liberation movement, the African National Congress.

We therefore dedicate this glorious chapter of the centenary celebrations and an unbroken record of heroic struggles led by our glorious movement, in memory of this revolutionary leader of the working class. History will always remember his courageous exemplary leadership and contribution during the most difficult period of our struggles for the liberation of the oppressed people of our country.

We pay tribute to the life and times of our leader Cde Chris Hani forty five years after the historic battle of Wankie and Spolilo. It was during this epic battle in the calendar of our history books, which he himself led as its commissar,  that the first ever combined military operation by Mkhonto we Ziswe and Zipra revolutionary forces unleashed a decisive defeat against the most powerful apartheid regime in Southern Africa.

We refer ourselves to the memories of this revolutionary fighter to the historic battle of Wankie and Spolilo, for the significant historic reason that it was the first ever military confrontations between our revolutionary forces he led and the forces of the enemy of our people, that paved way for the advance of our revolutionary forces and therefore heralded a new era of intensified struggles that led to the liberation of the Southern African region.

We take courage from the exemplary life of this leader of our Communist party twenty five years after the decisive victory of working class solidarity and internationalism by our revolutionary forces against Apartheid regime during the historic battle of Cuito Cuanavale.

It was during the decisive battle that the combined revolutionary forces of the Cuban revolution, MPLA, SWAPO, and the ANC defeated the most sophisticated and powerful racist regime that saw the independence of Namibia and subsequently the democratic state of the Republic of South Africa. The battle of Cuito Cuanavale was the end and the beginning of a new era of struggles in our region and the whole continent.

We celebrate the heroic life of the leader of our national liberation movement during the most important year when the people of our country are commemorating the centenary of the Native Land Act of 1913. 

It was the proclamation of this act by the Union of South Africa that saw systematic segregation and dispossession of the vast majority of the people of our country from the land of their birth. The 1913 Native Land Act was a cornerstone for the exclusion of the black people in general and the african people in particular from the socio economic mainstream of our country.

We salute this heroic leader of our people and the late Secretary General of our party, during the most important year in the calendar of the history of our liberation struggles, when the South African working class will be celebrating the 92nd anniversary of the birth of our vanguard party, the South African Communist party. 

The Communist party has throughout the years became the backbone of the struggles of our people for the liberation of our country. It was through the organic alliance with the party that our people grasped the dialectical relationship and the national and class character of our national democratic revolution. The vanguard party is the most trusted allied of our people in their struggles against imperialism and neo colonialism.

We celebrate the life of the late Secretary General of the South African Communist party at the most critical conjuncture of the international balance of forces. The collapse of the Soviet block and the subsequent communists states in the Eastern Europe had an unprecedented adverse effect on the struggles of the international working class movement. 

The sudden turn of epic events of the collapse of the world communist movement, ushered in a new era of the world balance of forces dominated by a hostile and aggressive unipolar world, led by imperialism and international monopoly capital. This new era of the world dominated by rampant forces of capitalism increased the levels of poverty, disease and underdevelopment in the whole world. It was indeed a major setback to the international struggles of the working class movement.

His personal warmth, humility and charm will forever glimpse the memories of the millions of the people of the world. We have lost a great revolutionary leader and an indomitable fighter whose contribution to the struggles of our people will remain immeasurable. In his memory we will take forward the banner of our party to advance the cause of the struggles of the working class into the future.

Phatse Justice Piitso is the former Ambassador to the republic of Cuba and the former provincial secretary of the SACP writing this article on his personal capacity.

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