On the accusations against me relating to the arrest of Ayanda Kota:

I write this statement in response to the media attention and the statements which have been released by the Unemployed People's Movement, the Democratic Left Front and Abahlali baseMjondolo on the arrest of Ayanda Kota, chairperson of the Unemployed People's Movement (UPM)

I have been accused of, wittingly or unwittingly, colluding with the police in the arrest and assault of Ayanda. I have been subjected to relentless pressure by the Jane Duncan of the DLF to unconditionally drop the charge of theft I had laid against Ayanda in August 2011. Comrades I work with in the Ubuntu Women and Community Forum were pressured to the extent that they felt intimidated and threatened by representatives of the UPM, with aim of getting them to pressurise me in turn.

I responded by repeating the request I had made to Ayanda many times - that my request for the treasured belongings he took from me should be treated with respect, and that if after having searched extensively they were still not found, he should simply and sincerely apologise to me. In my conversation with Jane following Ayanda's arrest, I offered to drop the charges immediately if she would be prepared to mediate between the two of us in a serious and fair manner. This she refused. My demand for the return of what Ayanda took from me, or an apology, was belittled as irrelevant and dismissed.

The campaign which has been drummed up against me, reaching as far as New Zealand (!), amounts to the equivalent of a public lynching of my political reputation and my name and is unworthy of people calling themselves comrades in the struggle against capitalism. It also violates a fundamental principle of natural justice which I would expect all progressive activists to recognise the principle of hearing also my side of the story.

I maintain that the truth is not as simple as the seemingly clear-cut picture of ‘privileged academic colludes with state repressive machinery to victimise heroic activist' which has been painted by the UPM and hangers-on. I want to caution those who genuinely want to build a united movement of workers and poor to maintain a critical political mind and a comradely approach to others who share the same commitment. I appeal in particular to the struggling communities of Grahamstown not to allow this issue, which has been blown completely out of proportion, to divide our important struggles for structural transformation of society.

Who I am and what I stand for

I have been presented in the media, and in the statements mentioned above, as a ‘lecturer at Rhodes University' - something completely irrelevant to the issue at hand. Beyond this, I am the chairperson of the Ubuntu Women and Community Forum, a grassroots organisation which struggles for service delivery and to raise political consciousness in the working class communities of Grahamstown East such as eThembeni, Zolani, Joza, Tanyi, Vukani and Phaphamani. I and other comrades of the UWCF have participated in joint struggles with the UPM many times - for example in the bucket system protest at the entrance of the municipal offices early last year, and in support (both financially, personally and through mass mobilisation) of Ayanda Kota following his arrest at a community protest.

My political criticism of Ayanda, which I discussed very sincerely with him on many occasions, related to what I regard as a lack of accountability and transparency on the UPM's financial matters and the complete lack of democratic control by the membership of the UPM over a leadership that has never been elected and my deep concern over what this means for the building of a strong, united mass movement. These political differences however have nothing at all to do with the personal conflict of concern at this point.

I have been involved in revolutionary politics from the age of 15 (33 years now!), starting in Argentina under the military dictatorship. In the course of our struggle, 30 000 of my comrades ‘disappeared', including many of my closest friends. I was lucky to survive to continue the struggle. This is something I shared with my beloved friend and comrade Dennis Brutus, who survived jail and torture at the hands of the apartheid regime. We got a chance to share the local and international struggle for some years; the last years of Dennis' life.

How I came to press charges against Ayanda Kota

The books which Ayanda took from me, and for which I have been ridiculed in the media and by supposed critical Marxist comrades, were gifts from Dennis during his last year in life, a year in which I spent every day by his side. I mention this to explain that the great value of these books - which could have been any other thing - to me was not monetary but as a last memory of my closest friend. Ayanda borrowed one book and took two others without my permission at the beginning of May, 2011. This was at a time when I had opened my house to him to protect him from the death threats he said he was receiving from the ANC Youth League at the time. I had explained the sentimental value of the books to Ayanda. A week later, I requested the books back and he promised to bring them but never did. For two and half months, I then tried with every means at my disposal to convince him to give the books back, or at least come to me with a sincere explanation. Comrades of the UWCF also approached him asking him to respond to me. Ayanda made me go and look for the books in various places, including his mother's house, and maintained a very arrogant and disinterested position.

In the end, I saw no other way of putting pressure on him than to approach the police, initially not to press charges. For a month, the police attempted to get Ayanda to return the books or approach me with an apology. When this failed I eventually laid a charge of theft in August. Between August and November, the police called Ayanda repeatedly to get him to make a statement, which he consistently refused. In the end, the police took the matter to court and due to Ayanda's failure to appear before the police, the prosecutor issued a warrant of arrest for Ayanda. This was put into effect on January 12, when Ayanda came to the police station. I did not at any stage demand the arrest of Ayanda. I denounce all forms of police brutality.

As a revolutionary activist, having myself been subjected to police torture and imprisonment, approaching the police was not something I took lightly, and which I would never do in a political matter, which I believe must be resolved through political engagement. But, having exhausted all other ways of engaging person to person, I believe I was in my full right to do so in this private matter. It is possible that the police used the charge of theft as a pretext for his arrest in pursuit of a different agenda - to persecute the left and social movements in particular - but had the charge not been there they could have invented any other excuse for his arrest. If this was the case it is not something for which I can be held responsible.

Abuse of trust, commitment and comradeship

When Ayanda said his life was under threat, I took him in without hesitation. But Ayanda abused my trust, comradeship and commitment to united struggle by taking what he knew was my most beloved possession without my knowledge or permission, and then refused to take responsibility for his actions. Contrary to claims by the UPM and the DLF, he never sincerely offered to return the books (as opposed to empty promises that the books would be brought), nor did he come to explain himself or apologise. Throughout this period, Ayanda was treating me with contempt and arrogance, to the extent that I felt deeply humiliated and harassed. If he was really my comrade, I believe he would have approached me with a simple apology, which would have sufficed for me.

I find it very alarming that those on the left who have attacked me appear not to realise that they are in fact committing an error similar to the one they falsely accuse me of: aiding the aims of the state in discrediting and dividing the movement that needs to be built to overthrow this system. It appears to me that the too-quick resort to this kind of frenzy against me is consistent with an unhealthy political method which prefers to elevate select individuals as martyrs or mascots as a substitute for truly democratic, accountable mass structures - which are of course much more difficult to bring into the cosy petty-bourgeois cliques which still occupy a political space far out of proportion to their significance.

I am today motivating for the withdrawal of my charge of theft against Ayanda. By doing so, I do not take responsibility for the state's actions against Ayanda, and I also maintain that he is responsible for his disrespectful, hurtful and arrogant behaviour against me. But I am not prepared to be abused as a puppet by anyone, including the capitalist state and its police.

Although I have lost all confidence in Ayanda's political integrity, and know that I am putting myself at risk of not receiving back what he stole from me, I am setting aside my personal considerations to protect the unity of the genuine movement, in particular all the members of UWCF.

I still demand that Ayanda returns the three books and issues a public apology for the theft of a fellow comrade's most treasured possessions.

I also demand an apology from those who organised the mob-like campaign against my political reputation and my personal life.

The issue between Ayanda and me is a private, not political, issue. It is very unfortunate that it has been turned into a public, politicised issue. This is my first and last statement on this matter.

I am convinced that most sincere activists in Grahamstown, South Africa and the rest of the world will be able to see beyond the clique mentality of the academic left circles.

I wish to end with a poem which Dennis Brutus dedicated to me in appreciation of my political integrity and unconditional friendship:

Claudia /DB - February 2009:

Guernica, Shatila, Sharpville, Gaza

Horror is all around us:
Death, destruction, mashed corpses,
It is all around us; commonplace
Astonishing, humanity erupts
Such virulent excess against humanity
There is no limit to our ingenuity
In the service of torture carnage;
Astonishingly, too, we have levels
Of pity, mercy, goodness;
Devices to repair injury;
Miraculously, somewhere, we have compassion

Issued by Claudia Martinez-Mullen, January 17 2012

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