The meeting featured Mike Tucker, a member of the National Committee of the Communist League (CL), who had helped promote it and similar books at the Havana International Book Fair this year. Nick Fowler of the Young Socialists, Baskaran Appu of the CL in Christchurch, and Brigid Mulrennan, a volunteer in the Pathfinder printing project, also spoke.

Six Cuban internationalists who are helping develop a literacy program in this country, four workers originally from China, and members of the Cuba Friendship Society took part in the event.

Fowler said he had been part of a group studying Our History Is Still Being Written. He drew attention to the sections describing the Cuban people’s role in Angola in helping defeat the invading South African apartheid army.

The history of Chinese in Cuba runs parallel to that of Chinese immigration throughout the Americas and also into New Zealand, Appu said. “Under an 1881 law here, the number of Chinese who could arrive on one ship was limited to one for every 10 tons of ship cargo. A poll tax was also imposed on each Chinese entering the country. The tax wasn’t abolished until 1944. English-language tests were also used to keep Chinese out.”

Today, thousands of Chinese come here “and still face many barriers,” Appu said. Hailing those rallying for immigrant rights in the United States, he said, “We can be sure the same confidence is brewing among workers here as well. Such workers can draw on the lessons and experiences of the Cuban Revolution as discussed by the Chinese-Cuban generals.”

Tucker said the aim of the event was to promote use of the book “as a tool to win workers and youth to socialism, a genuine introduction to the Cuban Revolution.”

He noted that anti-Chinese discrimination is not a historic question, as shown by the reactionary attack unleashed against people of Chinese descent in the Solomon Islands April 18. “Anger was turned on the Chinese, while those who dominate the Solomons, the imperialist rulers of Australia and New Zealand, were able to use these events to justify enforcing their military and police presence, in violation of that country’s sovereignty.”

He pointed to the medical aid Cuba is providing in East Timor, the poorest country in Asia. “What did the rulers of Australia and New Zealand do after 1999 when they placed East Timor under their military occupation? The New Zealand government established a prison system and trained police and prison guards. What the Cuban example represents is a different class approach.”

After the program most of the 40 people present stayed for food, drinks, and a slide show on the Havana book fair. A collection raised NZ$204 (US$126) to assist distributing books like Our History.
 
 
Related articles:
Pathfinder books now for sale through Amazon.com  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home