[van-announce] Announcing the Formation of the Fire This Time Movement for Social Justice

[Mike Krebs]

*PLEASE DISTRIBUTE WIDELY*
*SORRY FOR ANY CROSS-POSTINGS8*

Announcing the Formation of the

Fire This Time Movement for Social Justice

Fire This Time is a politically based action organization committed to
building the social and political power of poor and working people in BC.
We believe that the only way to effectively challenge and threaten the
Government and their corporate agenda is through the organization of
masses of people in motion in workplaces and in the streets. We are
dedicated to mobilizing and unifying a broad range of poor and working
people against the Liberal Government and their anti-poor, anti-working
people legislations and policies. 

We must work together with a wide range of people and organizations to
build a movement for social justice. We undertake popular education
through forums, classes and other sorts of gatherings to educate ourselves
and the communities around Vancouver about the issues we are all faced
with. Poor people, working people and people of colour all engage in
struggle for survival on a daily basis. These many struggles are all part
of one unified political struggle. Poor and working people understand
these politics, our responsibility as organizers is to break down the
barriers that have been constructed between us by centuries of governance
by parties like the Liberals, by colonialism and by the many oppressions
that push poor and working people apart. We are committed to organizing
with working and poor people from the most attacked and exploited
communities in the lower mainland: communities of colour, immigrants,
refugees, “illegals”, low-wage workers, disabled people, queer people,
indigenous communities, unemployed people, and low-income families in the
outlying districts of Vancouver. The Fire This Time Movement for Social
Justice will defend ourselves and our communities against Government and
Business attacks by any means necessary.

Fire This Time formed out of the political split in the Anti-Poverty
Committee in December of 2002. The members of Fire This Time resigned from
the Anti-Poverty Committee to build a serious disciplined organization to
work with the diverse communities of poor and working people in Vancouver
and throughout British Columbia. It is not possible for the APC to pay
heed to its own self-criticisms. The APC had become trapped in its own
successes, pigeonholed by its activist credibility and the strain of
living up to its own reputation. The people who left the APC felt that the
only way to work genuinely with organized and unorganised working and poor
people in Vancouver was to leave the APC and begin a new organization. We
felt bound by the activist community building and isolated individual
actions that the APC prioritised and is trapped within. We started the
Fire This Time Movement for Social Justice to fight alongside the people
and communities most deeply affected by Gordon Campbell; to organize with
people whose lives are an every day struggle for survival. We will work to
expose the politics of those daily struggles and to bring these
communities together into the streets to fight back.

Four Fire This Time members were elected to the steering committee of the
APC and then resigned three days after the election with the understanding
that the APC was not capable of undertaking the work it had set before
itself. Those four resigned steering committee members and three APC
general members formed the APC Members for Restructuring and Reorganizing
and put an Action Program before the APC with the concrete necessities for
the changes needed in the group vital to the viable struggle against the
Liberal Government. The APC not only rejected this program; they refused
to with us and attacked us personally instead. These actions taken against
the group finalized our conclusion that the ultimately undemocratic
character of APC made it impossible to change the organization. Despite
our willingness to support the APC in the future we believe that they are
not currently capable of undertaking a serious struggle against this
government. Eight people (Mike Krebs, Shannon Bundock, Marwan Marwan,
Nasim Sedaghat, Ivan Drury, Ali Yerevani, Vero Methot, and Laura
Cartwright) resigned from the general membership of the APC on Tuesday
December 17th to form the Fire This Time Movement for Social Justice. 

The Liberal Government has already been in power for a year and a half and
no effective, unifying force has taken shape to oppose Campbell. Fire This
Time is committed to creating and being part of a movement to defeat the
Liberal Government and build a foundation for the long struggle ahead for
the rights and dignity of all poor and working people in the province and
around the world. We are inviting all people who share our vision of a
broad based mass movement against the Liberals to come to our first public
meeting on Monday January 27th at 6 PM at the IWA Hall in Vancouver (2859
Commercial Drive, at Commercial and 13th). For more information please
check out our website at http://www.fire-this-time.org.

We Will Win

The Fire This Time Movement for Social Justice

http://www.fire-this-time.org
Email:info at fire-this-time.org
Phone: 604-322-1764
Mail: PO Box 21607
      Vancouver BC
      V5N 3T5



______________________________________________________________________ 
Post your free ad now! http://personals.yahoo.ca