The Socialist Alliance’s recent Victorian state conference decided to organise a July 9 demonstration outside the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade against Australian military intervention in the Solomon Islands.
While discussing the issue with a range of progressive activists in Melbourne it became clear that most organisations had no position on the issue, or had a different position to us (such as supporting unarmed “peacekeepers” or police-only intervention). The Socialist Alliance’s unequivocal anti-imperialist stance did not go unnoticed.
Our media release about the protest was picked up immediately. We did radio interviews with 3AK, ABC and SBS, interviews with the Herald Sun and Channel 7 News, and the July 10 Australian gave over its regular “Scrapbook” column to the Alliance’s statement on the issue.
The protest was a modest size — no surprise given the current confusion in the left about how to solve the Solomon crisis and deal with Howard’s imperialist agenda — but our speak-out outside the department drew quite a few passersby into fruitful discussions with us.
All in all it was a terrific success and we strongly encourage other SA branches to follow suit with demonstrations and/or media actions on the issue. This is an important opportunity to inform people about Howard’s imperialist agenda, and to get some well-deserved publicity for the Alliance.