From The Spark 24 August 2005. Note that prior to 2006 the organisation currently known as the Workers Party was called the Anti-Capitalist Alliance (ACA).
In this election the only party which will be challenging the capitalists across the country will be the Anti-Capitalist Alliance. Moreover, our candidates don’t just pop up at election time. They are involved in campaigning all year round for the rights of workers and against all forms of oppression and discrimination.
The five-point platform of the ACA forms the basis of our election campaign. (See below candidates list). These are the core ideas on which we want to build a new political movement. In addition, we will be challenging the propaganda of the capitalist parties, taking up immediate issues which confront workers and generally promoting the idea that we need to get rid of capitalism and establish a working people’s republic.
Workers desperately need a political movement of our own. A movement which puts our interests first because it is a movement by, for and of us. Since the system we live under, capitalism, is based on our exploitation, such a movement needs to be explicitly anti-capitalist. It needs to aim for the overthrow of the capitalist system and its replacement by a new truly socialist society, based on organising production to meet the human needs of all rather than private profit for a super-rich few.
That’s the kind of movement the Anti-Capitalist Alliance is trying to build from one end of New Zealand to the other, especially in workplaces and working class communities. One part of building such a movement is running in elections, to challenge the parties which defend and manage exploitation and oppression and to get our ideas out to the widest possible audience.
The Anti-Capitalist Alliance Candidates
Auckland ph 0211867450
Mangere Mark Muller —Storeman, delegate & executive member National Distribution Union
Mt Albert Daphna Whitmore —Nurse, delegate NZ Nurses Organisation
Hamilton ph 8565412
Hamilton East– Jared Phillips—Sessional Assistant (Tutor), Association University Staff member
Wellington ph 0274918749
Wellington Central Stephen Hay—,VUWSA campaigns coordinator, Unite union volunteer organiser
Mana Jasmine Freemantle—tutor, Volunteer organiser for Unite union
Christchurch ph 021443948
Christchurch East Paul Hopkinson—Teacher, member PPTA
Wigram Sam Kingi—Factory Worker, Unite union volunteer organiser
Christchurch Central Byron Clark—Laid-off factory worker, Unite union volunteer organiser
