The Logic of the choice
Excerpts from Enhancing the People's Power

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Enhancing the People's Power

President Ahmed Sekou Toure

Secretary-General of the Party-State

Supreme Leader of the Revolution

In every human society, power is exercised with the aim of:

• preserving and increasing the gains
• preserving a given discipline
• ensuring the observance of the hierarchy and the principles of behaviour binding the social group concerned.
• ensuring the development of the means for the satisfaction of the collective and individual needs in accordance with the nature of the regime.

Power belongs either to one man (chief, king, emperor) or to a group of men (fetish, priests, traders, industrialists, plantation owners, soldiers, bankers, etc.) or to the People as a whole.

Every power or authority is oriented according to the social basis of power, that is, those who are assuming and exercising it: the aim of power always corresponds to the interests of those who are holding it.

Thus, the king will defend his own interests, against his subjects. Likewise, the group of traders, the group of industrialist, of plantation owners, etc., detaining power in a country, will exercise it for the benefit of the class or social stratum to which it belongs.

At this level, power is not popular and the democracy which may be tolerated in the framework of personal, feudal power, or the power of bourgeoisie is a partial democracy, for men may act freely in the framework of the edifice in which they are held, provided they do not modify the dimensions of the edifice, nor the arrangements of the component elements of that edifice, in other words, liberty, dignity are limited by the interests of those who are holding and exercising power.

The People of guinea, by definitely destroying the colonial regime, by eliminating the feudal system once for all, have at once rejected all forms of personal power, all forms of bourgeois power, as well as every limitation to their freedom and to their will for progress.

That is why the P.D.G., which is their National Party, has organised the popular, democratic power, so that every man, every woman, every citizen, regardless of race, religion, wealth or standard of education, etc. could feel absolutely equal, as stipulated by the Koran. Only then could all the citizens of the Nation, in the framework of all the objectives popular democracy, freely partake in the definition of all the objectives of evolution of the Nation, the Region, the District or the village.

The distinction between intellectuals and non-intellectuals, between the haves and haves nots, the various ethnical groups have all been eliminated in Guinea in favour of the assertion of equality and freedom for all and sundry.

That is the People’s power. Who must exercise that power in Guinea? The people, and the People only.

That power must be exercised by the People, but how should they exercise it?

The people, united at the village or quarter level, hold a public Assembly every week in order to freely discuss and democratically decide of the solution or solutions to the problem examined in common.

Here, all citizens are placed in relations of equality and co-operation enabling everyone, through his intelligence, his experience and his positive willingness to contribute to the safeguard of the collective values, of the collective assets and of the development of the Guinean society at all levels.

Moreover, the youth, the women and the workers are organised on a sectorial basis so that the problems peculiar to each of them may be solved according to their collective will and in an ever democratic manner.

It is popular power which gives to a village, a District, an administrative Region or the Nation as a whole, its character of a social, political, economic, cultural unity and confers on it the essential attributes of the constant reinforcement and of the peaceful evolution of its members.

In Guinea, the People’s power is a reality; for only the People select at all levels of their organisation those men or women who have the mandate to speak on their behalf, to manage their collective assets and t guide their action in view of a happy future.

The means at the disposal of the people are judiciously distributed to enable every village to rationally use part of these means in view of exploiting the economic potentials at hand. This political reality raises up in Africa and in the world the admiration of all Peoples and constitutes the core of the pride of the Guinean henceforth considered in Africa, in Europe, Asia and in America as an emancipated citizen, free from all forms of slavery, indignity and irresponsibility.

At present, thousands of farming tractors, stubbing-machines, harvesters, shellers, decorticating machines, tens of thousands of ploughs and harrows, hundreds of thousands of light farming implements are put at the disposal of the P.R.L. in view of increasing the quantity and quality of their production.

Doesn’t this reality depict genuine progress in the peasants’ mode of living, and doesn’t it facilitate productive labour itself?

The Guinean popular regime, being faithful to the People, the mouth-piece of the will and the advocate of the present and future gains of the people works constantly for the reinforcement of the bases of popular progress and the constant qualification of the ideological, abilities of the People who, every year, acquire new means of labour from the Central Authority. 

But it is not only a matter of producing, or even of producing in large quantities, what has been produced must also and above all benefit the producer himself. That is why, the P.R. L. has been endowed with various Local Services or Deparments, allowing the products resulting form the Peoples’s efforts to be sold by the P.R.L. itself and to its exclusive advantage. This is what notably justified the role of the Local Economic Department in charge of the marketing of products with state funds put at its disposal by the national Bank. This Local Department is equally in charge of ensuring the sale of part of the same products to the villagers for their consumption and another portion to the Regional Trading Office which is the Region’s property and the profits of which are every year invested on behalf of the same producer.

Men may forget about the past, they may even forget their sufferings, the difficulties they experienced, but as for a revolutionary, he knows perfectly that the present always emerges from the past, and that the present will give way to the future.

Man must choose the objectives to be pursued and materialised.

Likewise, the People must choose their objectives and work courageously and resolutely towards their perfect realisation.

The popular power did well in liberating the People, in liberating the peasant, the fisherman, in enabling the men and women in the countryside, those constituting 80% of our society, to be organised and to manage their own affairs, to rid themselves of the exploitation of the category of citizens who live on speculations and smuggling.

Obviously, the People did well in seizing and assuming power, in working for themselves exclusively, in endowing themselves with a party which has organised them into a State which in turn has endowed them with modern means of production. Only the lunatics, the criminals, the emulators of satan may argue in a different way.

That means that the People’s power always has an orientation. Therefore, it cannot be a People’s power, while using feudal and bourgeois methods.

The bad leader of a Local Revolutionary Power (P.R.L.) plays the same role as the Iman of a Mosque whose daily behaviour is a systematic violation of Islamic morals.

The power of nomination is the exclusive attribute of the People.

They constitute, therefore, the electing authority, which has the duty and the power to sanction the behaviour of an elect either positively or negatively.

The Party has always recommended that the militants should elect but upright cadres, politically committed and honest in the discharge of their functions.

The militants have obligations vis-a-vis themselves and the Party, and they must fulfil these obligations in view of imposing respect for their rights.

A regime cannot be the People’s while favouring at the same time the exploitation and suppression of these People. The People’s power essentially aims at a balanced, harmonious and dynamic evolution of the Nation as a whole by eliminating inequalities, injustices, arbitrariness, by favouring the rapid development of all the material and moral means necessary to collective and individual happiness. That is why, every P.R.L. has been invited to establish its own school, and every school has been organised in such a way that the education it provides may, without any discontinuity, attain the baccalaureate level. Thus, every Region must establish its institution of higher education, so that the whole youth of the country many acquire a correct education, while enabling our People to become a learned People, technically trained and incessantly acquiring technological capacities, allowing the exploitation of all their economic potentialities.

Either we are for the People’s power, and as such, we heartily accept their decisions, or we are against the People and we complain about their decisions, and worse, we work towards the destruction of that popular power.

Man must choose the path he wants to follow, and pursue it throughout his life. To this day, the people of Guinea have chosen the way of responsibility, the full responsibility of their destiny, the way of dignity banishing puppeteerism, and any neo-colonialist schemes from another country.

The P.D.G. is a labour party. That is why it is organising all the laborious forces on a sound basis and asking them to increase more and more everyday their capacities of the creation of the material and immaterial goods necessary to national progress. The P.D.G. is fighting imperialism and colonialism. On whose behalf? On the People’s behalf. Otherwise, no leader would expose himself to the bullets, to the abuses of the imperialists and colonialists disposing of mighty means of destruction, were it not for the People and the future of the Nation. But if the People are prepared to surrender their freedom, to give up the anti-imperialist and anti-colonialist struggle, to give up the struggle against alcoholism, debauchery, capitalist exploitation, then, the P.D.G. which wants and must carry but the free will of the People, will consequently modify all its attitudes. The ambition of the P.D.G., and the pride of its cadres, is to be the expression of the People’s will to be the means of protection of the People, the instruments for the happy evolution of the Nation. That is why, in order to avoid any confusion in the interpretation of the thinking and the attitudes of the Party-State, the People must once again express their opinion on all matters concerning their existence, and indicate to the Party what it has to do.

It is not the Party which commands the People! It is the People who created the Party and who must consequently guide it as they please.

The People are not created for the Party, it is rather the Party which was created for the People.

If the P.D.G. wants to preserve the People’s power, it is up to it to defend that power, to defend it strongly and strictly, to defend it against all those who attempt to cast a slur on it, to defend it so that the future may be brighter than the present, and so that the shortcomings, the difficulties of the present may disappear, so that the nation may be prosperous and happy in all the aspects of its life.

Consequently, the organs of leadership of the party could not exercise the power entrusted with them as the feudalists and bourgeois would do.

Now, there are actually agents of counter-revolution camouflaged in the ranks of the Party-State and at all levels. It is those who, impudently utilising the position at which the Revolution has placed them, gather wealth by foul means and methods: embezzlements, thefts, breach of trust, misappropriation of public fund, all malpractices constituting the source and the mechanism of the formation of a bureaucratic bourgeoisie, which gives a helping hand to its accomplice and ally, the bourgeois, stratum of professional profiteers. In order to squarely enjoy the treasure they usurped from the People, these two categories of bourgeois elements put themselves in the service of colonialism in order to crush the Revolution.

We must adopt a consistent attitude in order to extirpate from the ranks of the Party the elements being used by the local and foreign reactionary forces against popular progress and popular power. We must not hesitate. It is the honour of the Guinean People as a whole that is at stake.

Counter-revolution is connected with Revolution; the tow are inseparable, dialectically linked. A positive choice always implicitly involves the rejection of a negative choice: a negative choice also involves the rejection of a positive choice. For instance, a man who has decided to buy something from a store or from the market will first of all assess the quality and the price of the items on display for sale; he looks at the goods displayed on the stalls before making his choice. He finally declares: " I would rather buy this article!" this choice is positive with regard to the item he wants to buy, it is also a negative choice with regard to the other items he doesn’t want to buy, having unfavourably assessed their quality or price.

Another example: a young man who decides to get married examines many young girls; he finally selects as his wife the one who best meets his criteria; moral and physical qualities, material and social condition, etc. this choice of his mate implies the rejection of all other candidates. And the observers would speak of love at first sight, while there was no such thing for, in reality, every choice is deliberate and conscious, and remains a mature choice of preference.

Thus, all manifestations of life, every choice is at the same time a positive affirmation and a negative affirmation. Every choice is at the same time an acceptance and a rejection, whatever the time of hesitation that preceded it . Whenever we define our stand, we determine ourselves negatively against another thing.

In brief, every definition, every determination is both a positive affirmation and a negative affirmation.

This unity of opposites must be rightly understood, for man to acquire the required capacity of the analysis of facts and things.

When we say, " I am for the P.D.G., I am for the Revolution, I am for the Party-State" , we are implying that we are no more for the anti-P.D.G., we are no more for counter-revolution. A man, for instance, may live well without adopting a religion. He may also freely choose to become a Christian or a Muslim, or he may choose to become neither a Christian, nor a Muslim; therefore, he freely takes the decision to choose a religion, a set of moral postulates, to follow one course, to observe a given discipline. Once he has become a Muslim or a Christian of his own free will, he must respect the morals of the chosen religion, for he cannot become a muslim or Christian and an atheist at the same time. He cannot be a Muslim and at the same time a follower of Satan, or a Christian while being a servant of Antichrist. The Holy Koran describes this double-dealing in the Chapter of the Cow as follows: "When they meet those who believe, they say, "we believe" and when they are among their devils, they say, "yes , we are with you, and we are making fun of everything else."

The P.D.G. militant who says " Long live the P.D.G." must know that it is not an empty phrase that he is uttering. The militant of the Revolution who says "Long live the Revolution" must measure the degree of his responsibility by asserting his determination to preserve the Revolution. The truth is that a choice does not materialise by itself; somebody has to materialise it. If we choose truth, it is not that truth that will defend itself, it is man who chose it that will defend it.

In fact, what is the Party of our choice? It is nothing but ourselves. Indeed, how could we hold a meeting of party members excluding ourselves? Where then would the Party be?

That means that to defend the Party is to defend all of us, we who have chosen the same Party, our common property and means. When we come together, it is said, " Those are the militants of the P.D.G.", it is, therefore, the P.D.G. which binds us all to one another. When one is alone, one must defend what links one to others. This is how the Party must be defended. But, if once, the meeting is over, someone believes that the Party does not exist any more, he would be making a wrong judgement; he is not a true militant, a conscientious Party member; he is not consistent with his decision of adherence to the Party. That means the he doesn’t still know what the party stands for, since he alienates himself from the Party.

God does not present himself to us in a physical form. But only man’s conscience sees God and tells him that God sees him. The Party, too, acts in the same way on men’s conscience. Thus, the Party must be in the conscience of each, so that it may reflect in the daily actions of everyone.

Let us reconsider the principle of the positive choice involving the rejection of a negative choice.

We have chosen the Revolution, and we have not done so under any pressure, or threats or any fear; we did so freely and consciously. That is why, our choice is a positive one, for we ourselves said "yes" quite freely. We could have also said "no", but having said "yes" we have committed ourselves through time and space, towards the society. These are not shallow, light and occasional feelings, they are class attitudes having the same weight as those of the counter-revolutionary who has chosen to live on human exploitation. The Revolutionary too, has made a choice: his choice requires that everybody should live in freedom, and dignity; that nobody should be exploited by another. The choice made by the Revolution has at once eliminated the choice made by the counter-revolution. The choice made by the counter-revolution has likewise rejected the choice made by the Revolution.

Let us illustrate once again this principle: Here are two men who have chosen each to move, one towards the East, and the other towards the West. Whenever the two men move, each in his own direction, or whenever one of them moves, the distance on the course of the journey, between the counter-revolutionary and the revolutionary, increases. There are two things differentiating the revolutionary from the counter-revolutionary: the revolutionary has a programme of emancipation of the whole society, without distinction. The revolutionary does not struggle in a selfish manner, as an individual: he does not struggle for his family or for his village, region or for his ethnical group, he does not struggle solely for his Nation; he is not a chauvinist. In struggling for his nation, he means to struggle for humanity as a whole, convinced as he is that the whole of mankind is aspiring to justice, freedom, dignity, and happiness. And there resides clearly a task of an unequalled nobility for thus and implicitly, the revolutionary is struggling for the counter-revolutionary who remains, at any rate, an element of that society for the emancipation of which the revolutionary is working consciously.

In fact, when the revolutionary State opens schools everywhere, it does not say, " only the children of the revolutionary militant will be allowed to attend"; the schools are open to all. All the gains of the Revolution are within the reach of all and for the benefit of all, whereas the gains of the exploiters’ class are exclusively meant for that class.

What the capitalist gathers and hoards belongs to him alone, not to everybody.

If we had a personal bank, or a capitalist company belonging to ourselves or to our family, if we had 10 or 50 taxi-cabs as our private property, it goes without saying that the profit resulting form the exploitation of these means would not be considered a property common to all of us. Now, when the Revolutionary State establishes an Enterprise of any kind, it does so on behalf of the People and for the People’s benefit. Whatever profit accures from this enterprise becomes at once a common property.

 The difference between the line of Revolution and the line of counter-revolution is, therefore, the difference between the "I" and the "We".

It is the difference between selfishness, individualism on the one hand, and altruism and generosity, on the other hand. It is, at the level of conscience, the difference between ego-centrism and socio-centrism. At the economic and social level, it is the difference between general prosperity, general well-being, common heritage on the one hand, and individual wealth reflected in misery for the broad laborious masses, on the other. If, therefore, the revolutionary line is respected by the revolutionaries, it necessarily involves the welfare of all, that of the revolutionaries as well as that of the counter-revolutionaries, whereas the counter-revolutionary line contains but private interests; whenever revolutionary action asserts itself, whenever revolutionary action increases the People’s gains, the class of exploiters takes advantage of it. That is why it is absolutely necessary to be alert on the observance of the revolutionary line, while overlooking no modification in the behaviour of the class enemy.