As we approach the 21st anniversary of the passing away of the great leader President KIM IL SUNG we recall and reflect on his lifetime achievements and profound revolutionary activities . I first became acquainted with the great theories and ideas of the great leader President KIM IL SUNG back in 1985 some 30 years ago. I have been vaguely interested in the DPRK since the early 1980s . After seeing a newspaper article I resolved to find out more . One day chance I came across a book "Korean Review" and Volume 5 of KIM IL SUNG Selected Works . I felt very excited !. I started reading the KIM IL SUNG Selected Works and came across the historic speech "The Democratic People's Republic of Korea Is the Banner of Freedom and Independence for Our People and the Powerful Weapon of Building Socialism and Communism." a truly brilliant work .
I was fascinated and spellbound reading it. I was gripped by the following passage;
"Under the conditions in which remnants of the overthrown exploiting classes are manoeuvring insidiously and class struggle continues there can be no 'pure democracy' or 'complete freedom' for all. Bourgeois democracy provides the billionaires with the freedom to exploit and plunder the working people for profit and oppress them at will,but it allows the toiling masses only the freedom to wear rags and starve to death .If the class character of democracy is denied in socialist society and so-called 'pure democracy' and 'complete freedom for all' under the dictatorship of the proletariat are advocated , it is in fact , tantamount to forcing bourgeois democracy and the freedom to be slaves upon the people. We are against such an abstract and supraclass conception of democracy "
This was totally brilliant . It was a clear exposition of the theories of proletarian democracy and the dictatorship of the proletariat . I had converted to communism at the age of 14 and joined the Young Communist League and Communist Party but I was disappointed to find any clear theories as the British Communist Party was sodden with modern revisionism and the Soviet Union regarded by some as the leading socialist country was not much better.
The great leader President KIM IL SUNG had made this speech in 1968 at a time when there was talk of the "Prague Spring " and the revisionist-led Eastern European socialist countries massively liberalising . President KIM IL SUNG sternly reproved this :
"At present , the Western imperialists and the renegades of revolution are cheering over the so-called 'democratic development and 'liberalisation fusses' made in some socialist countries describing them as a" lawful process" in the development of socialist society , a 'new wind in Eastern Europe that gives hope to the Western world" , a 'deep going process for transformation for further democracy' and so on . However , in the last analysis , this is an insidious manoeuvre of the imperialists and the renegades of the revolution to whittle away the achievements of socialism and open up the way to the restoration of capitalism in the socialist countries"
Thus the great leader slammed the liberalisation nonsense and ripped it apart showing that it was totally counter-revolutionary .
Later I read in KIM IL SUNG Works volume 7 the speech " Let Us Further Strengthen the People's Government " made in 1977 at that time the imperialists were attacking the socialist countries over human rights and some revisionists were even talking about "pluralism " under socialism and a peaceful and gradual transition to socialism . President KIM IL SUNG was having none of this rubbish and said
"In capitalist society there can be no democratic freedom and rights at all for the working masses. The imperialists go on about 'equality for all men ' and the "freedom of the individual ' but in reality , these are downright lies. How, in capitalist society , where all state power and the means of production are concentrated in the hand of a few capitalists and money decides everything , can there be 'equality ' between multi-millionaires and the poor working people and what kind of freedom can there be for the oppressed and exploited working people ? The 'democracy' loudly proclaimed by the imperialists is a sham democracy and the 'equality ' ,'freedom' and everything they come up with are nothing but a camoulflage designed to hoodwink the working masses and hide the reactionary nature of their bourgeois dictatorship and the anti-popular nature of the capitalist system ".
These very words are a thunderbolt that strikes down the lies of the imperialists and revisionists about proletarian democracy. In those days there was not the Internet so I wrote to my friends about it .
Thus as we recall the life of the great leader President KIM IL SUNG on the 21st anniversary of his passing away I remember him as the greatest defender and exponent of proletarian democracy.
Dermot Hudson
ASSPUK
JISGE
UK KFA
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