NOTE: The first letter below is the response to Nasim’s letter of resignation from Y3WA. The second letter below is the response from FTT.
Friday May 13th, 2005
Dear Nasim;
In our response letter to Mike Krebs a week ago, on Friday May 6th, we said that we were waiting for your letter. We said all that we have to say on the matter of Mike Krebs’s resignation in our response to him. We will not be provoked into playing along in your desperate circus for the entertainment of our political opponents and of the ruling class. Besides, you and Mr. Krebs still have a lot of work to do (transcribing conversations, phoning people, sending emails etc…) in order to try to prove your case in public and we don’t want to waste any more of your time.
It is obvious to us that your ‘open letter’ was drafted and distributed in close collaboration with Mike Krebs. The partnership between the two of you within Youth Third World Alliance has been in existence for some time now – something apparent in your knowing about Mike Krebs’ resignation from Youth Third World Alliance before anyone else and not telling me, the coordinator of your organization, as you were responsible to do.
Anyway, the issue is not whether you are right or wrong in your criticisms of Youth Third World Alliance. The issue is that if you don’t trust me, the coordinator of Youth Third World Alliance, you could have written this ‘open letter’ directly to the members of your organization and appeal to them to deal with the problems that you see. Unfortunately you have chosen to join Mr. Krebs and position yourself with our opponents and the ruling class against us in public. More unfortunately, this public positioning is opening up space for our opponents to opportunistically attack the group and movement that you claim to agree with the “overall political direction” of.
Dear Nasim, we are really not sure if you are aware of the depths of contradiction in your letter. A public attack on Youth Third World Alliance does not correspond with your supposed political support for our work. You have sided, or as you said, “supported” Mr. Krebs’s public split and, like Mike Krebs, took an internal organizational issue outside to be aired as dirty laundry as a gift to our opponents to try to smear on all of our faces. The worst part of this is that you, like Mike Krebs, did this without even attempting to discuss it in the organization.
You did attend a Youth Third World Alliance meeting on Sunday May 9th to discuss the issue of Mike Krebs’ resignation from the organization. However, there was no discussion at the meeting about any issue from you or anyone because you walked out of the meeting before such discussion could take place. If you do not remember this, we will remind you just how this meeting went. You can confirm this rendition with the recording you made on your (not very well) concealed digital recorder in your backpack. You recorded everything from the time you arrived at 11:27pm until the time you left at 11:53pm.
Before any discussion in the meeting began, the chair brought a series of motions to adjudicate a smooth, respectful and democratic meeting.
The first motion was that all discussion be carried out in a calm manner without insult or accusation. You did not participate in this vote that was otherwise carried unanimously.
The second motion was that the meeting be recorded with a Youth Third World Alliance tape recorder placed in the middle of the room. You did not participate in this vote either. It was also carried unanimously.
The third motion was that the meeting be recorded with only one tape recorder and that it be kept for all members of Youth Third World Alliance (including you) to have equal access to. Included in this motion was that you remove your concealed tape recorder from your bag and shut it off. You alone voted against this motion. You first denied having a recorder and then insisted upon keeping your own personal recorder going and then walked out of the meeting.
In your public letter you claim that at this meeting the other members of Youth Third World Alliance met your complaints with “silence and denial.” This was not the case. Rather than stay in the meeting to discuss your differences, you have chosen to send a public ‘open letter’ against Youth Third World Alliance including your decision to suspend your membership with the organization.
We would like to remind you that in any revolutionary organization there is no such process as “self-suspension.” You have a number of options in leaving or taking time off from a group like ours: you can voluntarily resign, ask for a leave or vacation holiday or even request suspension, since these processes are all collectively decided by the general meeting. However, there is no space in our group for an individual to launch public ultimatums and threats against our organization. There is no substitution for principled, democratic discussion and debate of differences. By publicly and unilaterally suspending your involvement with Youth Third World Alliance as some sort of self-hostage taking, you are attempting to flex your “individual right” against the rights of the collective, including democratic decision making. Politically, this means that you are resigning from the organization.
Since this is your wish, we are suspending your involvement with Youth Third World Alliance. As well, we are canceling your membership until your next application for membership, whenever you decide again that you’d like to join.
As you may have noticed, we have not and will not change our attitude, understanding or approach towards the actions of Mr. Krebs. We are waiting for him to finish his job completely and bring his activities against us to a halt. For him, there is no option of return to Youth Third World Alliance.
For you, we suggest you take a break. Your letter reveals a paradox in your vision of Youth Third World Alliance. How can an organization be so politically correct and so organizationally corrupt? It is not up to us to solve this paradox, it is up to you. We hope you use the time you will have in your trip to Cuba to think about this. When you come back at the end of June, you should contact us with your final thoughts. You and us will hopefully have a better assessment of each other by that time.
Kira Koshelanyk
Coordinator, Youth Third World Alliance
(Response letter from FTT)
May 14, 2005
Dear Nasim,
We have received and read your “public statement” against Fire This Time and Youth 3rd World Alliance which was released on Thursday May 12th 2005. We assume that you have also received the response by Kira Koshelanyk on behalf of Youth 3rd World Alliance sent on Friday May 13th 2005. While we agree with the points raised in the letter from Kira, we are now responding to your statement directly from Fire This Time.
First of all, as far as Mike Krebs’ resignation, we have nothing further to say on the matter. He has resigned, he has sent a public attack on us, we received his resignation and we have responded to the attack.
As far as your statement in support of him, it raises a number of contradictions for your involvement in Fire This Time Movement for Social Justice and the Fire This Time Newspaper Editorial Board.
If your position on Mike Krebs resignation was different from the position taken by the organization, and you had disagreements with how Fire This Time dealt with his attack, then you had a number of options for addressing this. You could have called me, as coordinator to discuss it. You could have called for a Fire This Time meeting. You could have sent your letter to Fire This Time members. None of these options were taken.
Instead, we believe you worked in close collaboration with Mike Krebs to draft a statement and send it publicly before any attempt to pursue discussion within Fire This Time. As such, your statement is a politically unprincipled and hostile attack on the organization. Interestingly, Nasim, in your statement you state your agreement with the political direction of Fire This Time. How can this be so, if you are attacking and sabotaging our work to such a great extent?
Similar to Youth 3rd World Alliance, there is no option in Fire This Time to “self-suspend”. A member can resign, a member can request a leave, but a member cannot refuse to discuss matters internally, attack the organization publicly and spread slander and lies about the organization, unless he or she decides he or she is not a member. You have ignored the democratic process of Fire This Time, you have breeched your duties as a member. You had enough time to read our response to Mike Krebs and to make a decision.
Mike Krebs’ premeditated public split attack and betrayal has meant that he has no choice to ever return to Fire This Time Movement for Social Justice or the Fire This Time Editorial Board.
Your actions and your support of Mike Krebs public split has put you outside the organization. You are no longer a member of Fire This Time Movement for Social Justice. You are no longer a member of Fire This Time Editorial Board.
If you ever decide to attempt to resolve this issue, we are open to discussion. When you have thought this through and you return from Cuba hopefully you will have a clearer understanding and we can discuss this in an open, democratic and comradely manner.
In Solidarity,
Shannon Bundock
Coordinator – Fire This Time
