Alhassan Mamman Muhammad
The expression self-reliance is in vogue in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Why is the DPRK emphasizing self-reliance? The DPRK needs external environment favourable for its economic construction, which is its main task. The hostile forces including the US are saying that they would help the DPRK achieve economic development while demanding that the latter give up its nuclear deterrent.
Suppose they keep their promise and the DPRK opt for a brilliant transformation. The core part of the economic development will be controlled by the big powers, and the developed countries will never give up their monopoly of the cutting-edge technology and development of equipment; they will offer equipment and related technical service to the DPRK, and very expensively at that, but not their core technology. The foreign forces will control the factories that constitute the lifeblood of the national economy even though the factories are situated in the DPRK.
The financial system based on the dollars will tightly control the DPRK: if the DPRK would not listen to what the foreign forces have to say, they will drive its economy to ruin in a moment. The same will be true of national defence.
Geopolitically, the DPRK is situated in a place where interests of big powers are acutely intertwined. If the DPRK continues to take the road of independence after giving up nuclear deterrent, it cannot escape the fate of Libya. The DPRK will have no other choice but to live as a slave of big powers. The people of the DPRK want to live as masters even though they may go hungry rather than to live as slaves.
From the historical point of view, the outside forces persistently tried to control the country.
The hostile countries started to impose sanctions on it already in the early days of its founding. Since the emergence of the word sanctions in the present world, no other country has been suffering from and overcoming such stubbornly harsh sanctions and blockade as the DPRK has been. The development course of the DPRK proves that the country will never yield to the sanctions, and the more intensified the sanctions are, the firmer its people’s spirit of self-reliance and will to build an independent power grow.
The summit meeting and talks between the DPRK and the US were held on three occasions and June 12 Joint Statement was adopted at the Singapore Summit, aimed at establishing a new relationship between the two countries. However, the present DPRK-US relations are still in deadlock.
Under the prevailing situation, the DPRK put forward spirit of which is to make a breakthrough head-on in order to defend the sovereignty, right to existence and security of the country and open a pivotal phase. This is why the present DPRK-US relation has turned into a full-scale stand-off between self-reliance and sanctions.
To see the country from the economic aspect, the sanctions by the hostile forces do not work in the country. The Korean people do not feel worried or uneasy in face of the sanctions; rather they are striving more actively. The word sanctions, which is a byname of horror and uneasiness for the people of other countries, cuts no ice with the Korean people; it only makes them feel disgusting.
In fact, there is no country on the globe other than the DPRK that has suffered the threat of aggression and sanctions imposed by the hostile forces so long; this has hampered the socio-economic development of the country and the people’s life is still not rich.
The Western media are painting the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea as a “human wasteland,” saying that “the life of the people is difficult” and “human rights situation is bad.” Then what is the reality of the DPRK? By the 1980s it achieved a comparatively high standard of economic development by building an independent national economy.
Free education and free medical care systems were introduced well before the developed countries in the West did. Its people enjoyed a dignified life even though not luxurious. No big power could dare to provoke the country. Today when the integration of the world economy has been realized, many people are sceptical that they could achieve prosperity by their own efforts only. The DPRK proved with the successes it achieved in the year 2019 that it is possible.
The DPRK called on to take a bigger stride with the spirit of achieving prosperity by the country’s efforts. The possibility is that all the Korean people are united single-heartedly. The foundation of their independent national economy is continuing to get stronger even under the sanctions. They have the strong power of science and technology. Their country has possessed ultra-modern weapons system which only the countries with advanced defence science and technology have. And all the sectors of the national economy are showing the sign of growth.
Everyone knows that the hostile forces have no more bargaining chips in their relations with the DPRK. The sanctions to check the advance of the DPRK is limited but not the potential of its self-reliance. The successes the DPRK has achieved in building up its defence capability prove this.
Prof. Muhammad writes from Abuja via [email protected]