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The Many Anti-Apartheid Campaigns of Albert Luthuli

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The Many Anti-Apartheid Campaigns of Albert Luthuli POLITICS BEYOND VIOLENCE VS NON-VIOLENCE © www.sahistory.org.za The Many Anti-Apartheid Campaigns of Albert Luthuli Moving beyond rigid dichotomies of violence and non-violence reveal lesser-known Human Rights and international non-violence struggles that linked US Civil Rights and the South African anti-apartheid movements in the joined battle against transnational white supremacy. By Robert Trent Vinson 38 THE THINKER POLITICS lbert Luthuli was the president outrage. The bloodbath brought decolonisation, Luthuli remarked that of South Africa’s current ruling pariah status and martial law to South Pretoria was bent on “concentration Aparty, the African National Africa. camps, terrorism, and legalised Congress (ANC), from 1952 to 1967. The declaration of a state of murder.” Luthuli had compared One of the most respected African emergency gave the government “concentration camp” apartheid to leaders in the age of decolonisation, sweeping powers to detain over a fatal force bent on its own final and the first African to win the Nobel twenty-five thousand people and solution. He could not rely on support Peace Prize, Luthuli, however, is outlaw the ANC and its rival the Pan- from powerful Western countries largely forgotten today. Africanist Congress (PAC), sentencing unwilling to see through Pretoria’s My new book, Albert Luthuli, is the the PAC president Robert Sobukwe Cold War propaganda demonising the first book to make use of the newly to prison. Prime Minister Hendrik ANC as godless communists. Was it available Albert Luthuli papers housed Verwoerd commended the Sharpeville useful to espouse civil disobedience, at the Schomburg Research Centre for commander, Lieutenant Colonel he may have wondered, in the face African American History and Culture Pienaar, who exonerated his officers of unceasing detentions, government in Harlem, New York, USA. Thandi, for teaching a violent lesson to “the massacres, and treason trials? When Luthulis’ daughter, smuggled the native mentality which does not the State had not only banned papers out of South Africa when she allow them to gather for a peaceful civil disobedience protest, but the went into exile in the late 1960s. They demonstration.” ANC itself? remained unavailable to researchers Justice Minister Francois Erasmus, To friends like Charles Hooper and until very recently. in his previous post as defense Goolam Suleiman, Luthuli emphasised My book makes use of these minister, had railed against Africans the appropriateness of “morally papers, as well as other archival who aimed to “bring to its knees any defensible” aggression – for instance, sources in South Africa and the United White Government in South Africa when “a madman is attacking one’s States, numerous oral interviews, and family.” Hooper described Luthuli’s personal memoirs, to argue against At the dawn “condemnation of violence as prevailing historiographical claims that conditional and qualified” in the face Luthuli was unconditionally opposed of African of “pass arrests, night raids, detentions to any form of armed struggle. Luthuli decolonisation, and the starvation of minds and bodies.” was not the hapless victim of a palace Suleiman described Luthuli as “a very coup led by an insubordinate Nelson Luthuli remarked that humble person” who “wouldn’t harm Mandela. To the contrary, in July 1961, Pretoria was bent a fly” but recalled the Chief saying, he mediated private debates among “There may come a time when we have ANC and Congress Alliance leaders on ‘concentration to use violence – when violence will be about the proposed turn to armed camps, terrorism, and forced on us.” In July 1961, the ANC struggle. He actively participated in National Executive Committee (NEC) and accepted a compromise solution legalised murder’. met near Luthuli’s Groutville home, that authorised the formation of MK expressly so the banned Luthuli could as a separate, but related entity of which stands for White supremacy.” preside over pivotal debates about the ANC, which at that time was to He wanted the South African Defense armed struggle. Early on in the NEC remain officially non-violent. Force to model itself on the French meeting, Luthuli stated his opposition Subsequently, he met privately with colonial army waging war in Algeria. He to armed struggle – for principled and MK personnel, declaring support and was confident that soldiers, reinforced practical reasons. He knew that during understanding for those who turned to by white civilian posses, would “shoot the long and just-completed Treason sabotage. down the black masses when duty Trial, he and numerous other ANC But the provocative question of called.” The regime’s intent was leaders had affirmed the organisation’s whether a Nobel Peace Prize winner clear: it would menace Africans with nonviolent principles. He also certainly could also accept counter-violence genocidal rhetoric, banish activists, and understood that his members could measures must be contextualised obliterate dissent. not win a war when they lacked both within the pervasive violence of Facing this onslaught, ANC leaders modern firearms and any experience the apartheid state. In March 1960, asked whether civil disobedience of a modern battlefield. Indeed, when police using machine guns and could effect change. In the aftermath Mandela, who was leading calls for high-caliber rifles killed 69 unarmed of Sharpeville, police and army units armed struggle, had never fired a African pass protesters and wounded acted in concert, reinforcing repression. gun. Finally, as ANC president, it another 186 people at a PAC rally Luthuli doubted “whether anything but would have been highly undemocratic in Sharpeville, and also fired into a indiscriminate bloodshed and violence leadership to unilaterally adopt crowd of 10,000 pass protesters in the will make any impression…If the whites armed struggle as official ANC Cape Town townships of Langa and continue as at present, nobody will give policy; a shift that would betray Nyanga, killing 2 and wounding over the signal for mass violence. Nobody the rank and file, which adhered to 50, headlines captured worldwide will need to.” At the dawn of African foundational rules requiring a national Volume 80 / 2019 39 LITERATURE conference to transform ANC policy. This statement acknowledged the apartheid politics with American There was also a desire to protect not double bind in which circumstances Civil Rights and global Human Rights only ANC members but also still-legal had placed the ANC. Only a majority movements. Congress Alliance partners from likely of the organisation’s delegates polled at As a deeply religious man, Luthuli state retribution. Other participants a national conference could formalise fought apartheid on both political in these debates like future MK armed struggle, but since the movement and theological grounds. He regarded commander Curnick Ndlovu thought was banned, this conference was all Christianity as a stirring social gospel of that Luthuli “believed unquestionably but impossible. justice, freedom, and equality and Jesus in non-violent struggle” but “he was not There is no extant evidence of as the champion of the dispossessed a leader who believed in dictating… Luthuli ever repudiating the formation who had died on the cross for all of The ANC had stood the test of time of MK. On the contrary, his avowal humanity. Thus, he criticised the many because of collective leadership.” ANC not to “countenance…loss of life” was pro-apartheid whites who claimed that member Joe Matthews, too, noted how affirmed by Mandela’s explanation they alone were God’s chosen people. Luthuli’s insistence on non-violence of what could be carried out: “forays Luthuli argued that all Christians should gave way to compromise. According against military installations, power fight for social justice, his ANC politics to Mandela, Luthuli himself suggested plants… and transportation links.” reflecting his own understanding of “two separate streams of the struggle”: After being kept abreast of MK Christianity. In 1952, shortly before the ANC, which would remain developments by Kotane and Ndlovu, being elected as ANC president, Luthuli nonviolent; and a “military movement Luthuli remarked: “Look, I am not a declared, “I am in Congress precisely that should be a separate and communist… but that doesn’t mean because I am a Christian. My Christian independent organ, linked to the ANC that when I am attacked, I will just be belief about human society must find and under the overall control of the like Christ and turn the other cheek. I expression here and now… My own ANC but fundamentally autonomous.” will fight back. MK is a way of fighting urge, because I am a Christian, is to get This compromise would permit the back. [but what] I would like you not into the thick of the struggle with other creation of a distinct sabotage unit that to do is to say that MK is officially an Christians, taking my Christianity with hit hard targets. me and praying that it may be used to The next night, Luthuli chaired an influence for good the character of the ANC-led gathering of its Congress This compromise resistance.” Alliance, featuring representatives from would permit the Thus he criticised the many whites, the South African Indian Congress, South creation of a distinct especially within the Afrikaner Dutch African Congress of Trade Unions, the Reformed Church (DRC), who used Federation of South African Women, sabotage unit that hit Christianity to justify white supremacy, the Coloured Peoples Congress and hard targets. relying on the Calvinist doctrine of an the Congress of Democrats. Luthuli “elect” in claiming divine sanction to opened the assembly by recognising rule South Africa as a supreme and MK, but demonstrating his democratic, ANC body.” separate population over blacks. DRC inclusive style, he stipulated that MK But Luthuli’s insistence that the religious leaders championed apartheid discussion begin anew with Congress ANC remain officially non-violent, as a divinely ordained, comprehensive allies present.
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