EPISCOPAL CHUR£UMEN for SOUTH Room 1005 • 853 Broadway, !'lew York; N. Y. 10003 • Phone: (212) 4n·0066 - For A Free StIIlt1Jenl AIti'II- 30 March 1980 MISSIONS & MOVEMENTS #6 'On this occasion~ I have not only joined you as a daughter calling for the release of her father - I've joined as part of my generation who have never known what a nomal Ufe 1,8~ what it is to be with a father and sometimes a mother~ not because one's parents had comrrl:itted any crimes. My generation have ,seen grave arimes of oppression aommitted against the people. We grew up disaussing the latest pass raids~ whose father had been detained~ who had lost a parent in detention, or in whiah prison one of your parents is~ when last they were visited, when the last po lice raid was in your home ...This briefly was our ahildhood aonversation. ' Zinzi Mandela, 'daughter of Nelson Mandela- imprisoned for Ufe­ and Winnie Mandela - banished, spe'aking at an amnesty rally at t,he University of the Witwatersrand,Johannesburg~20March 7-980. The stunning victory of the Patriotic Front in the February elections in Zimbabwe has sent shock wav:es throughout the world - especially across the Limpopo into the bastion of apart­ heid. South African whites, were shaken to their roots. 'The Pretoria response was an idea uttered by Prime' Minister Pieter Both~ for assembling a national conference of all races to stand I shoulder to shoulder' to defend South Africa against commmism. Botha has reneged and now says that his 'states conference' really means a gathering of leaders of his scheme of a 'constellation of Southern African states', a device for attempting to control all the sub-continent - a concept which now lies in ruins in the wake of the victory of the people in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe's message came through loud and clear to South Africa's blacks. Exultation swept the country. Soweto SUNDAY POST editor Percy Qoboza picked up on both the tide flowing out of Zimbatwe and Botha' s flustered reaction and launched a campaign for freedom for exiled and'imprisoned leaders. The 20th anniversary of the Sharpeville Massacre of 21 March 1960 was marked amidst the refreshing events. An enhanced determination' infuses the ranks of the oppressed and aJIDng those nore fortunate. An opportunity, a hopeful opportunity) pre­ sents.a path for a peacefUl and just settlement in that lovely and agonized land. No such settlement can succeed without an amnesty. South Africa's 'natural 'leade~s'must be free, unhampered and at home so that any genuine representative national dialogue can ensue. We outside South Africa must redouble our efforts, to support the call for amnesty, without in any way relenting in pressures for economic sanctions against Pretoria or in our suppor:t for the active forces of liberation. ' CALL ON PRESIDENT' CARTER, ON YOUR LEGISLATORS, ON YOUR CffiJRCH AND COMMUNITY LEADERS This is a last chance for peaceful change in South Africa. SEND MESSAGES TO: Ambassador Donald B. -Sole South African Embassy PHONE: (202) 232-4400 3051 Massachusetts Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20008 M&M 6 30 March 80 - 2 - The Afrikaner ruling National Party in South Africa is rent with fratricidal warfare. Which way to go? Particularly after the dramatic events in Zimbabwe. The schemes of Prime Minis­ ter Botha for loosening up on· some minor apartheid restrictions and for building up a black elite in the country's urban areas and installing a black governing class in the bantustans to act as buffers against ever rising black aspirations are threatened by the die-hard, all­ out aPartheiders whose rallying person is Dr Andries Truernicht, head of the powerful party caucus in Transvaal Province. Suddenly, former and thought-disgraced State President Baltha­ zar Vorster has surfaced supporting the hard line. In mid-March, the party almost split in 1:W:> over, of all things, whether boys classified in South African terms as 'Coloured.' should be allowed to play rugby with white boys. On that occasion the Botha-Truernicht differences were patched over - only' for the moment. So-called enlightened Afrikaners and some of their English-descended counterparts are calling for yet more 'radical' changes than heretofore contemplated. The fennent is widespread and many are predicting a certain split in the Nat Party. The South African Parliament, now sitting at Cape Town, is on tenterhooks. A curious thing has happened. Johannesburg Sunday papers on 23 March disclosed a secret document prepared by the South African Defence Force f s Director-General of Civil Action,pur­ portedlyon behalf of the Chief of the South African Defence Force, full General Magnus Malan. The document was dated 18 February and concerned with nullifying criticism of the SADF's bud­ get. Ostensibly aimed at the parliamentary opposition 'parties, the scheme could as well be focussed on the hard core enemies of Botha f s path of enlightenment. The SADF and especially General Malan,. are proponents of - indeed contributors to - the political objectives qf.the Botha faction - towards a more sophisticated effort to maintain white supremacy. ':.' . lDndon's GUARDIAN refers to the Afrikaans language newspaper, DIE VADERLAND, in 'identify­ ing five potential target areas of criticism:. the role of black and Coloured soldiers; coll\.... pla:i:nts that Citizen Force infantrymen bear the brunt of fighting in.the operational zone in south-west Africa~ conscientious objection; pay problems; and unlawful game hunting (an issue which has already brought the Defence FOrce adverse publicity).' Johannesburg's THE STAR gave details of, 'an alleged meeting between Defence Force officers and seniour personnel of the South African Broadcasting Corporation which resulted in television producers being told to make "sabre-rattling films". ' A story - unconfirmed - swept New York circles last week that General Malan (who received his ccmnand and general staff training in America in the 60s) was in Washington. This came at the time that an Israel radio station reported the Israeli Defense Minister, Ezer weiz­ man, had just made a secret visit to South Africa, a report denied by Tel Aviv. Four years ago ECSA received information that there would be a coup in South Africa - a 'left1 coup, which in the South African scene would be about the nature of the Botha-SADF efforts at ,liberalization'. South Africa is virtually at the point of total mobilization and there are those who predict an inevitable military take-over. * * * * * ** * * * * * * * * * The former head of the Selous Scouts, the Ian Smith-Abel Muzorewa regime's offbeat terrorist military unit, Colonel Ron Reid-Daly, is in South Africa stirring the fears and passions of the tmreconstructable. He spoke recently to a 100 students at Rand Afrikaans University,and was loudly applauded. Referring to Prime Minister-designate Robert Mugabe, he said, accord­ ing to THE STAR of Johannesburg: 'There he is, sitting with the gooks we were trying to kill in his army, with whites alongside them. It is only a matter of time before there is a counter-coup. He is a fool to think those gooks are going to trust him with whites in the army. They will call him a sell-out...One dark and smelly night he and his gooks are going to pullout their long knives and cut the throats of the white Rhodesian soldiers.'The colo­ nel waxed philosophic: 'War is actually a battle to win the hearts of people. We killed so many gooks we lost count, but what did we achieve? You must win the hearts of the people and then deal with the gooks.' 30 March 80 - 3 - ULLIAN MASEDIBA NGOYI, a long-time and well-honored leader in the struggle against oppressiOn in South Africa, died on 13 March 19BO. She was living at her home in Soweto under the latest of a series of banning orders stretChing back to 1962. She had suffered from severe cardiac problems and from disabling asthma. Lillian Ngoyi was rom in Pretoria in 1911 and grew up to become an active leader :in the gar­ ment workers union. She joined the African National Congress during the ,1952: Defiance Cam- paign and was made president of the ANC Women's League. When the Federation of South African 'Women was fOI'!Ied in'1954 she was elected president. In 1956 she became the first woman ever elected to the PlNC Executive Corrmi.ttee. In August 1956 she led a march of 20,000 women on Pretoria to protest against the extension of the pass laws system to women. She was one of the' acqused at the Treason Trial in the 50's. She was imprisoned for 5 months: during the , state of emergency ~ollowing the 1960 Sharpeville Massacre. .. ' , .' Lillian Ngoyi' s funeral was an affirmation of her own struggle and that of, all 'those strugg­ ling for freedom in South Africa. The Soweto ·church was full to overflowing.l, The 5-nri.le march to the .cemetery (the carriage' bearing her coffin broke down midway, so men shouldered it'to graveside) was'a celebration and are-dedication. People marohed in their MC colors and uniforms and sahg the freedom songs engraved in the hearts and minds of young and old alike. Lillian Ngoyi lived long enough to taste the sweet savor of victory flowing out of Zimbabwe. .. * * * i, * * * * ,'( ,'( * * ',* *** '!HE BlACK SASH, the organization of white women opposed to apartheid and anti-dernocratic acts of the Pretoria regime, held its 25th annual conference in Johannesburg in mid-March. '!HE RAND DAILY MAIL reports: 'If the Government failed to act on black grievances about in­ flux control as revealed in the Cillie Corrnnission report, the Rhodesian experience of civil war and terror, would be unavoidable in South Africa, the Black Sash has warned.