EPISCOPAL. CHURCHPEOPLE ior a FREE SOUTHERN AFRICA -t: 339 t.,afayett. Street. New YorX, N.Y. 100'2·2725 C (2' 2) 417.0066 rAX: (212) 9 79 -1 013 S 20 September 1993 A #141 Betweena rockanda hardrigbtl In its attempts to appease the demands of Chief Buthelezi and THE GUARDTAN ttie Afrikaners, will the ANC leave itself any real power? Tuesday September 14 1993 Stanley Uys ecunve council in which the These ministers and MPs A mountain ofcircumstantial I The central issue would be HE LESSON Presi· veto again will be implicit; or make a key point. which is Ievidence is available that the less the struggle for political dent FW de Klerk ensuring that when Mandela being overlooked in the current !systematic violence, at least, is Ipower and more the economic learnt from white becomes president, De Klerk squabbling between De Klerk I planned. The operational , problem: how to meet the ever· Rhodesians was not will become depul¥ and the and Buthelezi: that although method is always the same: rising expectations of the ever­ to delay peace talks assent of both will be required the NP and ANC bonded to see units of between four and 10 growing black population. The Twith the black majority until it to approve decisions on "funcla­ the negotiations process blacks (suspected (f being mer· ANC would be overwhelmed by was too late (as Ian Smith did). men'al" matters (like the bud­ through to the end - the cenaries re<'rl'..iled du!ing the demands from within its ranks So he opened the prison doors get and ;;;,curity). On matters of "founding coalition", as one an· South African Defence Force's I to confront the explosive ques· and invited black leaders to ne­ "average importance" differ­ alyst describes it - at a differ­ involvement in the Angoian, tlon of bow to transfer gotiate with him. The deal was ences can be settled in other, ent level. that of decentralising and Mozambican wars), armed I resources - how to rob (while) "I am not prepared to surren: agreed ways, "but with regard governmental power to the with AK47s and sometinles gre· Peter to pay (black) Paul. der power to you, but I am to the fundamentals there regions, and of gelling a central nades, kill at random, usually The issue could split the ready to share it." Since his needs to be consensus" De grip on the ANC's throat in the just before. during, or after ANC: first the whltes in the "new South Africa" speech of Klerk said recently. Further: TGNU, the NP's more natural TGNU would try to veto any "What we think is that if you some breakthrough in the February 2, 1990, he has not ally is Buthelezi and even the peace talks. The effect has been such action, and second the budb~d from this position. get 51 per cent of the vote, you white righL "moderates" in the leadership don't get 100 per cent of the devastating. The political vio­ The ANC had little choice. In Until a few months ago, the lence has spawned horrendous . wou1d argue that an ANC goy. his memorandum from prison power; you get 51 per cent ... I white right was hopelessly frag- I ernment could not afford to' think I'll be part ofthe top man­ criminal violence. De Klerk and (l989), Nelson Mandela had al· mented: the parliamentary Con-I' Mandela have been seen to be , alienate the white community ready accepted that minority agement of the country, not just servative Party was starting to I and domestic and foreign inves- as a minister but as one of the unable to establish law and groups (ie whites) would have haemorrhage, the volkstaaters order, and both have lost fol· , tors. The South African econo- to be given constitutional guar· major players, with a crucial (homelanders) were becoming , my, for all its quirks, is a capi· and leading role In stabilising I lowers: Dc KJerk to Buthelezi antees of their rights. He could more mystical, Eugene Terre­ and the white right, Mandela to 'talist one. familiar to the not have guessed then how clas­ our country." blanche's Afrikaner Resistance Iinternational community. The One would have expected this that growing pool of disen­ tic the definition of rights Movement was clowning its. chanted blacks who want to ANC tampers with ital its periJ. would become. As the negotia­ prospect of tying the ANC's way through the farming areas, ANC moderates might then I hands so safely to satisfy even start a socialist workers' party tions unfolded over the next and out on the fringes some 60 after tile elections. find themselves being de­ three years. the ANC leader­ the most belligerent of ANC militant/paramilitary groups nounced as "selJ-outs" as they opponents, yet both Buthelezi Dare De Klerk and Mandela ship came to accept that. con­ (few of them dangerous) were proceed with the peace process edge towards not exactly a pact. fronted by a hostile white and the white right walked out plotting their plots. Now a large but certainly a degree of com· of the multi·party negotiations. while Buthelezi and the while bureaucracy, army, police section of Afrikanerdolll is right are outside the tent? Man· mon Interest, not only with De force, and private sector, it Under pressure from Buthelezi. drawing together under tile ex­ K1erk, but with the white right the ANC earlier had conceded dela might be prevailed upon to would not be able to govern. generals. who are demonstrat­ take tile plunge, but recently and Buthelezi. The day then Also,. the litmus test used by do­ that the negotiating forum ing an unexpected political both De Klerk and Meyer have would inevitably come when mestIc and foreign investors to could draft the new constitu­ adroitness. Behind them, in the declared that it was not poss· President Mandela and Deputy gauge the country's stability tion in broad terms, within the shadows, are the men from mil­ ible to proccccl without Buthe­ President De Klerk would would be the degree ofco-opera­ framework of 27 general princi­ itary intelligence with their JezL De Klerk even said tllat if jointly sign an order to send se­ tlOn between whites and blacks. ples already written by the master plan and heaven knows violence continued at its pres­ curity forces into the black So a "partnership" was un­ forum itself. But the ANC re­ who on their payroll. ent level. the April 27, 1994, townships to suppress "trouble· avoidable: it is the' nature of fuses to abandon its position For the moment it's gridlock. electIOn date might have to be makers" - two senior ANC this partnership that is tearing that an ~Iected national assem­ Buthelezi .and tile while right postponed. leaders have already warned South African politics apart. bly, not 26 parties chosen at Later. apparently under In­ "troublemakers" (the Pan-Afri­ De Klerk's cabinet is prey to are becomIng more, not less, in· canist Congress among them) random to create a negotiating I, tra~sigenL De Klerk may have ternational pressure, he re­ seriOUS tensIOns, the ANC can forum. must construct the final to YlCld furtller to them, but can affirmed the date, but it must that they will be dealt with barely control the restiveness version of the constitution. still be secn as tentative. And frrmly. in it< ranks, and Chief Mango­ the ANC seriously consider The cleavage in South Afri· Buthelezi and the white right yielding t,i th~ nbht of a:: imp1c!!1cntotion of the TEC. suthu Buthelezi and the white now want to establish, before elected assembly to write the agreed with such fanfare at the can politics would in a sense, be right have pulled out alto­ the election, that "consensus" negoUatlng forum this week a more logical one, with a new gether, the air thick with daily constitution? On the otheT opposition emerging on the means agreement (ie a veto), hand, can De Klerk and Man­ Iremains equally uncertain: threats of civil war. The ANC and want the constitution writ­ Buthele7.i and the white right ANC's left, grounded in mili­ has scarcely any room left for dela go ahead with a TEC tant trade unionism and ideo­ ten in stone by the forum, inca· ('I'ransitional Executive Coun­ reJect It out of hand. concessions. It has agreed al­ pable of amendment by an De Klerk and Mandela may logical socialism, and embrac­ cil), which Buthelezi and the ing a wide spectrum of black reaay to proportional represen­ 'elected assembly. Together, white right reject out of hand have to l>ow to the demand by tation. which in itself could Buthelezi and the white right and then hold elections? ' Buthelezi and the white right dissenters, including the PAC cause its electoral efforts to fall have become a formidable for a summit of all political and the black consciousness Violence may well be the movement. The formation of below the critical two-tllirds force. Both De Klerk and his trump card. Since September leaders, or national convention majority in the new national as­ chief negotiator, Roelf Meyer, such an opposition probably 1984, when the ANC began as it is being termed (recalling would take years to consoli­ sembly. It has agreed, too. after accept that negotiations cannot the national convention that es· proceed without Buthelezi's In­ I "poaching" on Buthelezi's terri­ date. Meanwhile all ANG-Icd next year's first democratic tory in Natal, more than 16,000 tablished the Union of South election, to set up a Transi­ katha.