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THIS IS AN "UNDERCURRENT AFFAIRS" PIECE WRITTEN IN THE 1980s (!) WHEN THE APARTHEID STATE WAS REACHING ITS CLIMAX.
ITS ARGUMENT REFLECTS HOW
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FAR SA's WHITES WERE FROM EVEN THINKING ABOUT A NATION IN WHICH THEY WOULD BE A SMALL MINORITY ON THE VOTERS' ROLE.
NOTE: The intro on this column is missing, but I think the rest of the text is worth retaining as a reminder of how difficult it was to suggest even to liberal-minded white newspaper readers that transition to full democracy, with votes for everyone including illiterate 18-year-olds, was essential to avoid civil war.
[The footnote to this brings bad memories.]
BE BRAVE - BUY INTO THE
NEXT CENTURY
Firstly, even in the area of "talks about talks about negotiations", the Government continues to ignore the ANC and tries to consult with all kinds of subservient organisations. That strategy leads to a very short dead‑end.
Possibly the Government does not mind. Possibly playing for time rather than passing on real power is the only agenda it has.
The ANC, on the other hand, refuses to have anything to do with any part of "The System", even for an interim period. And the Mass Democratic Movement keeps taking refuge in "The People". They decline to negotiate over the heads of "The People", who must be consulted on every point - even on the shape of the negotiating table.
The device of pretending to rely on mass choice for every decision, is the familiar device of demagogues. It deceives few people, least of all "The People".
At best it is the strategy of Alexandre Ledin‑Rollin, who is said to have shouted at the barricades of Paris in 1848: "I've got to follow them! I am their leader!"
At worst it is what that most famous of all democrats, Edmund Burke called "the tyranny of the multitude", which he described as "a multiplied tyranny."
The most realistic assessment of today's situation is that all sides appreciate the need to be willing to negotiate - the white Nationalist Government perhaps more than anyone - but they are either unwilling or unable to.
There appears to remain the intractable problem. On the one hand those who hold power so firmly see no need to give it away, and no real intention of giving it up. Their opponents on the other hand do not have the strength to take it from them.
There is the third option which has been advocated many times in this column.
It is to "buy forward".
Settle on the year 2001.
It is far enough away not to frighten all of today's voters or freeze today's rulers. It is near enough to meet the aspirations of most black people. It provides enough time to prepare and plan a smooth hand over of power to a multiracial government. It offers a great opportunity to rebuild South Africa's potentially great economy and re-introduce her to the world of trade, sport and international competition.
All the Government has to do is to recognise the realities of demographics, politics, economics, and justice by declaring that the last day of the year 2 000 will be the first day of a united South African Government elected by all the people into a single Parliament.
In the meantime all parties can be unbanned, and the debate can rage about who represents whom; what the new constitution will be; how will the transition take place. . .and whether there be an interim government in the not so distant future.
The perspective of time should allow the Government - and all South Africans - to see that ripping our society apart until settlement comes is a tragic and stupidly shortsighted way to reach the inevitable.
So why not accept, now, that governments will change; all people will vote one of these day, and the majority of voters will incontestably be black as we move into a new century and a new era?
By recognising the realities, and giving all parties NOW a goal to prepare for, we could turbo-jet into the 21st century.
More important, we could creat mutual trust instantly.
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FOOTNOTE: This proposal went down like a kite made of cement. So much for the hoary political technique of 'kite-flying'.
I cannot recall the date on which this column was published, but P.W.Botha was still president; the secret police still had time - and increasing urgency - to murder people they had death-listed. Massacres and riots continued. Censorship increased at a desperate rate and oppression went on to reach its peak. Most whites seemed to be in denial. It was all so blindly stupid and unnecessary.
Yet South Africa managed to change course without revolution and the horrors of civil war.
We patriotic, peace-loving black, white and brown South Africans should take much less credit than we do for the miracle, however. It came about in 1990 because the Berlin Wall fell. If the Cold War had not ended in '89 - directly affecting Angola, Mozambique and all African as well as global politics - the old, racist regime would have remained in place for some time, desperately increasing its oppression and possibly bowing to the blind folly of the bitter einders as the regime was driven into a corner.
A Stalinist style of 'government' might have followed. It still might, in the next generation, if we don't guard our freedoms constantly. |
