Ministers visit scene of riots

Press, 8 September 1984, Page 10

Ministers visit scene of riots

NZPA-AP Sharpeville Four senior Cabinet Ministers, peering out through the steel mesh on police bus windows, inspected riot-scarred Black townships south of Johannesburg yesterday accompanied by two armoured personnel carriers full of police. Later, the Minister of Law and Order, Louis le Grange, blamed the black rioting that left 31 dead in three days of violence on unspecified agitators rather than community leaders’ anger over 15 per cent rent Increases. Sporadic incidents of looting and arson continued, but no other major clashes were reported.

The Ministers’ riot-proof bus passed through Sharpeville, scene of some of the worst rioting on Monday, when 29 died. Mr le Grange; the Interior Minister, F. W. de Klerk; the Education Minister, Gerrit Viljoen; and the Defence Minister, Magnus Malan; saw dozens of burntout shops and houses, though much of the rubble that littered the streets in the rioting had been cleared away. Mr de Klerk said he felt “shocked as we drove through and saw the havoc." He said the Government had taken all necessary steps to end the unrest, and signs were there of improvement. Mr le Grange said he did

not want to make a categorical statement about the cause of the rioting, “but all I can say is that I’m not convinced that the rent increases are the real reason for the problem. “There are individuals and other forces and organisations very clearly behind what is happening in the Vaal Triangle. More than that I would not like to comment at this stage,” he said. The Vaal Triangle refers to the worst-hit black townships and the white mining town of Vereeniging. The rioting broke out during a one-day boycott of classes and of jobs to protest at the rent increases. After seeing Sharpeville, the Ministers flew by heli-

copter to nearby Sebokeng and Evaton, where they again travelled by bus. The rioting in the three townships 68km south of Johannesburg was the worst in eight years in South Africa. A police lieutenant, Henry Beck, said the death toll rose to 31 with the discovery of a body in Sebokeng yesterday and the stabbing of a black youth in Vosloorus township west of Johannesburg on Wednesday. The official injury toll was 48, including 10 policemen, but newspapers reported 300 were treated for riot injuries at hospitals before the police allegedly ordered a clampdown on casualty figures.

Meanwhile, the. African National Congress guerrilla movement, which has waged a sabotage campaign since 1961 against whiteminority rule, said from its Lusaka office that the "sharp confrontations" in the riot areas should be stepped up and widened. “We must render inoperative the ability of apartheid to exploit and oppress us further,” the A.N.C. said. An Education Department spokesman, Job Schoeman, said 93,000 students were still skipping classes yesterday in the three worst-hit townships. Other boycotts continued in several townships, bringing the total number of boycotting students to about 120,000, he said.