‘Black struggle eroded by blacks’

Press, 13 November 1985, Page 20

‘Black struggle eroded by blacks’

The most important struggle going on in South Africa is no longer between black and white, but between black and black to decide how the country’s future is to be determined. Behind much of the violence in recent months have been revolutionary organisations whose leaders are outside the country. Members of more moderate black organisations that have tried to restrain the violence have been among the main victims. Chief Gatsha Buthelezi, a leading black voice for moderation in South Africa, recently made a strong attack on the militant aims of the banned African National Congress. In his 1985 Shaka Day speech (extracts of which are printed here), the leader of the predominantly Zulu Inkatha movement reaffirmed his support for peaceful change. Chief Buthelezi said:

Every aspect of apartheid is hideous and must be condemned. For nearly four decades it has systematically destroyed the very democratic process on which the salvation of our country depends. There will be no just society if there is no democracy. In virtually every part of Africa, we have seen that military victories lead to military governments, which have grave difficulties in becoming democratic.

Those of us who are a bit older will have personal memories of just how intimidated black South Africans became during the 19605, after the terrible crackdown by the National Party on black opposition. The younger generation, now becoming politically active, have a vast freedom of expression which we then did not have. The black struggle for liberation is being eroded from within black ranks by those who want to destroy the democratic forces we have built up after so many generations of suffering. Black is now taking to killing blacks for political purposes, and the black-on-black confrontation is surpassing black confrontations with police and security forces. A horrible dog-eats-dog mentality is now flourishing in black politics.

The African National Congress mission in exile has openly declared war on Inkatha and has ordered my assassination. It is bent on a strategy of attempting to woo Inkatha’s members away from (my) leadership. I am attacked by the mission because I do not do their bidding and dance to their tunes. They are

only interested in blind obedience. The A.N.C. has declared the armed struggle as the primary means of bringing about change. The so-called armed struggle has been a dismal failure for 25 years, and I see it as senseless to go on repeating that dismal failure for the next 25 years. President Samora Machel would never have drummed the A.N.C. out of Mozambique if he thought they could be successful. He knows they cannot wage an armed struggle from across South Africa’s borders, and he refuses to make his people pay terrible prices for their failure. The armed struggle will not succeed while there are no viable springboards from neighbouring bases. Having failed in military objectives, and having failed to develop an army, the A.N.C. is now turning black brother to attack black brother. Our youth are being exhorted to attack their elders. Blacks are stoning blacks, burning them alive, hacking them to pieces; the mission in exile regards this as a great surge forward in the struggle. They (the A.N.C.) have run away from the South African Army and the police, and are now hiding behind children who have to face police brutality as they use sjamboks, police dogs, rubber bullets, bird shot, and even bullets which are loaded to kill. They are trying to get black South Africans to expand an orgy of killing. Since the State of Emergency was declared, just about as many blacks have been killed by blacks as have been killed by the police. Those who are now committed to violence because they have

given up hope have turned their backs on the real struggle. The mission in exile has no mandate from ordinary black South Africans to escalate violence in our streets. Mr P. W. Botha (the South African President) is the most powerful man in Africa. He can direct the most efficient killing army on the continent against whomsoever he desires. It is madness to declare an armed struggle that you cannot win. I will not be dictated to by South African exiles who sit drinking whisky in safe places in the capitals of the world where they plot how to get more black South African children to kill more black South African children. The A.N.C. is calling on blacks to destroy factories in support of its disinvestment campaign. They know very well that millions of blacks living in black townships could not survive one week without cash wage packets and shops filled with food. The mission in exile wants blacks to have nothing so they have nothing to lose. Black South Africa roars it disapproval of this madness.

The mission claims to be the sole authentic leader of black South Africans, and it has been given special status by the Organisation of African Unity and the United Nations. Inkatha, with its membership now exceeding one million, is living proof that they are wrong. The United Democratic Front is no more than a bonfire of pseudo intellectual ideas coming from people ... who know nothing about the struggle, but pontificate from ivory towels at universities, and from the luxury of upper middleclass living. The U.D.F. has committed itself to making South Africa ungovernable; it applauds blacks when they kill black councillors, and desecrates what should be solemn funerals by turning them into political jamborees. This tragic black-on-black internecine strife is worsened by many white liberals who try to play off one bottom end against the other. The role of some white spokesmen, and such bodies as the Black Sash, has been extremely divisive and has done more to stoke the fires of conflict.

The U.D.F., which has a sprinkling of whites in its leadership, has always received very sympathetic

treatment in the media. Because Inkatha is a black organisation, led by black leadership, we are cast as villains of the deepest dye. We are getting sick and tired of the divisive games that they (the white media) are playing, and the extent to which they show bias in favour of the external mission of the A.N.C. and U.D.F. I call on Oliver Tambo (the leader of the A.N.C.) to cease pitting black against black, and sowing the seeds of a civil war which will destroy the soul of black South Africa. If, however, (he) means to drop a gauntlet, we will pick it up imemdiately. The mission in exile mimics the country’s apartheid bosses in trying to divide and rule. Democratic opposition to apartheid is stronger now than it has ever been.

Oliver Tambo must stop being afraid of black victories in this country. He must stop looking over

his shoulder at those who pull his strings, and he must stop dancing to the tune of those who finance the mission in exile and give it the means of surviving tenuously in the outside world. Mr Tambo must start heeding the voice of black South Africans. Dictating to us from the safety of the shadow of foreign flags in foreign capitals must come to an end. One tragedy we face is the possible tragedy of Mr Botha going down in history as the white leader in our country who stood on the very threshold of success in bringing about a race-free, democratic society, but failed to do so. The other possible tragedy we face is that on the other hand Mr Tambo could go down in history as the leader of the A.N.C. mission in exile who failed to become a

statesman and kept the mission out of participating in the people’s victory.