South African mosaic
Roy Macnab Johannesburg As the last of the South African troops came back over the Cunene River and out of Angola, their Defence Minister P. V. Botha, watching them return, remarked : 'This is the end of a chapter', adding, perhaps significantly, that a new chapter was about to begin. What many are now asking is whether this new chapter will describe the emergence of a new South Africa. All agree that after Angola nothing can ever be the same. It was not that that misadventure resulted in great loss, either of men or materials, nor even of national amour-propre since there was never any serious military confrontation, but it produced a profound psychological shock which has left South Africans with an acute sense of the urgency of their situation and an awareness that the world outside is watching them.
'The talk in Europe about the future of Southern Africa is very grave', the American columnist William J. Buckley told his compatriots on his return home recently from London. And so it is, even to the extent of questioning if the Afrikaner can have a future in the sense that he has a long historic past. But if in Europe doubts about Southern Africa continue, largely because the Rhodesian abscess remains unlanced, in South Africa itself the anxiety that persisted as long as its troops were in Angola has given way to a new mood, relief that the country has withdrawn from the brink, coupled with a quiet confidence and a determination to get to grips with its problems in what may be only a respite. Despite Mr Gromyko's denials in London of any further Russian interest in the sub-continent, South Africa feels Big Brother to be sufficiently close to be breathing down its neck, not a comfortable sensation but certainly one to concentrate the mind on the realities of today's world in which there can be no place for some of South Africa's delusions about itself. Will Mr Botha's new chapter be the story of how that 'Very Strange Society', as Allen Drury called it, changed at last ?
If change could be effected by talk alone, the country would already have been transformed. Dr Schalk van der Merwe, the Health Minister, told a recent conference in Cape Town that anyone who still believed South Africans could continue their traditional racial attitudes was living in a fools paradise. Racial discrimination had to be 'cast out', he said. Dr Jan Marais, chairman of the Trust Bank, in his presidential address to the South Africa Foundation in Johannesburg pleaded for discrimination to be made illegal. In Pretoria, Dr J. H. Moolman, director of the Africa Institute, told
the Rapportryers (a kind of Afrikaner Rotary) that separation had to be replaced by adaptation.
Such sentiments are being expressed daily throughout the country and if they are made by Nationalist Afrikaners they impress. But English-speaking leaders have not been silent. The liberal mining magnate Harry Oppenheimer told a conference on Southern Africa organised by the United States South African Leader Exchange that in the interest of national unity there should be a truce in the controversy over political separate development (the Homelands policy) in return for concrete action by the Government to fulfil its pledge to end racial discrimination. He was later supported by another powerful industrialist, Punch Barlow, chairman of Barlow Rand. What is significant about this proposal is its sen‘e of priorities, which seems to be saying, 'All right, leave aside for the moment what may be the future political structure, and tackle the one particular aspect which arouses the odium of the entire world—the fact that day after South African day those who are not white suffer an inferior social and economic status because they are not.'
True, some of the more absurd racial rules have disappeared; one Afrikaans newspaper 'actually invited readers to send in examples of such absurdities. In Johannesburg, before some 500 business and academic leaders, a speaker who was not white raised the basic question of separate lavatories. 'What,' he asked, amid roars of laughter from his audience, 'does a white man imagine that he can do in there that I can't ?'
It remains to be seen how soon . the Government may respond to what is clearly a growing feeling in the country that unless human dignity, a phrase made much of by the famous Lusaka Manifesto of 1969, is not quickly established • for. all, then the atmosphere will never be created in which a future constitutional structure can be worked out. Mr Vorster may be waiting for a pretext to act. The Theron Commission on the future of the two and a half million Coloured people is duetto publish its report soon. Many think that it may be the catalyst for a new deal on colour. Already the Snyman judicial inquiry into unrest in the Black universities has produced a report which makes no bones about the degree of Black frustration and discontent.
Then, too, in October the Transkei, first of the black homelands, will become independent, though it is unlikely to gain immediate acceptance abroad. More important than recognition, however, may be its effect on the rest of South Africa. The Transkeians intend to set an example to South Africa itself by allowing no racial discrimination and to admit whites as citizens. Moreover, an independent Transkei intends to ask Pretoria for the release of those of its nationals convicted under subversion laws and imprisoned on Robben Island. These include three of the best known figures in Black politics of the early 1960s, among
them Nelson Mandela. p. eIndications ct t or l7A parriel it 9h1a6t : such an initiative will be successful; it would give stature to the Transkei and remove a handicap from South Africa in its efforts towards détente in Africa. Although the Angola intervention made dents in détente, the policy is by no means dead; in some cases practical relations with Black states have actually been enlarged two oil trains a week are going to Zaire, and President Kaunda, malgre lui, is showing more interest in getting his copper awaY through South African ports than in tisin.g the Tanzam railway. N'djamena, Kigali' Cotonou, Nouakchott, Bangui are among the African capitals visited by South African businessmen and diplomats. Interior Minister Mulder has just seen President HO" phuet-Boigny at Abidjan. However, in .Paris Leopold Senghor spoke of his dis" appointment that South Africa had not yet agreed to a look-see mission from Senegal. Mr Vorster, meanwhile, packs his bags to visit Israel, following in the footsteps of a predecessor, Dr Malan, a generation agn' There may be sound practical reasons fc'r Mr Vorster's visit, but it also symbolises the curious and deep-rooted interest of the Afrikaners in Zionism. Early Afrikaans literature portrayed the history of the Afrikaner in Zionist terms, a chosen people in search of a promised land. One .of the most distinguished Afrikaans poets, Olga Kirsch, Jewish. Afrikaner, was among the manY South Africans who settled in the new state of Israel. And who better than the Jews t° help South Africa get the acne of racial off its face ? General Dayan's polite but firni observations in Johannesburg are remembered. What South Africa now needs, and here the EEC countries with their experiene`; could help her, is to evolve a new system °, government in which all its communities can become involved in decision-making at national level, the lack of which at present prompted the Zulu leader Gatsha Buthelezi to make his recent outspoken speech in Johannesburg. There is a general feeling among politicians that the Westminster pattern of parliament cannot meet South Africa's needs.
In the Commons in January, Mr Cannhan said: 'With my experience of th.! peoples of Africa and African countries, hope the force of national or tribal identitY will not be underestimated.' This Is as true of South Africa as of any other Africa° country. South Africa may have to turn to a form of executive presidential government in which all races could participate. That is,. one suggestion; others talk of federation, 01 the Swiss system, of a Strasbourg Parliament. In any case a way has to be found i which the Afrikaner national identity an the African national identity (a more reali tic description than 'white minority' 'black majority') can accommodate eac other, until in God's good time racial an linguistic differences cease to be anythin more than interesting cultural phenomena in an integrated South African mosaic.
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