Bantustans and the class struggle in south Africa

I

UNITED NATIONS

AFRICAN INSTITUTE FOR ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND PLANNING

ti'py^

cs/2528-35

DAKAR

CONFERENCE ON

THE SOCIO-ECONOMIC TRENDS AND POLICIES IN SOUTHERN AFRICA

(DAR-ES-SALAAM,

29 NOV.-7TH

DECEMBER, 1975)

BANTUSTANS AND THE CLASS STRUGGLE IN SOUTH AFRICA

BY I.B. TABATA

Lusaka,

Zambia

MARCH, 1976

y

BANTUSTANS AND THE CL.iSS STRUGGLE IN SOUTH AFRICA

THE EVOLUTION OF THE IDEA OF BANTUSTANS

The Black man in South Africa has always been regarded

as a creature whose sole _purpose of existence is to minister to the needs of the White population - the master race, in much

the same was as a draught horse serves mankind. The concept of

Bantunstans has its roots deep in the murky history of South

Africa. When the White invaders conquered the territory South

of the Limpopo River and divided it into four main state&ftfche Cape Colony Natal, and two Boer Republics in the .North»- ^, They éàoh crsàfceé re¬

servations for the Black populations subs-eqtlntly to be known as the

"Native Reserves",

After the discovery of diamonds in the Northern Cape, the territory of the Griquas, and vast deposits of gold

in the Boer

Republics of the Transvaal, the British found a

compelling need

to unify the economies of all the different

states. Thus the

Boer Republics were defeated in the Boer War

and in 1910 there

was born a single national state, the Union of

South Africa.

The Black population living within the

geographic, confines of

these states found themselves willy-nilly within the

jurisdic¬

tion of the new Nation State, not as citizens

but

as

subjects.

It is true that a limited number of Blacks in the ex-British

Cape

Colony were initially allowed a

limited

vote

for the

purpose

of

ensuring British domination in the ^new

state. As early

as

1894,

the arch imperialist Cecil Rhodes

introducing what

was

to be known

as the Glen Grey act which he called

"A Native Bill for Africa"

(by this he meant a

model for the whole of South Africa and

Rhodesia) made the following statements:

"The idea is that the natives should be kept

in these

native reserves and not be allowed to

mix with white

men at all,

"It must be brought home to them

that in the future

nine—tenths of them will have to

spend their lives

in daily labour, in

physical work, in manual labour."

"We want to get hold of these young men

and make them

go to work

and the only

way

to do this is to compel

them to pay a certain

labour tax0"

"Now I say, the

natives

are

children...They have

human minds and I would like them

to devote themselves

wholly to the local

matters that surround them and

appeal to them.

"I would let them tax

themselves..."

("The Rolé of Thé

Missionaries'in Conquest" by Nosipho

Majeke)

These sentiments were

expressed long before Dr. Verwoerd,

the architect of the

Bantustan policy and his successor

Balthazar Voster were born.

In this statement of policy Rhodes

was laying the

corner-stone of the Bantustan edifice and inci¬

dentally giving

the

reasons

for their necessity. From then on

every

successive government of South Africa slowly added its

quota of

bricks to the structure until the present government

of the Boers came into power

in 1948 when the process was speeded

up. Prime

Minister Verwoerd in a speech in Parliament 1961,

explains why:

"In the light of the pressure

being exerted on South

Africa" the government

will introduce new Bantu

States, "a form

of fragmentation which ^we would not

have liked if we were able to

avoid it, thereby buy¬

ing the

White

man

his freedom and the right to retain

domination in what is his

country."

Announcing

self-government for the Transkei in 1962,

Verwoerd said:

"This should strongly

counteract.. the international

animosity and

suspicion which have such a detrimental

effect on our

economy..."

(South Africa : The Bantu

Homelands, by Barbara Rogers)

Let us summarize in clear terms

Rhode's so-called Native

Policy as he

outlined it during the debatè on his "Native Bill

for Africa" :

(a) That the reserves

(later to be known as Bantustans)

where to be maintained as

reservoirs of cheap Black

labour, and

that the state has to make plans to see

to it that as many as

nine-tenths of the residents

go out to

work for the Whites

(b) That in order to

smoke them out, new taxes: the Poll

and the Hut Tax were to

be introduced, payable

in money which they

could only get by working for the

Whites.

(c) That in order to

keep these "children" who "have human

minds" occupied, and to

prevent them from aspiring to

Parliament they had to

give them Bungas (Rural Council

dominated by

government appointed paid chiefs under

the chairmanship of

white magistrates). Here they

could debate on

such problems as building country

roads, bridges

and dipping tanks for their stock, suit¬

able sites for their

huts etc. and taxing themselves

fr,i- thpsfí nroier.ts.

It is clear from the above that the driving force behind

these racial laws is the profit motive of a capitalist

society.

It has nothing whatsoever to do with hatred

of Blacks by the

Whites or the desire of the latter to annihilate the Black popu¬

lation, as some people

claim. Racism is

a

function of exploi¬

tation, It is an instrument for the most barbaric

oppression,

cruel and intensive exploitation. Little wonder

that imperia¬

lists the world _over,

obtain about the highest profits for in¬

vestments in South Africa - hence their support of

that country

through

thick and thi,n«

There is no principled difference between

the policy of

segregation enacted by

the English and the apartheid of the

Boers now in power. The aim is the same.

They differ only in

method. The modus operandi of the

impersonal British imperia-,

list was: create a set of

conditions which will of itself force

a people to do

what they want. Thus the creation of the Reserves,

too small to provide a living for

the Blacks

was

calculated to

force the African people to come

"voluntarily" to enslave them¬

selves to an industrial machine. The

feudal Boers

on

the other

hand, believe

in the

use

of the sjambok (whip) to force a

"kaffir" to do their bidding. In

the

course

of time, however,

the Boers became integrated into

the capitalist system. With

a boorish ( ^or is it

Boerish) sophistication, they combined both

methods to produce a vicious

system of government whose policy

they call

apartheid. On the foundation laid by previous English

governments,

they systematically built what is today a concen¬

tration camp for the Black ^man, a

South African Belsen. Statis¬

tics on infant mortality are no longer

published in South Africa.

But a while ago a

conscientious Medical Officer of Health affirmed

that 63% of all African children born in

the municipal

area

of

Port Elizabeth died before reaching the ^age

of five

years

of

diseases connected with

malnutrition alone. We do not know what

percentage of the

Jewish people survived the genocide in the

Belsens of Hitlerite Germany.

With the growth of industry, commerce

and mining together

with rapid development of

the country

as a

whole, three main

factors emerged causing deep concern

to the herrenvolk (master

race) rulers. They are:

(a) an acute shortage of labour;

(b) the growing

political consciousness of the

African population and;

(c) The proletarianisation

of the African workers»

By this time

roughly two-thirds of .the African popula¬

tion was permanently living

outside the "reserves". Of thé

remaining one-third, more

than 50% of all able-bodied men, at

any given

time of the

year,

were temporarily away from their

home in the "Reserves" working as

migrant labourers in the mines,

towns and ^on the

white

farms.

The problem of

supplying labour to an expanding economy

became priority number one

and had to be tackled vigorously.

Each party that came

to

power

turned its attention to the

"Native Reserves" with the sole purpose

of squeezing out more

labourers. With this in view

innumerable proclamations were

issued by the Governer

General (now the President of the Republic

of South Africa). All such

Proclamations had the force of

law as if they had been

passed by Parliament. The most sinister

of these was the so-called

Rehabilitation Scheme

^-

a fraudulent

piece of law

calculated to reduce the people to abject poverty.

Under the Proclamation, they

enforced the culling of stock,,

which meant that the peasant had

to dispose of all their cettle,

sheep, horses

etc. beyond

a

stipulated figure,» In some areas

this figure was

fixed at six beasts per family. These may

consist of three head of

cattle,

a

horse and two sheep# Since

the peasants depended on

subsistence agriculture, how were they

to till their plots of land? In

addition to this, a new

regulation was

promulgated whereby only the head of a family may

be allotted a piece of arable

land if and when available. Since

all available land was already

occupied, there

were no

prospects

for the younger

generations

ever

getting allotments even when

they eventually

married. The net result was that with every

succeeding generation, the

population increase only served to

swell the Sow of the labour force to

the cities, the mines

and the white farms. Today, in

practically all the cities in

South Africa, the Blacks

exceed the Whites in numberso Of

course, they do not

live in the cities or towns but in locations

situated on the outskirts and

surrounded by barbed wire; loca¬

tions from which they may not go

in

or

out without a pass to

prove that they

have been granted permission to reside there for

as long as they are

in white employment. Consequently in

proctically all branches of economic activity, the Africans,

Coloured people and Indians constitute by far the majority of the

workers.

Industrialism cannot co-exist with tribal organisations

with its economy» Capitalism imposes on society its own modes of production, its own norms and social

relationships. The whole

social fabric of tribalism is disrupted giving place to new so¬

cial organisations, industrial and political. By its very nature capitalism creates an unbridgable gulf between the

capitalists and

the workers due to irreconcilable interests of the two basic

classes in society. Accumulation of capital ^can only be*

achieved

through the usurpation of the

workers'

labour power.

This is to;-

say the capitalists as á class

exist and increase their riches by

thelexploitation of the working class. There

is

of course an

in¬

termediary class which does not concern us at

the moment, the

petty bourgeois - teachers,

doctors, petty traders etc. which is

as a rule not concerned in the production of surplus value,

the

source of all riches. By and large, the

exploited and oppressed

develop. their ^own organisations in

defence of their class

interests. The workers organise trade unions

for collective bar¬

gaining and fighting for

higher

wages,

better conditions of work,

shorter hours etc» The oppressed nationalities

form political

organisations against oppression. Faced with

the growing

consc¬

iousness among the Blacks in South

Africa,

the

herrenvolk rulers

took drastic steps to ward off the danger.

All industrial strikes

by African workers under any

conditions,

were

declared illegal.

African trade unions were not recogniseu by law and later

banished

altogether. But this did:not stop

workers from going

on

strikes.

It was inevitable that landlessness of the peasantry

in the

"Reserves" the miserably low wages and shocking

conditions of work,

must give rise to the

idea that they suffered all these disabili¬

ties because they were Black - the

beginning of nationalism.

Proletarianization of the Black workers was a factor

fraught

with tremendous potential and

calamitous hazards for the oppressors.

A national struggle led by the

proletariat must of necessity lead

not only to the overthrow

of the colour-bar but to the abolition of

classes. Praconian measures had to be taken to

prevent this danger

But what? It is of the very essence of

capitalism that it must

4

create an ever increasing proletariate The White proletariat is

infinitesimal for the requirements of the South African economy.

Even the Black workers already settled in the urban areas have to

be supplemented by migratory labour. The migrant labourers who are shunted back and forth, carry with them not only their labour

power but their powers, of observation. What they learn in the

towns quickens their minds and adds a new dimension to their think¬

ing. Having observed how their brothers and sisters in the towns

form organisations to solve their problems, they too, formed, similar

bodies amongst the peasants in defence of their stock which was

being culled and against other oppressive measures. The traffic

of ideas and influence was not a one-way traffic. Large numbers

of the Blacks who have been living in the towns for many years still considered that their "homes" were in the "Reserves" where

their relatives continue to live. Their rightlessness in the

urban areas where they were not allowed even to buy a house or hut

to live in, re-enforced the nostalgic feeling for their ancestral

homes in' spite of its abject poverty. They were thus vitally

interested in what was being done to their people in the rural areas.

Every crisis or peasant revolt followed by a massacre was

retailed

to them by the migrant labourers with all the details of

police

or army brutality. The mood of the people

in

the

"Reserves"

was conveyed to the people in the ^towns. Likewise the

militancy

of the workers at a given time was transmitted to the

villagers.

Migrant labourers became a connecting

link

between town

and country.

The fascist rulers decided to tackle the problem at the

âource. Permanent settlements of Black workers in urban areas must be abolished. All Black workers wherever they are, must be

turned into migrant labourers. Froneman, Deputy

Minister of Justice,

Mines and Planning, put it thus:

"We are trying to introduce a migratory labour pattern

as far as possible in every sphere. That

is

in

fact

the entire basis of our policy as far as the white

economy is concerned, namely a system

of migratory

labour."

Botha, the rabid

racist functionary emphasizing the

same

point said;

"As far as I am concerned the ideal conditions would be

if we could succeed in due course in having all Bantu present in the White areas on a

basis

of

migratory

labour only". (Barbara

Rogers)

The growth of a class—consci^ous Black

proletariat

was

linked

In the minds of the harrenvolk rulers with the growth of

Nationalism.

In an attempt to achieve the

impossible task of halting the natural

development, they had to pass a

whole series of seemingly unrelated

legislative measures.

The Group Areas Act divided the- whole coun¬

try into areas for

the settlement of different ethnic groups —

the Whites, Africans,

Indians and the Coloured population» Under

the Act, the whole of

the so-called Republic of South Africa was

declared a White Group Area with

the exception of little enclaves

dotted all over the country to be

known

as

Dantu Homelands or

Bantustans. Their combined

geographic extent is 13% of the whole

country for the

accommodation of 86% of the population» With a

stroke of the pen the

whole Black population became foreigners in

the country of their

birth

-

their motherland. The rulers knew

perfectly

well that it

was a

physical impossibility to cram 17,712,

000 Africans into 13% of the

land while 4,160,000 Whites owned the

rest of the country»

(The portion of the Coloured people and

Indians is too negligible even

to consider). The purpose of the

Act was to deprive the

Black people of any claim whatsoever to

South Africa, let alone

political or civic rights. Vorster under¬

lined this point when he

stated:

"It is true, that there are

blacks working for us.

They will

continue to work for us for generations,

in spite of the

ideal

we

have to separate them

completely.

Surely

we

all know that?

"The fact of the matter is: we

need them because they

work for us.».but the fact

that they work for us

can never - if one

accepts this

as

one's own criterion

one will be signing one's own

death sentence now

-

entitle them to claim

political rights. Not now, nor

in the future. It makes no

difference whether they

are here with any degree of permanency

or not...

Under no circumstances can we

grant them those ,poli¬

tical rights in our

territory, neither now nor ever", (cit)

This statement coming from

the horse's mouth leaves no room

for any doubt

that the Bantustans were established to ward off the

inevitable, namely

the granting of full democratic rights to the

Black population of

South Africa. Verwoerd puts it in his own

inimitable way as "buying

+"he White man his freedom and the right

to retain domination in

what is his country." Vorster, supported

by his

minions, reassures the faint-hearted and the doubting

Thomases that Blacks

will always be in the White areas as labourers.

The Bantustans remain what

the Reserves have always been — reser —

voirs of labor. But now

there is this difference that they serve

also as means to

facilitate the transformation of the whole of the

black labour force

throughout South Africa into migrant labourers.

Every African

wherever he

or

she is, in town or country,

is presumed to

belong to one or other of the Bantustans. If he

loses his job he

is immediately an illegal immigrant. He is not

permitted to

look for other employment. He must return to his

homeland. Many find

that they know nobody there since their pa¬

rents or

grandparents migrated to the towns before they were born.

They

certainly will find no employment nor means of support in

their so-called homelands.

A close look at the

Bantustans reveals ^a bleak picture of

dire proverty,

deliberately maintained as,a matter of official

policy.

We have mentioned above that their total extent is only

13% of the land area

of South Africa. Of this 75% is mountainous,

rugged

hill,

very

broken and eroded, (30% of it badly eroded).

Only 25% is

suitable for cultivation. Even before the Bantustans

were officially

proclaimed, the Tomlinson Commission had reported

that 25% of the

peasants in these areas owned no cattle at all

and 36% owned less

than 5 head of cattle per farmer. On the aver¬

age

African farmers had 5 sheep and goats each. This was before

the effective

application of the diabolical "Rehabilitation Scheme"

which compelled the

people to drastically reduce their stock, a

measure that created

untold suffering. May it be said also that it

was the root cause of

most of the peasant revolts in recent decades

of this later. -

.•

Tomlinson*s Report

gives the estimated annual income per

capita in

the "Reserves" as R25.8 in 1954. With earnings sent in

from white areas

(migrant labourers) it was R48. This had not

changed since

1936. In 1969 the per capita income was R37. making

a total of R53.

(about 73 dollers ) when earning from white areas

are added. Taking

into account, inflation and population increase,

this represents a

fall in real income. It is self-evident that

under these

conditions, people must seek other means to supplement

their incomes.

Little wonder that the permanent residents of the

Bantustans are

mainly old

men,

women and children. The government

policy

of opening border industries will not improve the situation

in the Bantustans.

For the industries are across its frontiers,

in the white area.

This factor alone emphasizes the official in¬

tent,

namely, that Bantustans must not be and never will be allowed

to develop into

self—sufficient entities. They will always remain

reservoirs of cheap

black labour. They are the dumping grounds,

the

grave-yard of all those who have been thrown out of the white

area as being no longer productive and therefore redundant. Under this category fall all those thousands of young men whose lungs

have been choked with miners' phthisis.

As the South African economy developed from a mainly agri¬

cultural and mining to ^an industrial _onej the Black population was drawn into the vortex of capitalist production which swept aside all tribal norms and relationships. Nationalism began to take root and the first tentative steps towards the formation of Trade Unions

were visible in the towns. (A detailed account is given in "The Awakening of ^a People" by I.B. Tabata, published by Bertrand Russel Peace Foundation for Spokesman Books). The "children with human minds" were no longer satsfied with the Bungas where they were allowed to debate problems of road building and hut siting. Al¬

though the geographic area of the "Reserves" was maintained, the political institutions had to be changed. The Bungas were abolished giving place to Tribal Authorities. Under the Act, tribal units

with government appointed chiefs were created by law. To combat the growth of peoples' organisations, the chiefs ^were given unli¬

mited _{powers over} their "subjects". Common law was withdrawn.

Every commond of the chief had the force of law. Whoever dis- obtjb*d it ^was indicted and convicted

in

the

Courts presided

over by White magistrates. A chief, ^on being told that a

magistrate

in¬

tended to visit an inaccessible _area, could order that on a speci¬

fic day all schools in the area be closed and

the teachers, child¬

ren, parents (men and

women)

must construct a

road

to

enable the

magistrate's car to go to the

required place. This state of affa¬

irs enabled the government to use the

chiefs

as

instruments for

carrying out a number of their nefarious schemes.

The chiefs

became agents for recruiting migrant labour to

the mines and White

farms. They were used also as instruments for

enforcing "the

Strangulation law", the iniquitous

Rehabilitation Scheme. Nothing

could have been more calculated to bring hatred upon their,.heads.

It was the application of this Scheme that was

the immediate

cause

of most peasant revolts in the last two and

ahalf decades.

The all-African Convention which initiated the formation of

the Non-European Unity Movement

(now

the

Unity Movement of South

Africa) came out in full support of the struggle of the

peasantry

against the Rehabilitation Scheme

and issued

a

pamphlet "The Reha¬

bilitation Scheme ^- a Fraud", exposing all

the machinations of the

Scheme. This was the first time that the Convention caught the ear

Nlfl H

of the peasants» Let me pause here to give as an example, a perso¬

nal experience which illustrated firstly the militancy of the pea¬

santry at that time and secondly, how a seemingly unimportant event

can fan the flame of revolt, in the same way as a spark falling on dry tinder can start a conflagration

Every year, for more than a decade, I used to undertake

poli¬

tical tours in the Transkei and Ciskei "Reserves", In the year

1948, I was arrested in Mount Ayliff

(South Pondoland)

after addres¬

sing the biggest meeting of my life, held on the mountain-side.

It so happened that the people in the area were at that time, up in arms against the culling of their cattle. The meeting itself

was illegal and the authorities knew about it beforehand. But no policeman would dare to go to that meeting and come back

alive.

They waited concealed along the main road, miles away until the people dispersed and arrested me while I was having lunch at a teacher's house. I was charged with incitement. The news of my arrest immediately spread and the peasants took up arms that same' night with the intention of rescuing me. It took all the powers of persuasion of their leader, to stop them from engaging in battle

with the police that day. Afterwards, when the dust settled down, they gave him a name "Sindisigazi"

(the

saviour of

bloodshed).

On

the day of the trial, in spite of their leaders' injunction to the contrary, the peasants from far and wide came on horseback and on

foot, armed with assegaais and sticks to the hearing. Before enter¬

ing the village town they hid their weapons in the bushes. They

were convinced the trial was a farce and _my conviction was a fore¬

gone conclusion. They were going to rescue the prisoner by force.

The African clerks at thé magistrate's Court informed me beforehand

that the peasants were coming to Court in their numbers. And we decided amongst ourselves that I should demand to be tried in the vernácula^ so that the people could follow the proceedings. Thus

the Court was forced to obtain the services of an interpreter. Our

case was that the Rehabilitation Scheme could not be enforced by

law unless the people themselves or through their local chiefs had accepted it after consultation. In acquitting me, the magistrate

made a long speech

lasting

over an hour. Addressing himself to the peasantry he expained that although the Scheme was not a law, it

had the force of law in all those areas where the chiefs had accepted it. Since the people of Mt. Ayliff had not been properly consulted

the accused was found not guilty of incitement. Within a few days

the news had travelled throughout the length and breadth of the

H

Transkei. But the peasants everywhere carefully omitted that part of the verdict which did not suit them and reported only that the Rehabilitation Scheme was not a law, enforceable by the Courts»

From then on, the people with one accord, including those who had

been misled into accepting it, now summarily rejected it. This brought about a state of confrontation between the peasants and the government. Fearing the adverse consequences of the failure of the so-called Rehabilitation Scheme on the supply of migrant labour, the government let loose terror on thq population. In village after village and even whole districts the people defend¬

ed?' their cattle against culling, drove away stock inspectors and cut down the fences that were erected in the prosecution of the

scheme. In some areas they killed the chiefs together with the leading quislings (traitors) of the old Bungas. The wave of re¬

sistance spread down the Transkei, swung up to Witsieshoek in the Orange Free State, the Boer stronghold, where it was drowned in

blood by the army. The bravery of the people, once aroused, is

unbelievable. Às if acting independently of the defenceless

people, the tidal wave once more gathered momentum. It turned north¬

wards to Zeerust in the Transvaal where the army decided to put an

end to it once and for all. The army blockaded the whole area, allowing no one, not even returning residents or

journalists to

enter or leave the district. By Proclamation, they decreed that

anyone who failed to report the presence of a stranger

in the

area,

of anyone who reported what was going on, was guilty of an

offence.

Meanwhile they massacred the people and unleashed

unt-cld nrutality.

Fortunately some resident white missionary

in

an

understandably

restrained book subsequently recorded the

atrocities in

a manner

that was obviously a pale reflection

of the realities. But for

this account, the world at large

would

never

have had

an

inkling of

what took place there. Many people

together with the "recalcitrant"

chief fled to what was then Bechuanaland. No sooner was

that

episode supposed to

be

over

than the subterranean current returned

to the Northern Transkei at the

beginning of the sixties there

to burst out with greater ferocity

in Pondoland spilling over to

Natal and across to Emigrant

Tembuland, Matanzima's area. Those

quisling chiefs

who escaped death took refuge in Police camps.

After some time, they

would return by devious routes to their

"Courts" in the day only to return

before sunset to the Police

barracks where they spent the

night. Army nnits were permanently

stationed in barracks situated

in strategic position in the

"Reserves" especially in

Pondoland. It

was

the nefarious

*

12

activities of these

units with their trigger-happy propensities

that gave rise

to the myth of the numerous so-callèd"1 faction

fights

throughout the "Native Areas" in the early seventies.

It became palpably

clear that the Bantu Authorities could

not stem the growth

of nationalism. A new approach was neanae^ry

and new names for

old institutions were evolved. The "Reserves"

were now called

Bantustans

^-

the Homelands of the Black population.

The very names were a

recognition of the fact that nationalism

could not be

destroyed and therefore an attempt had to be made to

contain it and

divert it from demanding its proper place within

the body

politic of South Africa. The African people were to be.

encouraged to

develop

a

pride and seek self-expression in what was

called their

Homeland. The old village Bungas were amalgamated

into what were now known as

Bantustans parliaments. Naturally,

the "children"

with "human minds" were now given greater respon¬

sibilities and a

wider

scope

to debate a variety of subjects to

keep them

occupied. The masses were not deceived. On the very

first day that

the first so-called parliament was promulgated,

the people

dubbed it variously as a "dummy", "toy parliament" or

"baboons'

parliament". To this day they refer to then as such,

the basic

position of the masses in South Africa remains in tacit

sullen

oppdsition to the Bantustans, This is what lies behind the

rejection of the impending so-called ind«rc**d»rvre by all the

quisling chiefs except Mutanzima who, incidentally was awarded the

title of

Paramount Chief because he was the first to accept, tív,

Bantustan

against strong opposition by the Tembus.

THE CLASS STRUGGLE AND" THE NATIONAL MOVEMENT

I must state at this point that I am a committed parti-

dr..,? y~ïy.i " 1 ■ '•

cipant in the struggle• My approach, therefore, is neither

academic nor impartial» I see the nature of the struggle and

the solution of the problems facing us, through the spectacles

of the organization to which I belong.

South Africa is to day commonly referred to as the pole¬

cat amongst the comity of nations:. At the United Nations it

sticks out like a sore-thumb, an embarrassment even to Western imperiqlism which created it and is obliged to support it. It

is an enigma that appears to be outside the ken of the modern

world. How did this come about?

We have said above that Capitalism the world over creates

its own institutions, organises society around the means

of

pro¬

duction, splitting the populations into two

main mutually

oppos¬

ing classes, the working class and

the capitalist thus imposing

a uniformity in its basic structure. Nevertheless each

country

has its. own past history,

its

culture,

traditions and religion

which impose special features on the development of

local capi¬

talism, This history of Europe, the conquerors of the world

is

vastly different from that of the conquered continents.

Conse¬

quently the development of capitalism in these

continents

followed different paths. England, the pioneer of

capitalist

parliamentarism, evolved its system over a span

of centuries,

passing through the prolonged period of

the guilds which led to

the manufacturing industry, thus making the city

the

power

centre

of the bourgeosie. It was this slow growth

which is mainly

re¬

sponsible for that peculiar

conservatism characteristic of British

politics as expressed in their

belief'in gradualism

or

evolution

as opposed to

revolution;

a

characteristic which has permeated

"even the working class. This does not mean

that the English

bourgeosie did not engage in

violent revolutions. On the

^con¬

trary their history

abounds with violence, beheading their kings

and murdering their families and supporters

without the slightest

qualm. Whereas the French

bourgeosie fought their revolution to

a finish, destroying the

nobility, bringing the two basic classes

the emerging working class face to

face with the capitalists,

the English bourgeosie on the other hand, made a marriage of

concenience with the aristocracy, and kept a constitutional

monarch as a symbol of uniting the nation with the _{express purpose} of blurring and blunting the class conflict.

With the rise of imperialism, Europe conquered nations

in search of markets. With her export of capital and introduction

of prototypes of Her mode of production, she disrupted the economies of the conquered countries. In this _way she sought

to create world in her own image - a world which was to be an extension of her economy and subordinated to it.

South Africa cannot be properly understood unless we take into account those aspect of its history which give it its

specific character. The first is that it was invaded by two distinct _conquerors who were at different stages of development.

The English who were mainly responsible for the defeat of the Africans came from an expanding capitalist system whose driving

force was the profit motive. The feudal Boers, having fled

from Europe as heretics, were looking for a new Canaan» Under the banner of Calvinism they set out to conquer the indigenous people and carry out the injections of the Old Testament:

"When the Lord thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it, and hath cast out many nations.»»»

thou shall make no coinranat with them, nor show mercy unto them;

neither shalt thou make marriage with them." The impact of these forces was to have disastrous effects on the life of the

indigenous population. The two sets of conquerors combined to rob the Africans of the whole of their land at the point of the SWcufd' and forced thom. to live in tiny pockets aottod over the country. They became helotc in the land of their birth.

The discovery of diamonds and gold in the second half

of the 19th century brought about a dramatic change in the life

od South Africa» International finance capital poured in,

followed by a swarm of fotune-seekers, adventurers and brigands,

The mine became the hub of all economic activities. Trade boomed, manufacturing industries sprang up

overnight; railways

and roads were speedily built up and country was set for a leap

into a modern industrial _power.

The point to be remembered is that South

Africa

as a

state which is today comparable to industrial Europe, did not

go through the long and

turbulent.period

of

development from

the Reformation to the formation of national states. It escaped

the battle ofideas and the growth of social institutions which

15

accompanied each stage in the

evolution.. Above all it did not

have a bourgeois revolution..

It emerged without precedents.

It imported

everthing including its parliamentary system.

With its gold and

diamonds,it bought from

overseas

all its

consumption goods, its farming

implements and seed, its rails,

machinery for the

extraction of minerals, in short, everything

except black labour-power and

land which it had grabbed from

the Blacks. The only other thing the

Herrenvolk relers did not

import was the human

relationships between themselves and the

Blacks. This was an indigenous product.

This had to be kept

pure, undiluted

and zealously guarded from any contamination

by the outside

world.

South African industry is highly advanced.

Its technology

matches that of some European

countries. In the field of

mining, it ^uses some of

the most advanced machinery in the world

And yet its manual

labour is amongst the most backward. In

fact, the mines

prefer illiterate workers preferably tribal mi¬

grant labour.

Herein lies the source of the enigma in South

African politics -

economics sophistication side by side with

primitive feudal

relations.

Since gold is the

measuring yard-stick for the world mone¬

tary system. South

Africa

was

assured of a ready market for

every ounce

she produced. (Today the biggest producer in the

Western world, estimated at

85%)• It

was

inevitable that any

government

in

power

would regard gold production as priority

number one. All other economic

activities

are

subordinated to

it and their growth on it. To

the herrenvolk rulers, gold was

their god,aMoloch who

had to.be fed with human flesh, black

flesh. The cost to human life, was

of

no

consequence to them.

For the English section of

the bourgeosie accept as a norm that

under capitalism, super

profits

are

made out of blood especially

in the colonies. As for the Boers

S

They

had

no

scruples. For

did they not learn from

the scriptures that Moloch was a Canaan-

ite idol to whom children were

sacrificed. The numerous laws

passed over the years

to

smoke

the Blacks out, of their allotted

enclaves provide ample

testimony to the ruthlessness of the new

ruling class. The sum

total of their effect is racist oppres¬

sion' and intorerable suppression

without

any

relief.

16 m

THE PLIGHT OF DLACK WORKERS IN SOUTH AFRICA

We have already shown that official policy is to turn every African worker into a migrant labourer, irrespective ^of

whether he resides in town or countryside. It is estimated that 60% of the black labour force today are migrants» The purpose of this measure is three-fold; to prevent the growth

of a settled proletariat; tò control and direct the flow of labour to specified ^{areas and} to depress _wages. A few facts will suffice to illustrate our point. In the "Imperialist Conspiracy in Africa," I wrote: "The gold mining industry is

the biggest employer in the whole country. In 1972 its bill of wages for Blacks according to the Financial Mail was R95 million. Its profits before tax were R548 million and this

was R212 million or 63% more than that of 1971. Profits made

by the industry are more than five times the bill of wages

paid to the black employees. This increase alone in profits

over the previous year is more than twice the wages of the Blacks," Super exploitation of such intensity is hard to beat.

We may mention here that aithouyh a nnv.ru JLo llloofotl and lays them open to prosecution, African mine workers are never arrested. They are simply shot down and driven back into the mines. Work underground must keep at full-speed, 24 hours

a day, otherwise the mine becomes flooded.

In spite of the brutal law enacted to force them to work,

The Africans avoided going to the mines with the result that the industry had to depend to a very great extent on contract labour recruited from adjacent states0 Financial Mail 17th

June 1975 states: "As of December 31st 1974, South African Blacks comprised only 70,996 out of the Blacks on the gold

min^s ~ligure was down 8,000 in October of last

year." The same paper continues: "The _{mines at}

present only have about 74% of their underground complement, ana «îui the shortage of Black miners is beçominy moro and more "serious." We may add here that the Malawians constitute 30%, the biggest com¬

plement of the total labour force. With the independence of

neighbouring countries, the position is not going to improve.

On the contrary, it must deteriorate. Following the plane crash

on April 4th 1974 killing 74 of her nationals, Malawi stopped

all recruitment of contract mine labour. Vorster may beg, bully

and bluster. He will never receive the full complement. The truth of the matter is that Malawi is potentially a rich