Are you mystified? Well, allow me to enlighten you!
We are watching ordinary South Africans riot as they see Jacob Zuma tried and sentenced to jail for corruption. If you live in the UK or in Europe or in the USA then your media cannot explain to you why this is happening. Why are people defending Jacob Zuma? As Adam Curtis put it, when the media doesn’t inform us properly about what is happening then all we can do is throw up our hands, shrug and say: ‘Oh dear!’
Great Britain, the USA, Australia and New Zealand are now full of embittered white South Africans who left because Apartheid ended. Don’t let them bend your ear and drip poison into it, either. They are not a reliable source of information on South Africa. When you meet them at work and in pubs or bars, remember who they are and take what they say with a big pinch of salt.
Jacob Zuma earned the respect of the majority of ordinary South Africans the hard way. Jacob Zuma was jailed for 15 years on Robben Island from 14th February 1964 to March 1979. After his release he organised internal resistance for two years and then, after setting up ANC intelligence networks, he joined the Central Committee of the ANC.
Great Britain, the USA, Australia and New Zealand are now full of embittered white South Africans who left because Apartheid ended.
In comparison to Nelson Mandela (may he rest in peace) Jacob Zuma is what the Chinese would call “an uncarved block”. Although Nelson Mandela was a high-ranking member of the Tembu Royal House who rejected tribal customs and ran away from an arranged marriage. Jacob Zuma, on the other hand, had no formal education. He was self taught, and he behaved and lived like a traditional Zulu chief with six wives and twenty children. In contrast, Nelson Mandela studied law at the University ofWitwatersrand and set up his own Law practice.
Perhaps it was partly this unpolished traditionalism that helped Zuma in the early 1990s, as ANC Chairperson of the Southern Natal Region, persuade the Zulus to turn away from bloody civil war, and to persuade Inkatha to sign peace accords and channel its energies into democratic competition in the elections of 1994. It was not Mandela who stopped the civil war, but Zuma. I can hear some of you now.
Machete and spear-wielding Inkatha party members massacred ANC supporters in Boipatong- June 1992
In succeeding by preventing the civil war, Zuma sabotaged the last gasp effort of the Apartheid regime, in collusion with Inkatha, to Balkanise South Africa: to shatter the new born ‘Rainbow Nation’ and set up black enclaves and white enclaves.
But, five years later, Zuma attracted the enmity of the neoliberal wing of the ANC being groomed by foreign and domestic capital, Thabo Mbeki and Cyril Ramaphosa. This enmity started after he began to speak out against Mbeki’s neo-liberal policies and the failure of Thabo Mbeki’s government to redress the structural problems of inequality created by Apartheid.
Zuma sabotaged the last gasp effort of the Apartheid regime, in collusion with Inkatha, to Balkanise South Africa
The riots that you see happening now in South Africa are as a result of these failures. Don’t blame Zuma for the structural inequalities. In criticising neoliberalism, Jacob Zuma, nominally a socialist, also attracted the support of many people on the left in South Africa in the ANC and the Trade Union movement (COSATU) and in the South African Communist Party. The knives came out. Jacob Zuma was now targetted by forces at home in South Africa and abroad.
It was no surprise then when an orchestrated campaign against Jacob Zuma began. Zuma came to represent the alternative to Mbeki. The “Zuma Matter” – as it was known in South Africa – began with a press conference given by Thanda Mngwengwe, the Head of the Scorpions.
Zuma attracted the enmity of the neoliberal wing of the ANC being groomed by foreign and domestic capital, Thabo Mbeki and Cyril Ramaphosa.
Subsequently, the corruption charges brought against Jacob Zuma were dropped. But the attempts to stop him from reaching the presidency continued. On the following two occasions the charges were dropped against Zuma because, according to Judge Chris Nicholson and then Mokotedi Mpshe (head of the National Prosecuting Authority), the judicial process against Zuma was manipulated by Thabo Mbeki.
In the second instance, the accusation was backed up with evidence: recordings of Thabo Mbeki caught discussing how to make political capital out of the Zuma Matter with Leonard McCarthy, the former head of the disbanded and discredited elite anti-crime unit, the Scorpions – initially responsible for bringing Zuma to trial and investigating him.
The opposition appealed and, with the help of judge Azar Cachalia, suspected (and with good reason) of having a personal vendetta against Zuma, and judge Louis Harms, (who conducted the “Harms Commission” in the 1980s in London which effectively exonerated the Apartheid regime of war crimes), they tried to reopen the case.
An enormous effort went into magnifying the charges against Zuma to discredit him. The tactic of domestic corporations and international agencies attempting to get rid of Zuma were successful and Zuma was recalled and replaced by Cyril Ramaphosa, a darling of the corporations. Remember, Zuma din’t lose in an election.
This tactic of highlighting questionable behaviour and corruption by representatives of foreign governments played no part in British foreign policy, for example, when it came to the one billion dollar bribe paid to Saudi officials by a British company to get a contract. But when it came to Zuma, and how he benefitted from being the President of South Africa, it became a priority of the British government to help take Zuma down. He was an opponent of rampant neoliberalism, and, as they perceived it, of British strategic interests in South Africa.
So, when representatives of the western media like Simon Jenkins and Simon Tisdall, and organisations like the Guardian and the BBC sided with the opposition to Jacob Zuma, it is probable that they were not offering high-minded independent opposition to a corrupt and discredited South African politician at all, but behaving as part of the British media-security apparatus.
There is a contradiction. If you don’t take the Guardian or the BBC seriously when it comes to reporting or commenting on socialism in the UK, then why should you take them seriously when it comes to their take on politics in South Africa? Now, because of their lopsided reporting on Jacob Zuma, they have no way of explaining convincingly what is happening.
An earlier version of this article resulted in Ros Taylor, the former Law Editor at the Guardian banning me from writing for that newspaper. It was probably a decision taken by several editors. I am grateful for the help of Dominic Tweedie in the writing of this article.
Phil Hall is a college lecturer. He is a committed socialist and humanitarian. Phil was born in South Africa where his parents were in the ANC. There, his mother was imprisoned and his father was the first journalist from a national paper to be banned. Phil grew up in East Africa and settled in Kingston-upon-Thames. He has also lived and worked in the Ukraine, Spain, Mexico, Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi. Phil has blogged for the Guardian, the Morning Star and several other publications and he has written stories for The London Magazine. He started Ars Notoria in May 2020.
A prefacing note: On 31st January it will have been exactly 13 years since Tony Hall passed away here in South Africa. A bit over a year before his passing, Tony penned a 14-page document that he titled, ‘2020 Vision for Southern Africa’ . While the document did get circulated amongst smaller groups of Tony’s family, friends and comrades it was (to my knowledge) never published anywhere and has not been formally engaged/responded to, publicly. Late last year, Tony’s eldest son Phil asked me to write a piece on the document given the arrival of 2020 and the approaching anniversary of his father’s passing. I am more than happy to offer this brief engagement with Tony – in the same vein that I engaged him in person after he had provided me with a copy in 2007. May Tony’s soul continue to rest in peace and his spirit continue to live on in the thoughts and actions of the many whom he influenced and touched.
Tony Hall was a giant of a man; not just because of his imposing physical presence but more importantly because his was a principled, committed and loyal life. A significant part of each of those life attributes were given over to the organisation that Tony (and his life-long partner Eve) joined just after the Sharpeville massacre in March 1960 – the African National Congress (ANC).1
That ANC journey had begun for Tony when, as a young journalist with the Rand Daily Mail, he interviewed Nelson Mandela and covered the Treason Trial in the late 1950s. Soon, Tony and Eve’s home became a (secretly renowned) gathering place for movement leaders. Not surprisingly, this and other activities resulted in the apartheid authorities ‘listing’ the two
This foundational and life-long journey with the ANC, infused with all its attendant political, ideological and organisational characteristics, is absolutely central to understanding and interpreting the core content of Tony’s ‘2020 Vision’.
as members of a banned organisation. As opposed to the high probability of being arrested, tried and sentenced to lengthy prison terms, they packed up their belongings and, along with their three young boys, went into exile. It was to be 26 years before they would return home.
During those 26 years spent in Africa, Asia and Europe, Tony maintained his membership in and active support for, the ANC/Congress Movement. This saw him forge close relationships with many leaders and activists within the ANC and in other Southern African national liberation movements (NLMs) such as Mozambique’s FRELIMO and Angola’s MPLA, as well as volunteer as the production editor of the ANC journal Sechaba while in London. From the time that Tony returned to South Africa in 1990 until his passing, both he and Eve remained active members of the ANC through their local branches.
he [Tony Hall] always believed that there were enough good people in the ANC, particularly amongst the broader and older generation leadership to, as the document puts it, “return to the transformation of society, to lay the base for completing the emancipation of the people”
This foundational and life-long journey with the ANC, infused with all its attendant political, ideological and organisational characteristics, is absolutely central to understanding and interpreting the core content of Tony’s ‘2020 Vision’. Simply put, despite his increasing criticisms of the behaviour of some individuals and component parts of the ANC as well as of certain socio-economic policy choices made by the ANC-run post-apartheid government in the last few years of his life Tony, at heart and in practice, remained an ANC loyalist. The same applies, even if less directly and experientially, to other liberation movements in Southern Africa (most especially FRELIMO).
As my many conversations and debates with Tony serve to further confirm, he always believed that there were enough good people in the ANC, particularly amongst the broader and older generation leadership to, as the document puts it, “return to the transformation of society, to lay the base for completing the emancipation of the people”. Indeed, Tony locates his ‘2020 Vision’ in a “duty” of the ANC and associated Alliance2 leadership, who he believed still had the necessary moral authority and willingness to effect the needed changes.His plea to these leaders in the ‘2020 Vision’ is that they must act accordingly and do so immediately, through example and action.
Tony locates his ‘2020 Vision’ in a “duty” of the ANC and associated Alliance2 leadership, who he believed still had the necessary moral authority and willingness to effect the needed changes.
The ideas and policy recommendations that make up the majority of the document reflect both Tony’s own political-ideological and organisational journey as well as this ANC-specific leadership framing. More particularly, they reflect a positionality embedded in three decades of an exiled ANC (alongside other liberation movements in Southern Africa in the first two of those decades) in which a relatively small group of leaders (some of whom were in prison and/or underground in South Africa) took centre stage and amongst which a post-independent, ideological ‘middle of the road’ social democratic liberalism was preeminent.
They also reflect a hearkening back to a time in Sub-Saharan Africa when a strong, centralised state (run by ex-liberation / independence parties) driving a nationalist developmental agenda was seen as the preferred post-independence ‘model’ of governance. Further, they are largely embedded within certain ‘historic’ and core strategic and policy documents of the ANC such as the 1955 Freedom Charter, the 1988 Constitutional Guidelines and the 1993 Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP).
The ideas and policy recommendations (…) are largely embedded within certain ‘historic’ and core strategic and policy documents of the ANC such as the 1955 Freedom Charter, the 1988 Constitutional Guidelines and the 1993 Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP).
This is clear in Tony’s socio-economic proposals where he calls for the adoption of a Keynesian economic model (referenced by the restoration of the RDP) that incorporates, among other things:
a “capitalist/free enterprise market” with increased taxes for the rich and corporates
“public oversight” of the economy with necessary regulations and “public ownership” of state-owned enterprises (SOEs)
“nationalisation of all mines” with 55 % state ownership
the continued free movement of capital overseas and allowance for the holding of foreign personal accounts
a basic income grant for “all adult South Africans”
public ownership and delivery of essential services along with free basic services such as electricity and water to those who are officially categorised as “poor”3
Reflecting his embrace of the generally collegial as well as support and solidarity networks that existed in Southern Africa during the period in which various national liberation and more immediate post-independence struggles were waged, Tony proposed the “free movement of all SADC-born citizens in South Africa”. And yet in parallel, the underlying and often exclusionist nationalisms of those movements and struggles is also reflected in his proposal that “all illegal immigrants (should) be either deported or allowed to apply for 2-year work permit” and further, that “citizens only (should) own houses and land”.
Tony proposed “walls of remembrance … to acknowledge those who died in the struggle” as well as “special support for MK veterans”.
Consistent with that embrace, are Tony’s proposals in the sphere of culture and on foreign policy. In respect of culture, they further reflect the centrality of the ‘struggle years’ and a view in which the history of that struggle should be ‘told’ through formal remembrance and affirmation of those involved. Besides the naming of urban streets after ‘struggle heroes and martyrs in both SA and region as well as international supporters”, Tony proposed “walls of remembrance … to acknowledge those who died in the struggle” as well as “special support for MK veterans”.
The proposals on the foreign policy front retain and strengthen the embrace. First up is the dual call to “start negotiations for all SADC members to form the Federation of Africa South and East (FASE)” and, for the establishment of the ‘Southern African Liberation Movements Association (SALMA)’. Amongst other things FASE and SALMA will ensure that all member countries “follow a social charter and coordinated economic policies and allow free movement of people and trade”, where no party/government leader is “to serve more than two five-year terms” and where respective governments hold a majority “of all natural resources and infrastructure”. This is followed by more specific calls for the South African government “to renounce (the) neoliberal provisions of NEPAD4 and endorse an economic and social programme for Africa which returns to the provisions and strategies of the Lagos Plan of Action and the African Alternative Framework”. Added to this, the SA government should “strengthen relations with Russia” as well as South-South relations.
First up is the dual call to “start negotiations for all SADC members to form the Federation of Africa South and East (FASE)” and, for the establishment of the ‘Southern African Liberation Movements Association (SALMA)’
Even though some aspects of these proposals are no doubt informed by Tony’s critical appraisal of certain governance and policy performances of post-independent states in Southern Africa, they are more centrally, in context, shape and purpose, a nod back to the halcyon days of the continental Organisation of African Unity, more regional bodies such as the ‘East African Community’ as well as strong regional as well as international anti-apartheid and national liberation movements. That was a time when political solidarities and liberation party/movement connections were paramount, and where the dominant expectation was that once in state power, the NLMs would largely follow the promises of their stated democratic, socially progressive and internationalist politics/ideology.
While there are many other proposals in the document that are not mentioned here, their core thrust, and purpose is consistent with Tony’s historic positionality as earlier noted. It is that positionality that was imprinted on Tony’s political, ideological and organisational DNA. What this translated into was an understandable but ultimately contradictory relationship between belief and reality.
Although Tony very clearly saw – and was genuinely saddened by – the litany of governance failures, of ideological betrayal, of corruption and of personal moral degradation that had become so widespread across all ex-NLM parties and the post-independent states they ran, he still believed that it was possible for those same parties and people (most especially, the respective leaderships) to reclaim what he calls in the document, the “liberation project”. The fundamental problem though is that the reality had long destroyed the foundations for such a belief.
[Tony] still believed that it was possible for those same parties and people (most especially, the respective leaderships) to reclaim what he calls in the document, the “liberation project”
In this sense then, it is not that the ideas and policies contained in Tony’s ‘2020 Vision’ are to be dismissed. On the contrary, many of them speak directly to the “alternative” and the “dream” that both ordinary folk and liberation activists from the past and in the present embraced and continue struggling for. It is rather the vehicles that Tony remained attached and loyal to and which he saw as the ultimate carriers of the ‘Vision’ have, for a long time, simply not been capable of what he expects and asks of them. Indeed, even if there are some conjectural and individual part exceptions, those vehicles have, for an equally long time, become the main barriers to pursuing and potentially realising most of the ‘Vision’.
“socialism in our lifetime”. Regardless of the U-turns, the detours and the lost journeys, that is most definitely a vision worthy of new vehicles that can become a reality through our individual and collective ideas and practical struggles.
The document ends with the exhortation, “socialism in our lifetime”. Regardless of the U-turns, the detours and the lost journeys, that is most definitely a vision worthy of new vehicles that can become a reality through our individual and collective ideas and practical struggles. I have no doubt that Tony would agree.
1 At the time, formal ANC membership was only open to black Africans but in practical reality, its members were effectively constituted through a range of organisations. For example, the previously banned South African Community Party (SACP), the ‘Congress of Democrats’ and the ‘Transvaal Indian Congress’ among others, that fell under the umbrella of what was called the ‘Congress Movement’ and/or ‘Congress Alliance’. While the ANC was banned soon after the Sharpeville massacre, most of the remaining organisations in the ‘Congress Movement/ Alliance’ were banned in the ensuing two years.
2The ‘Congress Alliance’ has changed over the years to reflect shifting organisational realities. By the 1970s all of the previous ‘Congress Movement’ components, with the exception of the independent SACP, had been absorbed into the ANC in one form or another. The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) formed in 1983, then become the third formal member of the ‘Alliance’ and after 1994, the South African National Civics Association (SANCO) became the fourth official member.
3This specific proposal – to essentially adopt a state managed means-test to determine who is and is not “poor”, was and remains highly controversial and a continuing point of serious opposition from most of the poor themselves
4 The ‘New Economic Partnership for African Development’ – this was adopted at the 37th Summit of the OAU held in Lusaka, Zambia, in July 2001.
Dale T. McKinley is an independent writer, researcher and lecturer as well as research and education officer at the International Labour, Research and Information Group. He is based in Johannesburg, holds a PhD. in International Political Economy/African Studies and is a long-time political activist and has been involved in social movement, community and liberation organisations and struggles for over three decades. He is the author of four books and has written widely on various aspects of South African and international political, social and economic issues and struggles. Dale occasionally lectures at university level, is a regular speaker at various civil society and academic social and political conferences and events and is a regular contributor in the print media as well as commentator on radio and television.
A car arrived at Tony Hall’s funeral in 2008 with Aggie Msimang. It was sent by the ANC with a message of condolence from Jacob Zuma, ANC President, Kgalema Motlanthe ANC Secretary General, Sankie Mahanyele, Deputy Secretary General, Mendi Msimang, Treasurer General.
Aggie Msimang came to the three sons saying:“You can be assured that by tomorrow morning your father’s 2020 vision will be on the desk of every single ANC leader.” Did the leaders read it? As socialists, did they agree with the 2020 vision? To what extent have they achieved it?
Daring to dream, preparing to act Now is the mandate, now is the opportunity, now is the time. A Quixotic mix of policy guidelines and practical measures to remind us that there are alternatives
– there is a way.
by Tony Hallin 2008
It is the duty of the present generation of leadership, a very broad spectrum in itself – from exile, Robben Island, 1976, MK, COSATU, MDM, SACP and the Youth Leagues – to return to the transformation of society, to lay the base for completing the emancipation of the people. It cannot be left to the young people and coming generations, because they have not experienced the commitment, the sacrifice; they are drifting away from a sense of what national liberation means.
The leadership has time to restore and set all directions in place. It must start now. The situation requires moving away from wrong and dangerous steps, moving back to dynamic people-centred policies and actions. We can waste no more time on analysis and shocked revelations as a substitute for action. Never, since we became a democracy, has the political conjuncture been more openly and clearly described and outlined, in the organs of the ruling Alliance. Even within the mainstream media, often hostile to national liberation, there are clear critical analyses breaking through at times, of the runaway capitalism, elite empowerment and corporate dominance that is beginning to erode the liberation project.
Never has the popular mandate been stronger for resolute action towards meaningful socialist democracy. Never has there been, or will there be again, a collective leadership with a better historical record of commitment and sacrifice, energy and ability, to carry through what is already the most peaceful and massive social transformation in history.
Never has the need been more urgent to promote and complete the emancipation and cooperation of the people of South Africa, and the region.
Daring to dream, preparing to act.
In the following pages is a mix of indicative policy guidelines and practical actions, some in broadstroke, some in detail. Quixotic, eclectic, far from comprehensive, it is nonetheless informed by a vision that is attainable in practice – and crucial as the type of programme to rescue our society from greed and poverty.
Realising a 2020 vision for Southern Africa Immediate steps to be taken by a strengthened Tripartite Alliance of ANC, SACP and COSATU to complete the emancipation of our country and our region:
Economy
1. The Alliance to commit publicly to changing economic policy from monetarism to a Keynesian model, and to instruct Cabinet to act accordingly; endorsing:*
a) the commitment to a fair and open market, recognising the dynamic, innovative role free enterprise can play;*
b) free expression through varied and free – but not corporate-dominated – mainstream media, including public media; controls on advertising;*
c) commitment to strong government and public oversight, mediation and controls, to curb a free economy from becoming a casino economy.
2. Dismantle the GEAR type approach to the economy and restore the RDP.
3. Keep/restore the commanding heights of the economy including infrastructure and essential services, to the public sector, for example and specifically…
4. Restore the Steel industry to majority public ownership, compensating Mittal and other private companies on the basis of value after tax, and reduction of total compensation by the amount of extra profit made by charging ‘world prices’ plus transport, for locally produced steel.
5. Government and Unions each to make up 35 percent of Boards,30 percent to be private sector owned.
6. Directors’ income in all forms to be strictly limited. This formula and these proportions to be followed in all case.
7. Renationalise Sasol, and reduce prices for petrol and diesel, compensating by value after tax, and reduced by amount of overpricing for the past five years.
8. Keep/restore Transnet, Telkom, Eskom and Water in the public sector.
9. Embark on a rehabilitation of national railways, and scrap the Gautrain project.
10. In stages, reduce SAA’s intercontinental operations and expand internal hub and regional services.
11. Nationalise all mines – gold, coal, platinum and others – to 55 per cent state ownership, with NUM providing 20 percent of directorships, government 35 percent.
12. Directors and executive incomes/expenses in all public sector or parastatal institutions to be capped.
13. All foreign investment to be for a minimum of three years, only half original investment to be returned if withdrawn before that.
14. Continue present arrangements with regard to free movement of capital, overseas/foreign personal accounts etc.
15. Allow free movement of all SADC-born citizens in South Africa, with residence subject to two-year renewable work permits until qualifying after ten years for permanent residence permits and/or dual citizenship.
16. Reciprocal arrangements to be negotiated with and between all SADC countries.
Preventative maintenance is the ultimate virtue
17. Present regulations/arrangements be continued with regard to entry/immigration for all other foreign nationals.
18. Illegal immigrants (excluding SADC-born citizens) to be registered, and either deported immediately, or allowed to apply for work/temporary residence permits, subject to certified offers of work for two years, or holding of funds adequate for family living and sufficient for professional/entrepreneurial activity for five years.
19. Negotiate within SADC for free movement of capital and lowering of tariff barriers between all member states.
20. Citizens only to own houses and land.
21. All foreign ownerships to be converted to 50-99 year leases.
22. Encourage all citizens who wish to emigrate to leave South Africa.
23. Encourage white and other citizens who wish to stay and contribute to the country to do so, with offers of jobs-for-skills, pensions, support for entrepreneurial activity and good education and equal career prospects for their children.
24. Encourage immigration on the Australian model for all foreigners with needed skills and capital.
25. All public works and parastatal/public sector institutions at national and local levels to increase job recruitment, and to reduce and strictly control tendering, consultant employment, outsourcing and sub-contracting.
26. Corporate and upper level income tax to be increased.
27. Tax breaks to be increased for companies with active training and empowerment programmes.
28. All national, provincial and local government salaries to be nationally prescribed, capped and monitored by central government.
29. All farms deemed to be productive, with farm workers paid and housed to basic minimum legal standards, are excluded from government takeover, subject to periodic (3-5 year) inspections.
30. Where land claims by clans or individuals are deemed to be valid, claimants are paid out from funds which would be otherwise used to train and equip them to farm productively.
31. Valid claimants with farming experience/skills are assisted through transfers of unused/government land, or willing-buyer/seller deals, training upgrades, credit schemes, farming cooperatives and agricultural extension schemes.
32. Conservation areas are excluded from clan takeovers.
33. A Basic Income Grant (BIG) be provided to all adult SA citizens.
24. Free light and water be provided for all legally recognised high density/low income and farm labour housing.
25. All RDP housing estates and legal settlements be provided, pro rata, with a park, a civic/community centre, sports fields, a library and a spaza/small store shopping centre;these all to be built as public works schemes, employing small building teams under strict public works supervision; tenders, where necessary, be administered under strict central government supervision.
26. Technical/vocational and IT training institutes be increased and facilities and staff upgraded throughout the country, being given high status in education.
27. In these institutes, in classrooms, municipalities, in Eskom, Telkom, Transnet and other public utility buildings everywhere, a large slogan is put up:MAINTENANCE IS NEXT TO GODLINESS.PREVENTIVE MAINTENANCE IS THE ULTIMATE VIRTUE.
Culture
1.South African film, theatre, art and culture production to receive full subsidies.
2. All violent ritual, from unhygienic male circumcision and all female circumcision, to witch hunting, hut burning, casting bad spells and use of body parts be banned outright and heavily penalized.
3. The history and origins of traditional practices in all South African communities be researched and libraries and museums established in all traditional homelandswith collections and displays of literature, films, photographs, dance, art, crafts and artefacts.
Street names and monuments
1. Many street names in cities and major towns must be changedto do away with those of apartheid leaders and replace them with struggle heroes and martyrs.
2. It is timely to begin a major renaming exercise in time for the printing of new street maps for the many thousands of extra visitors and tourists during the World Cup period.
3. Johannesburg, for instance has some major streets and long highways with names of apartheid figures, from prime ministers to mere provincial administrators, on signs at every corner. Those to be replaced do not include such boer war generals or pre-apartheid leaders as Jan Smuts, Louis Botha, or General de Wet, or Dan Pienaar.
4. The names of DF Malan, JG Strydom, Hendrik Verwoerd, John Vorster and PW Botha should be restricted to minor streets in their birthplaces.
5. Lesser figures should appear nowhere, like Ben Schoeman and FC Odendaal, who named highways they ordered to be built, after themselves! They have had decades of undeserved prominence.It is high time that many more anti-apartheid heroes, and African heroes (mostly those deceased), be celebrated in major renamings:
6. The name of Mandela must not be tarnished by overuse at the behest of those seeking to occlude other struggle heroes. Outstanding among those still relegated or neglected after 12 years are:
Nnamdi Azikiwe, Murtala Mohammed, Thomas Sankara, Sekou Toure, Modibo Keita
11. Still to be publicly honoured are the many brave people who died for fighting apartheid, or had their moment of leadership in the apartheid era.
12. Those many whose names should be on streets, memorials, buildings around the country include (as they come to mind – you add others):
Solomon Mahlangu, Cassius Make, John Harris, Babla Saloojee, Ahmed Timol, Rick Turner, Neil Aggett, Griffiths and Victoria Mxenge, Matthew Goniwe, Sparrow Mkhonto, Fort Calata, Sicelo Mahauli, David Webster, Anton Lubowski, and so many others… Philip Kgosana at the front of the Cape Town anti-pass march, Tsietsie Mashinini, one of the 1976 Soweto leaders.Other leading anti-apartheid fighters to be honoured include JB Marks, Moses Kotane, Z K Matthews, Moses Mabida, Yusuf Dadoo, Jack and Ray Simons, Rusty and Hilda Bernstein, Jack and Rica Hodgson, Yusuf, Amina and Maulvi Cachalia, Dave Kitson, Harry Gwala, Alan Paton, Trevor Huddleston, Ambrose Reeves, Barney Desai, Cissie Gool (add your other choices…)
13. Some veteran South African freedom fighters have said that they don’t expect compensation for fighting in a good cause – but nor do they expect to be forgotten. There must be walls of remembrance around the country, as at least a partial redressing of the shameful neglect suffered by so many Umkhonto militants and other liberation soldiers – both the memory of those who died, and of those still living. The brief of the task force that has worked hard to find graves and identify missing militants, from the apartheid years, and from the third force killings, must be widened and strengthened, so that the name of every person who died or went missing in the struggle, appears in golden letters.
Some veteran South African freedom fighters have said that they don’t expect compensation for fighting in a good cause – but nor do they expect to be forgotten.
14. As MOTH (Memorable Order of Tin Hats) clubs and old age homes went up all over South Africa for (white) World War II veterans, and special suburban plots allocated, so MK and other liberation veterans must be registered and their families given pensions, and access to special community centres, clubs and site and service plots.
15. Corporates which were enriched by cheap labour through the years of white minority rule be called upon to finance these and other social initiatives.
Let the naming and renaming begin now!
16. There are whole suburbs in our cities with streets named after all Afrikaans poets and writers, or all Afrikaans artists. That is fine, but now is our time name other whole sets of streets after South African and African writers, musicians, artists, actors…of all races – and not just in settlement and housing estates, but major suburbs and cities.
17. Complete the research for names to go on the walls of remembrance!
Corporates which were enriched by cheap labour through the years of white minority rule be called upon to finance these and other social initiatives.
Law and Order
1. All accused of violent crime to the level of grievous bodily harm and more to be tried within three months, to be given no bail and if convicted, to receive mandatory long sentences.
2. All forms of gender and sex discrimination are outlawed, and full human rights protected, as in the Constitution.
3. Solitary confinement of prisoners to be banned.
4. Convicted prisoners to work 40 hours weeks at jobs useful to the economy and society, with an element of training for rehabilitation.
5. One major contributor to a culture of violence is the layer of hypocrisy and betrayal covering the recent past in our public life: that many people guilty of apartheid crimes of terror and murder, as leaders, as activists, walk free. Some self-admitted, like Craig Williamson, have profited in recent years from doing business in Angola, the same country in which in apartheid years his parcel bomb killed an ANC woman and her young son. Foot Soldiers of apartheid, again some self-admitted killers, are working for high salaries, effectively mercenaries in ‘security’ companies in occupied Iraq, and in parts of Africa. Adriaan Vlok, Wouter Basson, PW Botha, and so many others have not even come before a court.
The principle of amnesty for such people must be reconsidered, and their cases must be subject to fresh hearings.
6. Those working in these roles abroad must be subject to the full force of the law, amnesties withdrawn, and heavy jail sentences imposed.
7. Meanwhile hundreds, maybe thousands of Umkhonto veterans, are destitute – unknown and uncared for, let alone unhonoured for their commitment and readiness to sacrifice for liberation; some driven by despair to violent crime. So many of the victims of apartheid terror are still to be identified and named, let alone honoured.
Seek out and help these victims, and employ them for their training and experience, to identify and confront violent criminals, and to see that more and more security companies are formed without relying on apartheid veterans.
Region
As preliminary steps to consultations for broad-based reform in Swaziland and Zimbabwe…
Swaziland
1. A Constituent Assembly be set up, under UN/SADC supervision, monitored by the above HOST and DOPs team, to establish a full democratic system, with the king being given the status of a traditional leader, with salary and allowances, and with all ‘royal’ assets taken into the public sector.
2. A national referendum be held on Swaziland being incorporated as a province of South Africa.
Lesotho
1. On the next anniversary of the apartheid army’s raid on Maseru and killing of liberation movement activists and families in the 1980s, the SA President requests he make a state visit that day, on which a monument be unveiled to commemorate the sacrifice, and the Lesotho peoples’ hospitality to the liberation movements. In his speech
a) He pays tribute to the long and brave resistance of the mountain people under the Moshoeshoe dynasty against the raids of SA settler farmers and other invaders through the 19th century, their efforts and sacrifice in hosting liberation movement members through the apartheid era – and their contribution as migrant workers to the South African econoomy.
b) He apologises for South Africa’s share in the loss of lives and property in the SADC forces’ incursion into Lesotho in 1997, though it was at the invitation of the authority there.
2. He proposes talks to invite Lesotho to become a province of South Africa, and to hold a referendum to endorse this.
SADC
1. Propose negotiations for all SADC members to form the Federation of Africa South and East (FASE), as a nucleus for wider membership at a later stage within the framework of AU.
2. FASE states follow a social charter and coordinated economic policies, and allow free movement of people and trade within all member states.
Foreign Policy
some main guidelinesSouth Africa to act…
Bilaterally
Inter-regionally, within the SADC framework
In Africa, within the African Union (AU) framework
Internationally, as a member of the United Nations…as follows:
1. Form the Southern African Liberation Movements Association (SALMA) SALMA should be a treaty-based regional framework that brings together five of the most influential and sustained political movements in history, each of which not only brought their countries to independence and majority rule, but – in alliance against huge imperialist violence and pressure – continue to be the ruling parties of those countries, containing many of the cadres who fought the liberation struggle.They are ZANU (PF) of Zimababwe, MPLA of Angola, FRELIMO of Mozambique, SWAPO of Namibia and ANC of South Africa.
SALMA resolves at its founding meeting:* to honour those who died in their liberation struggles, through full historical research, including into the role of western intelligence, for widespread media and educational publication, and to look after the surviving veterans.
Together these countries contain considerable – even vast – wealth in natural resources, development and people.
2. SALMA resolves at its founding meeting:* to honour those who died in their liberation struggles, through full historical research, including into the role of western intelligence, for widespread media and educational publication, and to look after the surviving veterans.
a) to pledge that no party leader among these five countries will serve more than two five-year terms as head of government or party –
c) to restore/keep in the public sector, through majority government holding, all natural resources and infrastructure and public service industries.*
d) to place a moratorium on all short-term foreign investment.*
e) to ensure that none of their citizens are involved in illicit exploitation of Africa’s mineral and other wealth.*
f) to invite other SADC countries to join as SALMA associate members, provided they adhere to all the above terms.
g) SALMA to offer its terms as guidelines for future operations of AU.
South Africa (and SADC) in the African Union (AU)
1. The SA government renounces all those provisions of the New Economic Policy for African Development (NEPAD) which make it subject to the critique that Nepad is little more than a recolonisation of Africa and an extension of GEAR; and that Nepad’s vision is blurred by fixing its sights on increased global integration and rapid private sector growth as an answer to rising poverty, and by its failure to engage with Africa’s people to transform the continent.
2. Government endorses an economic and social programme for Africa which returns to the provisions and strategies of the Lagos Plan of Action and the African Alternative Framework.
The case graphically put in the Framework document:
“It is clear that simply sopping up red ink by cutting government spending and balancing imports and exports will not deal with African underlying problems…they have to be dealt with structurally. They are not purely economistic. They are political and social as well…The central principle of the Lagos Plan is that the worth of economic development is measured only by the well-being of the people.”
3. Government proposes that the AU Secretariat is headed by the most experienced international diplomats, such as Salim Salim of Tanzania, and Mohamed Sahnoun of Algeria.
4. All peace negotiations and peacekeeping initiatives within Africa be conducted through the AU, under the auspices of the United Nations.International relations
5. Government maintains strong diplomatic and trade relations with the European Union, particularly with its original core members and with the Scandinavian countries, and strengthens relations with Russia.
6. Strengthens South-South relations,particularly to the east, with Malaysia, India and Turkey,to the west, with Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Cuba, Venezuela and Bolivia.
7. in the Middle East,suspends diplomatic and trade ties with Israel unless:
a) Israel guarantees as a preliminary step to return to its 1967 borders, return East Jerusalem to Palestine, and agrees to the right of return for Palestinians.
b) guarantees to remove all racist laws and religious discrimination – or returns to its 1948 UN-recognised borders, and if it continues as a racist state, is subjected to total sanctions and isolation as were Rhodesia and white South Africa.
Socialism in our lifetime
Tony Hall
Tony Hall was born in Pretoria in 1936. He went to Witwatersrand university and then went on to work as a reporter at the Star. He joined the Congress of Democrats after Sharpeville along with his wife Eve Hall and interviewed Nelson Mandela in Hiding. His wife, Eve, was jailed by the Apartheid regime. Tony Hall was the first journalist to be banned from a major newspaper in South Africa when, after interviewing Potlako Reballo on a forthcoming insurrection, he was questioned and refused to give information to police.
Tony and Eve went into exile in Kenya where both of them worked on the Daily Nation. Tony wrote the column ‘On the Carpet and Eve was the woman’s editor. However, at the request of Ruth First, an intermediary for Odinga Odinga, Tony drafted the platform of KANU. He was appointed Communications Officer for the East African Community, but when his involvement with KANU was discovered he and his family were forced to leave the country.
In the United Kingdom Tony worked for Oxfam and then moved with his family to Tanzania to work as Training Editor for The Standard with Frene Ginwallah as editor. From there Tony was appointed Oxfam information officer for East Africa and was the first to reveal to the world, the 1973 famine in Ethiopia. After Ethiopia Tony and Eve shared the job of Oxfam Information officers in India.
After India Tony Hall worked as an editor of international Newsmagazines focused on the Middle East for eight years. Then he left to join his wife in Somalia where he worked for UNDP starting IMR, a trade magazine. He trained a team of Somali journalists to run the magazine.
In the late 80s Tony and Eve were in Harare. Tony was Editing the Magazine Africa South and East under the aegis of editor-in-chief Govan Mbeki. It was at this time that Mandela was released and Tony and Eve were unbanned. Africa South and East moved its headquarters to Yeoville. When Allister Sparks resigned as head of Institute for the Advancement of Journalism, which he founded, Tony Hall was offered a senior management job at the institute, however, once again, he left to join Eve who was working in Addis Ababa. There Tony become the Communications Director of the Economic Commission for Africa, a branch of the UN.
Tony carefully selected and oriented his replacement and Eve and Tony retired to a nature reserve in Mpumalanga where they lived together for ten years until Eve’s death in October 2007 and Tony’s two months later in January 2008.
You must be logged in to post a comment.