The decision by FW de Klerk, the last white president of SA,to end formal apartheid, unban liberation movements such as the ANC and release Nelson Mandela and other political prisoners was done not for moral reasons or because he believed apartheid was a crime against humanity. It was purely strategic.
De Klerk was a pragmatist, not a moral crusader. He had strategic nous — like Mikhail Gorbachev when he unbundled one-party rule by the Soviet Union Communist Party — to grasp that apartheid’s time was up and make these critical decisions timeously, when the political, economic and international climate appeared propitious.
Apartheid SA’s internationally isolated economy was on the verge of collapse, with white business and Afrikaner intellectuals urging reforms to give blacks a say in political decisions to financially save the country.
The South African Defence Force (SADF) was losing the initiative in the region. Heavy losses, like those at the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale in Angola between August 14 1987 and March 23 1988, filled body bags with young conscripts and white families increased pressure on the government to bring an end to the border war. At home, townships were rendered ungovernable by young comrades. Civil war between black and white South Africans appeared imminent.
On the other hand, the ANC was also at a low. Its armed struggle was not very effective and its largest donor, the Soviet Union, was on the verge of collapse. Gorbachev, who in the late 1980s introduced reforms to unbundle Soviet communism, also pressured the ANC to get to the negotiating table with the National Party.
The ANC’s Rob Davies said that when he and the organisation’s Pallo Jordan attended a Soviet Union Communist Party seminar in Moscow in 1986, party apparatchiks made it clear to them that the prevailing belief in leadership circles in the Soviet Union was that the initiative to end apartheid was with the National Party. They warned that the ANC must be ready to negotiate with the apartheid government, include the protection of minorities in their strategy or face being left behind.
My sense, after participating in 'The Other Man', the 2014 documentary of De Klerk life’s, which he approved, was that De Klerk, at the time, calculated that neither the National Party nor the ANC bloc had the initiative and if he acted quickly, he would have first-move advantage.
From De Klerk’s vantage, the collapse of Soviet Union communism discredited Marxist-Leninist economic and political options for the ANC and such an option was not on the table. The SACP was in crisis ideologically. Western countries, such as the US, Britain and Germany, also supported a negotiation process for a non-communist and democratic option for SA.
In Africa, frontline countries supporting the ANC were also in political and economic free fall — Zambia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Tanzania were facing economic and political crises. They also pressured the ANC to go to the negotiation table. For De Klerk, the pragmatist, launching his reforms would secure the initiative, goodwill and early advantage.
Given the ideological collapse of Soviet-style political and economic options — and the post-Cold War global consensus of liberalism in politics, neoliberalism in economics and the importance of minority rights, De Klerk believed he could secure the property rights, public service jobs and equal rights for whites in any postapartheid dispensation.
De Klerk also saw ANC old-guard leaders Mandela, Oliver Tambo and Walter Sisulu as non-racist men of principle, with moderate political and economic views, who would not want to pursue revenge politics, unleash civil war or implement irresponsible, populist economic policies that would plunge SA into crisis like most other African countries.
My sense, after participating in The Other Man, the 2014 documentary of De Klerk life’s, which he approved, was that De Klerk, at the time, calculated that neither the National Party nor the ANC bloc had the initiative and if he acted quickly, he would have first-move advantage. He secured his legacy by his pragmatic decision to end formal apartheid.
De Klerk, like Gorbachev, who was despised by many Communist Party supporters who did not want to see the end of communism, was also hated by many white South Africans who did not want to see the end of apartheid.
On his deathbed, De Klerk apologised to black South Africans for the pain they suffered, but not for apartheid itself. During his lifetime, he refused to acknowledge apartheid was a crime against humanity. He also refused to give information about who did what and where bodies were buried during that time, leaving victims and their family without answers.
It is very likely that the reason De Klerk refused to acknowledge apartheid as a crime against humanity was that, as a pragmatist, he wanted to prevent himself and his comrades from being prosecuted for apartheid crimes, such as the security polices’ murders of the Cradock Four, attorney Victoria Mxenge and many others.
It comes as no surprise that on his deathbed De Klerk sought legal advice regarding whether the families of those murdered by the apartheid state could lay criminal charges against him.
De Klerk, like Gorbachev, who was despised by many Communist Party supporters who did not want to see the end of communism, was also hated by many white South Africans who did not want to see the end of apartheid. His decision to unban liberation movements and anti-apartheid activists and start negotiations for a democratic SA were seen as a betrayal by many National Party supporters.
De Klerk, the strategist, clearly appeared to believe that apologising for apartheid and acknowledging it as a crime against humanity would be interpreted by many white South Africans as backsliding on his and Afrikaners’ upbringings, belief systems and assumptions, something he was not willing to do, not even while dying.
Not acknowledging apartheid was a crime against humanity and not providing the full truth about atrocities during that time may, for him, have been a strategic move to protect his and his former comrades’ interests, but it has undermined reconciliation between white and black South Africans.
William Gumede is associate professor, School of Governance, University of the Witwatersrand, and author of ‘Restless Nation: Making Sense of Troubled Times’ (Tafelberg).
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