10 August 19922
At the outset, I wish to express mygratitude for the honour and privilege granted to us to address the United Nations Special Committee against Apartheid on this solemn occasion marking the International Day of Solidarity with Women in South Africa, also known as South African Women's Day. Yesterday, South African women of all races assembled at various centres in our country to share ideas and develop strategies around the pressing matter of the emancipation of women and their elevation to deserved places in the political and economic processes in society. They did so, together with all the men of conscience of our country, also within the context of the national liberation effort.
The lamentable situation of women in modern society received great attention and has been well-documented in recent years. And no less a great institution as the United Nations also dedicates time and resources to sensitize humankind to the issue through declarations, conferences and promotion of the notion of affirmative action. Indeed, barely two weeks ago, the United Nations Economic and Social Council, during its substantive session of 1992, had occasion to deliberate on no less than four important reports, all of which reflected a serious and concerted effort on the part of the world body to realize the implementation of strategies designed for the advancement of women.
The women of South Africa are immensely gratified to note that in all these endeavours, the United Nations has lost no opportunity to place high on its agenda the plight of women under apartheid. The adoption on an annual basis by the Economic and Social Council of the draft resolution entitled "Women and children under apartheid" bears testimony to this fact. It iswith that in mind that we would like to pay a special tribute to the United Nations Special Committee against Apartheid, as well as to the Centre against Apartheid, for their invaluable support, and particularly for their tireless efforts in highlighting the plight of the millions of South African women who are daily subjected to apartheid tyranny.
Our organization, the African National Congress (ANC), has placed great emphasis on the need to prioritize the issue of women's rights with a view to redressing the historical injustice that has been exacerbated by apartheid.
This the ANC does, convinced as it isthat there can never be any true liberation and democracy without the emancipation of women.
This year 9 August bears a special significance. It falls within the context of epochal developments in the southern African region. In the neighbouring States there is great expectation that the South African problem might at last be resolved sooner rather than later. A mood is abroad reflecting a desire to advance into an era of hope, peace and reconstruction. Yet developments inside South Africa point to growing tensions rather than disinterested rapprochement.
In the recent period, our continent has been rudely awakened to the complex scheming and machinations of the South African power establishment. At a time when the world was looking towards the Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA) as the long-awaited forum to facilitate a peaceful negotiated settlement, the Pretoria regime, true to form, seized the opportunity to scuttle the process by insisting on undemocratic measures. They demanded a constitutional entrenchment of mechanisms to ensure minority political privileges amounting to a veto power. They refused to agree to an elected constitution-making body - in favour of an unelected body - in the form of CODESA to perform the task of drafting a new democratic constitution; above all, they deliberately recast the universally acknowledged democratic principle of majority rule to imply “a winner-take-all" scenario, falsely accusing the ANC and its allies of harbouring party dictatorial ambitions.
Yet, if the truth be told, it is the Nationalist Party and its Government that from the outset embarked on an orchestrated campaign of skullduggery and intrigue. Pervaded with corruption and a history of racism and repression, the Government from the beginning of talks sought to stifle the democratic movement by promoting civil strife through the sponsoring of violence. To this end they have financed the activities of organizations opposed to the cause of the oppressed; they have created and continue to maintain hit squads; they have gone further by unleashing hordes of assassins against ordinary citizens. This they have done with the express purpose of creating a climate of mistrust, instability and fear so as to deny the forces of change organizational space. The net result of these policies of the regime has been devastating. As ANC President Comrade Mandela pointed out to the Security Council on 15 June 1992, more than 11,000 women and children have died in the past five or six years and in the period from January to June this year close to 2,000 people have died. The situation became so intolerable that the ANC felt compelled to end its participation in the constitutional talks within the framework of CODESA and to sever all bilateral contacts with Pretoria. Through the Organization of African Unity (OAU), the ANC made an appeal for the intervention of the Security Council on the issue of violence.
This body will also recall that pursuant to Security Council resolution 765 (1992), the Secretary-General appointed a Special Representative to travel to South Africa. We appeal to the Security Council to move with great speed in considering the Secretary-General's report, so that it can in turn take firm and decisive action and thereby contribute towards the speedy end of one of South Africa's saddest chapters, namely violence.
Our organization and people have continuously called upon the international community to see through the machinations of De Klerk as he went from capital to capital seeking applause for a process into which he was forced through decades of unrelenting struggle.
In any event, whatever else might have happened in South Africa in the period following De Klerk's assumption of the stewardship of the apartheid State, the harsh reality that today stares millions of South Africans in the face is that apartheid is far from dead. On the contrary, the impact of the deteriorating situation in our country is being felt with greater intensity.
In spite of the pious pronouncements of good intentions by spokespersons of the regime, apartheid is very much in evidence in every facet of South African life. Vast disparities in the quality of life persist between blacks and whites. There is massive and growing unemployment among blacks - it is about 43 per cent of the work-force, as opposed to 4 per cent among whites; the average monthly income for blacks is R650 whilst that of whites is placed at Rl,550. Sixteen million black people live below the poverty line. The hopelessness of the health and educational services among blacks has led to endemic unrest that has reached crisis proportions in these sectors. The situation of land-hunger and homelessness among black people has reached alarming levels. This situation has been further exacerbated by the drought that has afflicted southern Africa, threatening millions of people in the region with starvation and death.
All of this occurs amid numerous reports that this regime has sought to project itself as an agent of change and a paragon of perfection when it is in fact highly corrupt and scandal-ridden, where government departments continue to squander millions of taxpayers' money.
In order to appreciate the full impact of apartheid on the majority of the population, it is pertinent to make the point that those who are hardest hit by apartheid policies are women and children, and particularly women in the, rural areas. Whilst many nations of the world invest in their future by ensuring the healthy development of their children, apartheid continues to create many orphans through violence and terror, and generally through policies of criminal neglect. It therefore comes as no surprise that South Africa remains one of only two countries in the world that have not deemed it necessary to sign the Declaration of the Rights of the Child.
The oppressed women of South Africa, precisely because they have been forced to shoulder a greater share of the burden of apartheid, are increasingly becoming conscious of the fact that the road to their emancipation goes through the destruction of apartheid and the creation, in its place, of a non-racial, non-sexist democratic society.
On many occasions we have gone to international forums, as we are doing today here at the United Nations, to expose the real intentions of the regime. But precisely because of the euphoria generated by De Klerk's crusades abroad, it is imperative that people of conscience the world over should intensify their efforts to sustain pressure in order to compel the South African Government to act honourably and to engage in negotiations in good faith. The assassination, torture and mysterious disappearance of activists continue in spite of the National Peace Accord and subsequent bilateral agreements. There isa method in the nature of these occurrences that points to the overt and covert involvement of the State apparatus.
Participants in this gathering will of course know that it was against this background that the Boipatong massacre took place. The fateful events of that day, coming as they did against mounting popular despair, led our movement to disengage from CODESA and break off all contact with the Government. It was a decision that we had to take with heavy hearts, at a time when we were left with no option but to act decisively yet peacefully. Even so, massacres and physical harassment continue to be the order of the day, whilst the regime washes its hands and claims innocence. We believe that by now the Secretary-General of the United Nations and the participants in this gathering will have heard reports from the United Nations monitoring group sent to South Africa to observe the unfolding of our campaign of mass action.
At this point I should like to crave the Chairman’s indulgence in order to make a comment on the mass-action campaign. In spite of the prophets of doom and the attempts of the South African regime to link mass action with violence, over four million workers in South Africa responded to our call and stayed home on 3 August and 4 August 1992 in order to back the demand for peace and democracy now.
Those who chose to close their ears to this message from our people sought to diminish the historic significance of this action, claiming that the stay-away campaign owed its success to the intimidation tactics of the organizers.
No purpose will be served by answering these spurious claims. Suffice it to say that if over the years the people of South Africa have never allowed themselves to be intimidated by an apartheid regime wielding the mightiest military power in the southern hemisphere, nothing can ever intimidate them. At any rate, as some observer noted, if the ANC and its allies were to succeed in intimidating over four million workers, then it would have to be admitted that the alliance wields power beyond imagination.
We can only hope that the Pretoria regime will have taken note of the people's message, which was eloquently expressed as they proceeded to vote with their feet.
In our situation, mass action remains the main weapon left to pressure the Government to accede to our democratic demands as listed in our National Executive Committee statement of 23 July 1992. The centrepiece of the demands isthe speedy installation of an interim government preceded by the ending of violence. Only then can we suggest that the Nationalist Party and its government are beginning to behave sincerely.
The prevarication and scheming on the part of Pretoria have not affected our resolute determination to forge ahead to a new, non-racial, non-sexist and democratic South Africa. They have only delayed the process, sadly, at the cost of thousands of lives. The attainment of a united, peaceful, democratic order remains the main plank of our strategy. Our inclusivist policy, which derives from our desire to negate the exclusivist, racist approach of the apartheid system, remains unshaken.
We come to the united Nations, as we have in the past, to call for the international community to act swiftly and effectively in pressuring Pretoria to act in conformity with the United Nations General Assembly Declaration on Apartheid and its Destructive Consequences in Southern Africa and other consensus resolutions by, amongst other things, promoting a climate conducive to free political activity.
In this regard, we wish to take this opportunity to caution those Member States that seem to be displaying overzeal in establishing ties with the South African regime. Such an approach, as recent developments in South Africa have aptly demonstrated, can only embolden the regime to continue to resist the acceptance of the consequences of democracy and thus delay the much-needed democratic transformation.
On this day we cannot end our presentation without calling the attention of this body to the millions of women struggling for justice in other parts of the world. We salute the women of Western Sahara and express the hope that the speedy implementation of all relevant United Nations resolutions will usher in peace and stability in that region. We greet the heroic women of Palestine, whose valour and determination have always been a source of inspiration to us. It is our fervent hope that the process of negotiation currently under way will bear fruit and that at the end of the day there shall emerge an independent Palestine. Likewise, we dip our banner to the gallant women of El Salvador, who, like us, have endured numerous hardships and made many sacrifices.
On this day we appeal to the international community to give some thought to the plight of the women and children of the war-torn regions of the world, who, as they struggle to survive the ravages of war, are forced to contend with the monsters of famine and disease. We call upon the world body to intervene more resolutely in Somalia and elsewhere in order to end the prevailing conditions of famine and misery which constitute a blight on the human conscience.
Turning back to our own situation, we of the ANC believe that the impasse at CODESA II, accentuated by, among other questions of constitutional procedure, discord over voting percentages in the new parliament or assembly, isin truth and in effect a dispute about the nature of democracy itself. It ismore than a crisis of interpretation. It isessentially about whether South Africa will experience democratic change or stay pinioned to racist minority veto powers. In this regard, the position of the African National Congress isexplicit. The path forward must lead the country to a genuine and full-fledged democratic State without any racial, religious or gender discrimination.
I believe that the Chairman already has the four reports that have been prepared by various people. Thus, my report should be seen in the context of those four reports.
The first is a report on hostels, fortresses of fear. It is an investigation into hostels by the independent board of inquiry into informal repression, and therefore gives an independent overview of what happens in the hostels. The second one is the consolidated report on the Reef violence put out by the Community Agency for Social Enquiry (CASE). It is prepared by Dr. David Everatt, Deputy Director of CASE. The third report is one by the Human Rights Commission. This is a summary report on repression and massacres. The fourth report contains affidavits on the much-spoken-about AK-47s. All these deal with the violence in South Africa and are by independent people, not the ANC.
In conclusion, allow me to add that we trust that we shall leave New York carrying a message of hope for the millions of beleaguered South Africans, and that on our arrival at home we shall be able to say to the people: "Let us labour on. The world is fully behind us".
Footnotes
1. Ms. Mompati was a member of the National Executive Committee of the ANC and chairperson of its Northern Cape region.