**Nelson Mandela deserves every accolade he has received. He has been a walking symbol of reconciliation and without his towering stature I am not at all sure that we would have made it through the transition as (relative to what might have happened) easily as we have.
LIVIMi close up to event* it is difficult for us to stand back from du transitioti and appre ciale just how extraordinary a pro cess it has been, tor a minority to ghup exclusive power and to begin dismantling the edifice that pro ux ted its privileges is an uncommon event in history. The conventional w isdom. long propounded by Cass andras. was that minorities never gave up power without a fight, the implication being that South Africa was destined for civil war and the spilling of blood on a colossal sc ale before, finally the majority would triumph — and iidieril a society that lead been reduced to rubble
We had violence Io he sure the economy was be ing strangled; and ra c ul polarization shenved danger signs of passing some kind of point of no return Somehow the inevitable des cent into war was averted, and out of the wide divisions a tolerable com promise was achieved.
In giving ourselves a pat on the bac k we should note several points; Scaah Africa s transition reflected the cynical saying that "Men and nations w ill act ratkmaU* once all other pos sibilities have been exhausted’ It was madness for tlie National Party to have believed even into the mid 1980s that some form of neo apartheid could have provided a durable basis lor an accommodation: it w as madness for the AM to have believed that a stale as strong as South Africa could have been weak ened. let alone defeated, by the puny efforts of a guerrilla army.
11k transition bcy$ui when. in one of those rare historic al moments. the leaderships of the two contending forces recognised that neither would w in outright and that a negotiated settlement was the only realistic hope. It took leaders of the stature of Mandela and de Klerk to pilot the process through what was to be a rough sea.
It is unfashionable these days to say anything in praise of FW de Klerk s predex essor Inn c redit should be given where it is due. The prelimi naries that led to die initiation of the negotiating process began in the mid-1980s. presumably with Botha s know ledge. It was Botha, too. who knocked out the major ideological props of apartheid and destroyed some of its major institutions, like the pass laws.
Botha. alas, had neither the vision nor the sagacity to take the next step, and that is why South Africa was
like a ruciderk-w ship lor the last four year* of his administration. It is fascinating to speculate whether had he ■UK been stric ken with a stroke early in 1'189 he would have moved sgpufi canth or. as is more likef*. Iiave tried to stand pat. At all events he was the CHirbaches of south Africa
rhe case of Mr de Klerk fastman-* me. I have been looking for modern instances of politic al leaders who have acted as boidh and sagaciously a* de Klerk. Of course, the contexts of leadership differ profoundly: ( hurt lull, de ( caulk- t-orhachev. FDR. perhaps John F Kenned* I for his han dling of the uhan missile critis). and Sadat are some possible names who deserve similar accolades, but each operated in contexts and with re strainls that were different from those of de Klerk. Even so. there is an inesc apabie ranking of leaders, and on that scale he must rank near the top.
Nelson Mandela deserves every accolade he has received. He ha* been a walking symbol of reconcilia tion and without Ills lowering stature I am not at all sure Out we would have made it through the transition as (relative to what might have hap pence!) easily as we have.
Another leader deserves praise. (onstand Viljoen for his decision to opt in to last year s election, thereby substantially defusing the right wing threat. Heaven knows what might lune happened if, as was widely pre dieted, the right wing had tried for some I TH. seizing a large tract of ter rilory where (onservative Party-controlled kxal authorities were in power and then said, in effect what are you going to do about it? And what might have happened if as many as 100.000 trained and disciplined men had taken up arms in the name of counter resolution?
The right-wing as a threat to sta bility has been largely neutralized, -u id those who are in Farhanina under the banner of the Freedom Front have managed to create good working re lationships with the AM. imitating
the example of the personal chemistry between A iljoen and Maiulria.
The achievement* of the past year have montiv hern m the realm of the symbolic and in the riticallv un portant area of rec one ihatfon. With the powerful example being set by Mandela the AM has pine out of its way to avoid triumphalism — or crowing over its victory and kieding it over whites. It has held in check po tentially powerful anti-white semi merits and has stuck to the principle of non-racialism. It could have been so easy for the AM to inflame black attitudes with an appeal to a kind of counterracism. Almost certainly, something is owed to people like Joe Slovo who however regrettable his earlier views (which he recanted i may have been. played a role in preserving the AM's non racial commiunenL
A* I have argued before, "non ra cialism in the sense that racial con sideration* disappear compkxelv is a utopian hope: no ether multicul tutal multiracial society has been able to athieve this: but non rac ialism as the entrenchment of nondiscrimina tory norms and an atmosphere of in terracial tolerance is achievable. Much remains to he done on the Lah r score, but a hopeful start has been made. It is astonishing to hear re ports from the Free Mate of reason ably cordial working relationships be tween pillars of rural conservatism in the tanning community and AM. ministers. with the estimable premier Patrick U kou leading the way
Tolerance will remain a fragile plant for years, if not decades It will require careful nurturing and the avoidance of measures that can endanger it So manv good qualities and institutions in life take dec ades. even generations to build up. but such is their fragilitv that they can easily be destroyed in a month.
As far as the mercurial Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi is concerned, the report must be mixed. It looks as if the issue of international mediation may itself require mediation to
solve Buthelezi is making beifacose remarks and the AM is stoutly asserting that it will not yield to threats of coercion or black mail One never knows with Buthelezi: I suspect now that h» stated reason* lor participating in last year s elec tkm were the real ones nameiv that non participation and the violence that inevitablv would have ensued would haw been disastrous for the countrv
Watching him on Agenda (2~ April), he gave me the distinct im pression of not wanting to piungr the countrv into a crisis. I believe that he has a strong sense of historv that div inclines him to want to be remem bered print ipalh a* the leader whine tactic* destroyed a promising start to de mt x rac* He mat well believe that his tactics in the run up to last year’s elections brought him more gains, in the form of amendments to the draft interim onstitution and the agreement on inlernational medi ation. than he would have obtained by staying in the Multiparty Nego listing Process and agreeing far earlier to partkipate in the elections. He may believe that brinkmanship will bring similar dividends this time round. My prediction is that a face saving formula will eventually be found and that IT* de Klerk max he the broker. There are many reasons for wanting Inkatha back in the Constitutional Assembly: not the least of these is that its withdrawal gives the AM a two-thirds majority and thus enabk-s it to write the final constitution (subject to embodying the At .•-institutional principles). It is nix desirable for any single partv to have so big a say — as Thabo Mbeki is prepared to acknowledge
The down-side of our first year has been in the matter of delivery. The evidence of mas* impatience has been largely anecdotal and is not supported by survey data. But there are sufficient warning light* flashing to make it clear to the (xwernment of National I nity that delivery must begin to roil this year, or else tension
It was ahravs unfair to the new government to expect instant deltv err reconstructing the bureaucracy, merging homeland administration' into provincial administrations and brokering transitional local adnanss traions have been immense under bated by the virtual collapse of ad ministration in parts of the old Transkei. Bophuthatswana and else where
That said the time for drbvvrv tn start is now. No-one even the mon impatient, can reasonably expect । rvcTnighr c hange but they can — and do — expect visible movement people accept the principle of a queue but only if the queue moves. There is no inherent reason why it should not begin to move
longer term prehiems are abun dant and some of them are likely to prove uitrac table I focus on three m terrelaaed issues in the second half of this report urbanisation population growth and the growth of (technacaliyi illegal muragrants from ricighhounng states K< ughh "50 TWO people migrate to the towns and ci ties annuallv substantialh. the whfte and Indian communities have peaked as far as urbanization is c on cernrd. and the • ok Hired cunmunily is not far behind. Although com-pietth relsfok figures for Africans are not available, it would be a fair esti male to reckon that roughly 50 per cent of the African population is ur han. and that the expected swelling urban populations will. omr Largriv (90 per cent plus I from continuing ru ral urban African migration and growth generated by existing urban populations. To this one has to add foreign migrants, estimated to number between one and-a half and as high as four million — again, the fig ures are imprecise because officials simply do not know Neither electrified fences nor efforts to repatriate them have mix h hope of success. The problem will have to be addressed in a regional context
Population growth rates have come down quite significantly: for the whik communities k is a Hole below replacement level: the figure for (.otoured and Indianotnmunit.es is rapidly approaching that for urban Africans the figure is IJ per cent demonstrating again the impact of urbanization on population growth. For rural Africans the figure is swufi candy higher The average rural African woman bears over five c hi! dren on average though this figure i I9B9) may be coming down. । weraU. for the entire population the figure is 2.3 per cent, which exceeds eco-nomic growth rates for the past lew wars.
The spread of the AIDS epidemic may have an impact on population growth, some estimates say that it could reduce the population growth rase by 0.5 to 0.7 per cent
J will say nothing about the coo verUKXial wavs of uidrewung these » sues except to observe that propa ganda and exhortation appear to have achieved little. The decision to Imw vnuiier tamilies w in ipnerai a di reel consequence of recognizing the ec onomic cost* of large tamilies: and safe sex is probably promoted most effectiveh when people arc m solved in networks that drum in the messagi about the danger* of :nk on. and when, tragically, the demonstration effect of seeing peo pk in your community die of a terrs bk wasting ducw takes hold
A less conventional way of addressing ihese issues is to view (hem through the prism of the statu* of women. II one message has come through clearly ui our times — here and global!* — is it that the gender revolution is permanent' Apart form the elementar* question of justice. cmIkt bciugn c< HMequriM cs flow from the increasing capucky of women to assert their right* and mobilize their power: by taking charge of their own reproductive power the* become critical agent* in the drive to reduce population growth and perhaps, to limit the spread of HIV On the wIk* the evidence from Third Hirid ciniiKries suggests that development protects managed b* women have a bette r chance of success than those managed by men. Women also stabilise communities and in general ire more peace oriented than men.
(To hf ctsu-ludeti tomorrow)
The author u Profipxaor of Southern African Studie*, University of Cape Town.