Black Consciousness Movement supporter: 'The struggle in South Africa is against racial capitalism'

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Soweto youth demonstrating after Mandela's release.

Nelson Mandela: What kind of an agreement will he negotiate?

Chris Nieta is a supporter of the Black Consciousness Movement in South Africa and a professor at the University of Mass.Boston. He spoke at a Boston Socialist Action Forum on March 17, 1990. The following are excerpts from his talk.

As we enter the last decade of this century, we are witnessing the extinction of one of the last states in Africa under white hegemony and control and supremacy-Namibia. With that, we enter probably into the last phase, and that is South Africa.

We are witnessing the regime in South Africa beginning to unloosen, to let go. If Namibia can be free, then the question is, can South Africa be much further behind? I think we are poised to see those changes that will—probably by the end of this century— bring about in South Africa itself, that heartland of racism and economic exploitation of the people-freedom, equality, decency, and humanity, after years and years of suffering pain, death, ignorance, poverty.

People [in the United States] have been exposed, almost on a daily basis, to a one-sided, distorted view of exactly what's going on in South Africa. The attention has been given to one organization, and the impression is being created in the international community that only its leadership is going to carry the peoples of South Africa into freedom.

That distorted picture that has no relationship whatsoever with what is going on in South Africa. And I think that not only the international press but what I refer to as the "anti-apartheid industry" is solidly behind perpetuating this myth.

[They say] that the African National Congress [ANC] of South Africa, the oldest, most prestigious, and strongest of all the liberation movements, the one with the most international support and solidarity, is the sole, legitimate, exclusive agent for the liberation of the peoples of South Africa.

South Africa has a population in excess of 30 million people. To expect that the people would support and follow the dictates and the direction of one organization is a little mind-boggling.

Many viable tendencies exist In South Africa there are a number of political tendencies that have emerged over time, that are viable, are doing progressive work, and have to be recognized. They've made an impact in the struggle of the people of South Africa. And not only do they exist and cannot be wished away even by the mighty "anti-apartheid industry," but most William Campbell Gideon Mendel/Magnum of those organizations have brought forth positions that are clearly on the left of the ANC.

The international community will be doing us a service if they begin the task of making available forums where the organizations in South Africa can come together on a principled unity to oppose what I believe is still going to be a very, very hard and arduous struggle that lies ahead.

[A number of issues have] become prominent since the release of Mandela. There's an [ANC] delegation that is preparing to meet with de Klerk-led by Mandela. These questions [will] then come to the forefront, because they're unresolved.

And as long as they are unresolved it is going to be difficult for the ANC alone to attempt to broker a negotiated settlement. It's not going to work. It is going to be resome of the large monopoly concerns, but stopped there.

That limited [approach], inadequate as it is, sent shivers down the spines of many businessmen. [But what] has not been adequately addressed by the ANC is whether [the new] state is going to continue as a capitalist country, or are they going to look, as a model, to other forms of economic arrangement.

Mandela and the ANC have not spelled out in clear, explicit terms that the society is going to be a socialist society. That's one area that, on the Black side, is causing quite a lot of concern.

Third was the question of [renouncing] armed struggle. On that point Mandela made very clear that he wasn't going to. He disappointed many of the whites who'd hoped he'd come in with more moderate views.

A main thing that you see now is the attempt to sponsor some "moderates" to be the people who will negotiate and work with the government. The danger there-and these are the issues being debated—is what kind of arrangements are being discussed and what accommodations are being arrived at. Those on the left are very leery of these discussions. When you listen closely, they make you very nervous.

The danger in South Africa is a bourgeois-democratic kind of settlement. That may settle the national question, national oppression, and apartheid, but that's just one part of the solution in South Africa, because the struggle in South Africa is [against] racial capitalism.

Class exploitation

There's national oppression, and there's class exploitation. The whole debate that has been ensuing has been that the ANC, aligned with the [South African] Communist Party, conforms to the two-stage revolution theory. "Let's have the democratic revolution, and then later we'll attend to the socialist." And others say, wait a minute, you can't do that. And that is one of the fundamental questions.

When you listen to some of the statements made by prominent ANC people, they are promoting the national democratic revolution. Great. That's part of it. But what is not being said is the other side of this class emancipation, the socialist part of it.

Very little has been said beyond nationalizing certain industries, mines, banks, and so on. But then, they don't proceed beyond that. They talk about how "the wealth in South Africa shall be owned by all." That is what the [ANC's] Freedom Charter says. But they don't spell it out.

The impoverished masses of South Africa are not going to settle for some little Swedish model. They want real, fundamental, far-going transformation of society, that will bring people out of poverty and ignorance and suffering.

My hope is that Mandela can give the kind of leadership that will pull forces together. I was disappointed when in his opening speech [after his release] he paid respect to all kinds of people and organizations ... [but] nowhere did he say one tiny word about the fact that the Pan-Africanist Congress has been involved in the struggle. He said nothing about the Black Consciousness Later, in an hour-long interview, somebody posed the question, "What do you see in terms of a unity movement between the African National Congress and the PanAfricanist Congress?" He said, "That has to be addressed." [That is] language that the ANC has not spoken in more than 25 years. They don't even recognize the Pan-Africanist Congress. Mandela at least began to address this.

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