S. African trade unionist tours U.S., exposes De Klerk's "reforms"

Scan page 22

Mercia Andrews being interviewed on a New York radio program. 20 SOCIALIST ACTION APRIL Mercia Andrews, a South African trade unionist and national organizer of the Workers Organization for Socialist Action (WOSA), recently completed a highly successful North American tour. Thousands of people in 18 local areas were given a firsthand account of the South African freedom struggle and WOSA's demand for a democratic constituent assembly. The tour began Feb. 27 and ended on March 28.

The tour was organized by the Democracy in South Africa Tour Committee. It was co-sponsored by a broad spectrum of over 100 organizations and prominent individuals in this country and Canada. A number of campus departments also chipped in to make the tour a success. Other co-sponsors included religious organizations, labor unions, and political groups.

Andrews participated in over 80 meetings and in several radio and newspaper interviews.. Fund-raising and generous contributions by people attending the events allowed the tour to cover all its expenses. In addition, donations raised at the meetings were sent to South Africa to aid the cause of freedom.

A "racist" referendum There was high interest in the freedom struggle in South Africa during the tour because of the publicity given to President F.W. De Klerk's all-white referendum on March 17. Andrews was frequently asked, "Aren't you excited about the referendum results?" Andrews told questioners that she believed the vote was racist, allowing 15 percent of the population to make a decision for 85 percent.

She said that when De Klerk called for the referendum, he essentially said to whites, "Give me your confidence. We are not going to strip away your privileges, but actually retain them by other means."

Andrews pointed out that "the most important reason the De Klerk government began a process of dismantling apartheid was because of the movement of resistance in our country." Unless there was change, she said, "the government believed it would be faced with a revolt from below."

Negotiations, she said, are clearly an attempt by the South African government to draw the liberation movement into a deal that offers Black people a limited form of democracy—in order to blunt the struggles of working people.

For that reason, she said, De Klerk's initiatives are carried out with the approval of the bosses of big industry, as well as their counterparts in the United States and its partners in the New World Order.

Andrews pointed out that while, after two years of "reform," the worst trappings of apartheid have begun to disappear, inequality remains. Black people are still economically disenfranchised. Unemployment is 42 percent and growing. Seven million people live in shacks-with no hope of ever getting a house. The majority still are without citizenship rights. And the white referendum shows that the government still wants to give the white minority veto power over the aspirations of the Black majority.

Highlights of the tour The Mercia Andrews tour began in New York City, where she addressed the Organization of South Africans/Azanians for Liberation Education (OSAALE) and spoke at Columbia University. She then went to Minneapolis, where she spoke to about 60 people at two campus meetings.

In Pittsburgh, Pa., events at the University of Pittsburgh were organized by supporters of the Fourth Internationalist Tendency and chaired by noted South African poet, Dennis Brutus.

In Boston, Mass., she spoke to 50 Black construction workers and several hundred students at Tufts, Harvard, and Northeastern Universities. The Nation of Islam played a key role in sponsoring the Boston segment of the tour.

In Milwaukee, Wis., the Milwaukee Revolutionary Socialist Group helped sponsor a meeting, which was attended by people from several countries in Africa. In Chicago, IIl., she spoke at a broadly sponsored meeting of 75 at the Chicago Circle campus and on other campuses. In Toronto, there was a successful community meeting of 50 activists, including several South Africans living in exile.

In Cleveland, Ohio, Andrews spoke to 100 people at a meeting sponsored by the Northeast Ohio Anti-Apartheid coalition. Later, she addressed several hundred of the all-Black congregation at Cleveland's Antioch Baptist Church. Her arrival in Baltimore, Md., coincided with the all-white referendum in South Africa. The questions from the audience focused on that subject when she spoke at Morgan State University and at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, campus.

In Kansas City, Mo., Andrews spoke at a community meeting sponsored by several Black organizations and other groups. In Portland, Ore., she spoke to 75 students at Portland State University.

In the San Francisco Bay Area, Andrews spoke to approximately 800 people, including a meeting of 250 workers at a Machinists union local. She also spoke at several community colleges and the University of California, Berkeley. Meetings in the Los Angeles area included one of 150 at Long Beach State University.

Andrews also spoke at meetings in Iowa City, Iowa, Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J., and Bucknell College in Lewisburg, Pa.