NATIONAL LEADERSHIP ASSEMBLY DOCUMENTS

KEYNOTE ADDRESS DELIVERED TO THE GAMALIEL FOUNDATION'S NATIONAL LEADESHIP ASSEMBLY, DETROIT, MICHIGAN, USA - 07 DECEMBER 2001 BY MS. SOPHIA DE BUYN

MADAM PRESIDENT, MADAM DEPUTY PRESIDENT, MEMBERS OF THE BOARD OF THE GAMALIEL FOUNDATION, MEMBERS OF THE CLERGY,

LEADERS FROM ACROSS THE USA AND SOUTH AFRICA, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN.

You have invited me; thereby you have greatly honoured me. I accept this honour in all humility and I am proud and pleased to be here, to share with you some of the experiences that have brought South Africans, to where we are in our own democracy. It is quite flattering that the North or the West, or to be more direct, the United States of American, believes that there is something to learn from Africa, the Third World and South Africa in particular. For centuries, the relations between the West and Africa have been plagued by slavery, colonialism, imperialism, racism and sexism. These issues and their consequences are still with us today and rightly so because our past is an important part of what we are today. However, I think that we must keep looking for new and better ways in order to address our skewered history. This is the only way that we can create a better world, a world defmed by new relationships between religious groups, ethnic groups, different communities and nations - in short a reconciled world.

Our land - South Africa, is an amazing country. A country whose fortunes are a mixture of uncertainty, danger and celebrations. A country blessed with people who are innovative, who face their own challenges with courage and determination and are able to live to tell their painful stories with relative calm and less emotions. It is a country whose very tip, is dipped, in the popular oceans of India and the blue waters of the Atlantic. Indeed the beauty of this county is owed to God and to the ancestors of Africa, who have allowed us to be citizens of this great continent.

And as we go about our daily chores and assignments, there are those who think and plan evil for us, the nation and our country; they do not wish us well. Those are the sons and daughters who remain scornful at the progress and gains Africa has been able to achieve. They generate their attitudes from their fore-parents, whose agenda, has always been to oppress and suppress the legitimate feelings of those who declared their patriotism right from the beginning of the history of this land. The irony is that South Africa is also blessed with courageous compatriots, whose, allegiance and loyalty have stood the test of time, when the rulers of yesterday, arrested, detained maimed, hanged and killed the majority of its people. The same majority, is today, again working hard to reconstruct South Africa and its peoples. Our Government through its Parliament has already made a lot of change, but we shall be deceiving ourselves, if we do not recognize that we still have a long way to go as we struggle to work for material and moral reconstruction in South Africa.

Yes, a long way to go because the Afrikaner victory of 1948, when the then Nationalist Government, took over from the British colonizers, brought a great deal of suffering and inflicted indignity to the rest of the majority of South Africans. Repressive laws and social prejudices, also assaulted the rights of, as you say "people of colour" - the Black indigenous, the people of Indian origin and the so-called Coloured (mixed race) Communities. The degree of segregation and discrimination, varied from one Province to the next. Prime Minister Malan of that Regime, chose what was in the wider scheme of segregation, an unimportant but newsworthy issue, with which to launch the legislative onslaught. By that time, sex across the colour-line, had been partially restricted in 1926, the Government now introduced blanket embargoes, steering through the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act and in 1950 an amendment to the Immorality Act. The latter placed a total legal ban on relations between white and non-white persons (or rather black and non-black persons). But if the Government of the 50's was to succeed in dividing the country into racial segments, it first needed to define the meaning of race. This it attempted to do with the passage of the Population Registration Act in 1950 and a series of enabling laws during the following years. All of these, reduced down to a crude formula which held physical appearance (colour) customary association and repute to be the characteristics, distinguishing one race from another.

From these measures flowed all else; including a racially based identity document, (which when refined over the succeeding period, provided a razor-sharp instrument of control) and most notably, that massive foundation called the Group Areas Act. Passed also in 1950, the latter consolidated all previous restrictions on urban people living into one all-embracing legal code, designed to confine each of the racial groups to its own residential and trading areas.

South African's towns and cities had developed haphazardly over the years. Africans for the most part were locked in their locations (later called Townships), but in other respects the lines were blurred: Whites, Coloured people and Indians, lived in adjacent and often overlapping so-called suburbs. The Act forced thousands out of their homes and business premises. Predictably, those most affected were the already disadvantaged Coloured and Indians. All this inflicted great suffering and indignity but it did not represent the essence of Nationalist ideology. The big legislative guns were reserved for the black majority. From 1957 when Dr. Vervoerd became Minister of Native Affairs, the pillars of what came to be known as "Grand Apartheid" were steadily erected. The plan was to confine the entire indigenous African population of South Africa to its traditional "homeland", where it would, according to their theory, develop its own political institutions. Blacks would continue to reside near the cities, but only to the extent, dictated to labor needs. They would have no citizenship rights, nor vote, and basic human rights were savagely curtailed. These aims had always been implicit, and often explicit, in Government policies, since the four colonies united in 1910 as the Republic of South Africa. But Vervoerd gave them a new meaning. For the first time rigid segregation was to be entrenched within a unified system of statute law and lightly structured Administration. Among the measures introduced were:

= The abolition of the Native Representative Council and the passage of the Bantu Authorities Act in 1951. This set up tribal and territorial bodies within the country and prepared the ground for the Promotion of Bantu Self Government Act of 1959, which established Bantustans (later referred to as National States, but known to all as "Homelands") for the countries main black groups.

= The Native Laws Amendment Act of 1952 was one of the Prime instruments of influx control. It placed tight restrictions on the movement of blacks to urban areas, it extended the pass system to black women (the pass was a document restricting people to particular geographical boundries in the country of their ancestry!) The Act placed a 72 hour limit on blacks that were regarded as unqualified to be in the urban areas and empowered local authorities to forcibly remove idle or "undesirable" Natives.

The Abolition Of Passes Act of 1952, was intended to do away with the simple `pass' but substituted as the ultimate control document, commonly as the Dompass. The much hated and complex reference book, contained the entire life and job history of its owner, his every movement and his fingerprints. Every adult African was obliged to carry a referenced book, failure to do so meant arrest and appearance before the Bantu Commissioner's Court. From 1956 defendants were denied the right of appeal against the courts' sentence. Police and local authorities, were later given wide powers to raid dwellings, without warrants in order to root out illegals (illegal in the land of their birth).

=The Prevention of Illegal Squatting Act reinforced those draconian measures which were designed to eradicate "black spots" - pockets of Africans driven into `white', mainly rural areas, because of "land hunger" they were then just forcibly removed to the barren homelands.

=The Bantu Education Act which gained passage through Parliament in 1953, was aimed principally at the thousands of private, mostly church­mission schools, where, according to senior National Party apologist, dangerous, liberal ideas from outsiders, were fed into untrained minds. Vervoerd brought black education under State control, and reduced its quality in order to train and teach people in accordance with their opportunities in life. Those of course, were largely limited to unskilled and menial jobs.

Black people in our country, were already disenfranchised efficiently and without legal complication in 1936. The Coloured issue, however, was to prove a lot more protracted, as the last vestiges of Nineteenth century British Liberalism finally disappeared, during the 1950's, when the Cape Coloured people were taken off the common electoral roll, and for the impatient Nationalist, described as troublesome in the extreme. The government went to extra-ordinary lengths, to overcome this final, political obstacle, to gain absolute political power. The vote was  constitutionally entrenched and any proposed changes to the status quo had needed a minimum of two-thirds majority approval by both houses of Parliament. Minister Malan thought differently and claimed that South Africa's Parliament had been the countries highest judicial authority since the Statue of Westminister conferred national sovereignty in 1931 and that it could make whatever laws it wished. In 1951, on his initiative, it enacted the Separate Registration of Voters Bill. The new Act had been passed by simple majority and was immediately challenged, both in the streets (by the low key Franchise Action Committee and more visibly, the largely white War Veteran Torch Commando) and in the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court where it was held to be unconstitutional and thrown out. Angry and stubbornly, Malan then rammed through a new Bill constituting Parliament as the highest court, so that the lower courts would be exempted from, in his words, the invidious necessity of becoming involved in constitutional issues. This too, was declared in-valid and despite complex schemes to obtain the necessary two-third approval, the issue was still unresolved when the Prime Minister retired from office. His successor J G Strydom, abandoned any scruples that may have remained among the governing party and brought the matter to a conclusion within a year - simply by increasing the size and changing the composition of both the Senate (the Senate Act of 1956) and the Appellate Division. Both bodies were packed with Nationalist party loyalists. The Separate Registration of Voters Bill finally received its required parliamentary majority and the approval of the courts. Its passage had taken five years. And so the oppressive laws, Acts and Bills continued year after year to keep our people in perpetual bondage. The latest Act, was provoked by the extra parliamentary opposition, that had grown in numbers, strength and organization to increase repressive action, such as the Suppression of Communism Act. But the communist Party was a step ahead. In order to save their members from prosecution; they disbanded as an organization, just before measures was passed. The law was later made retroactive: The Native Administration Act; the Monolithic Criminal Law Amendment Act and the Riotous Assemblies Act, which is an old statue that was refined in 1956 principally, for the purpose of breaking up strikes.

Throughout all the years of indignation, humiliation and oppression against defenseless people, the African National Congress was not standing by idle, with folded arms. So in 1952, the African National Congress and its Youth Wing and Women, supported by a variety of Coloured, Indian and white groups (half of the participants were women, though mainly African women) launched a nation-wide defiance campaign, against unjust laws in general. It was a brave and gallant effort, but by and large, an unsuccessful one. By the end of 1952, most of the ANC leadership and a large number of its supporters were in jail. There were many campaigns, launched over the years of oppression, small ones, and some large; they were organized around the many Acts already referred to. How were they carried out? - always peaceful, never violent like the Passive Resistance of the 40's of the great Mahatma Ghandhi.

A new initiative and the last major peaceful one for more than three decades began on 26 June 1955 3,000 delegates of all races were present at the Congress of the People, at Kliptown just near Johannesburg, where the Freedom Charter was endorsed. One of the most significant political statements of the century was the Charter affirming that South Africa belong to all its inhabitants and that no government shall exercise authority, save by the will of the people. It went on to urge the creation on a non-racial democracy, equal rights and protection before the law, equal jobs and education opportunities, a redistribution of land and the nationalization of mines, banks and the larger industries. Signatories to the Charter, at the time included the: ANC, the South African Indian Congress, the South African Coloured People's Congress and the White Congress of Democrats. Women members of these organizations made up a third of the delegates.

Four months later, police raided the homes of more than five hundred activists, the prelude to a massive crack down that saw thousands arrested, restricted, and banned. All the experiences that I've shared with you here this evening, are important historic events in my history. But the highlight of my life, as the history of Black women in South Africa, was August 9, 1956. 1 was among those fortunate ones who were free to be at Union Building, the center to Apartheid domination. But I was even more fortunate: I was chosen to be one of the four women leaders, that led the women to Union Buildings, to take the thousands of petitions collected against the Passes I already described, to the Nationalist Prime Minister and dumped them on his desk. Because he was too scared, he had ran away. There were thousands of us, 20,000 history records and maybe more. There were some who couldn't be there because they were banned, others were turned back by police, full buses also never arrived. The women were harassed by police and given wrong directions so that they should get lost and not find their way. Those who found their way made up the 20,000. Here we see something very moving, on the morning of August 9. Some were in beautiful, colourful, traditional wear with babies strapped on their backs. Indian women were in their brightly coloured saris, there were others that wore ordinary clothes and of course, there were those in ANC uniform in the colours of black, green and gold. Imagine for a moment, the massive body of women in their colourful garments as they converged on the immaculately, manicured, grassy slopes, below the Union Building, with their thumbs up in the ANC sign, striding purposefully, graciously and with dignity, as the late winter sun shone brightly on them carrying their meager lunches, depending on no one but themselves. It took more than an hour to file upwards, to assemble around the grounds of the Amphitheatre. They had assembled to hand in their petitions, which stated their indignation and contempt for the hated pass, which was now to be foisted on them. In 1913, an attempt had been made to inflict passes on African and Coloured women but the women had resisted fiercely. They had unleashed a campaign of civil disobedience in Bloemfontein. Hundreds of women were arrested and imprisoned throughout the OFS and Bloemfontein. African People's Organization (APO) Chronicle has left us the following account: "Friday morning, June lb, should never be forgotten in South Africa. On that day, the Native women declared their womanhood. Six hundred daughters of South Africa taught the arrogant whites a lesson of their way and kept shouting and cheering until his worship emerged from his office and addressed them, they then proceeded to the town hall. The women had now assumed a threatening attitude. The police endeavoured to keep them off the steps - the gathering got out of control. Sticks could be seen flourishing overhead and some came down in no gentle thwacks across the skulls of the police, who were bold to stem the onrush. We have done with pleading, we now DEMAND" (African People's Organization, 28 June 1913) - sounds like a CBCO or Gamaliel Public Meeting!

The APO chronicle added: "In the meantime, we the men who are supposed to be made of sterner stuff may as well hide our faces in shame and ponder in some secluded spot over the heroic stand made by Africa's daughters" (APO 28 June 1913). Although, largely rural-based and subordinated in a patriarchal society, African women were organized alongside African men at the beginning of the century. By the end of the second decade of the century a number of women's organizations had been established and these were conscientismg the women into a new sense of self-worth. The Native and Coloured Women's Associations the APO Women's League, were founded in 1912 in the OFS both under the Presidency of Charlotte Mxeke. The Bantu Women's League, the Mother-body of the ANCWL was founded in 1913, a year after the South African Native National Congress. The Indian Women's Association of the Transvaal and Natal were also founded in 1913. In 1912 a deputation from the Bantu Women's League met the Minister of Native Affairs; a similar deputation confronted the Prime Minister in 1918. The men however, relied, primarily on negotiations, while the women were militant and confrontational. The ANC did not accord women full membership until 1919, yet Charlotte Mxeke, was a prominent speaker at the All African Convention, convened to Protest against the Hertzog Bills. The 1950's was the most turbulent years in the history of our country. All the laws and legislation mentioned, were taken up in protest and campaigns by the women as well but the most pernicious of all was the Act, extending passes to African women, throughout the country in both urban townships and rural areas. For months ahead of August 9, women had protested against passes, against the monopoly of beer held by Municipalities, against Bantu Education and Group Areas removals. Impelled by its members whose vital concerns were issues of daily survival, food, housing, transport, the league was active on the picket-line of the 1943 Alexander boycott, in the post-war squatter movement and the food committees. The ANC Women's League, founded in 1943 under the Presidency of Madie Hall, an Afro-American, the wife of one of the former Presidents of the ANC, effectively co-ordinated the resistance; its organization having been strengthened by the Defiance of Unjust Laws Campaign, in which roughly half the volunteers were women, held the Congress of the People where women from all race groups, made up the delegates. Despite the Women's resistance the Government made gains. By March 1955 it had distributed 1,500 passes. A place called Winburg came under particular criticism at a special Anti-Pass conference convened by and ANC. The President of the ANCWL went to investigate the situation. Her presence galvanized the women, to burn the passes and this gave renewed impetus to the anti-pass campaign. In Natal, the Durban and District Women's League, a joint organization of the ANC and the NIC women organized a march to the capital city. 600 women were arrested and tried in an improvised, open air court by motor light.

A lot of hard work went into the mobilizing, organizing and planning of August 9 because this was to take place on a Nation-wide scale, all regions of Provinces had to be visited as well as the rural areas, factories, farm workers, domestic workers, the Shebeens and the Stockvels as well. Not all of us where full-time organizers and activists. Comrades that were willing to volunteer could only do so after they come four the factories at night, or out of the white madam's kitchen, so the bulk of the work fell on the few of us that were full time. Those were difficult times; there was always a shortage of money, to do the things that need to be done. But we survived and continued as best as we could, all of us.

August 9 is the celebration of our victory over apartheid, of our transition into a non-racial, non-sexist democracy. It was the overwhelming of the spirit of Africa. It was Africa's outrage against injustice and oppression on behalf of, not only the people of South Africa but on behalf of all humanity. It symbolizes the spirit of our liberation struggle, but while August 9 focuses on women, it is inclusive of men and of our youth, it is the representative of the whole history of our liberation struggle and this must always be born in mind, for women do not have a monopoly over that struggle; they have a magnificent share in it. Our history cannot be and is not gender specific, or age specific or for that matter race specific. We survived the injustices and indignities of racism. We emerged phoenix-like from the ashes, stronger and better. We dedicate ourselves to Ubuntu, the African Renaissance which, shall reclaim the African ethos and place it on par with every other in the world. We have emerged out of our colonial oppression and gained our independence, but we remain impoverished. It is estimated that half of the world goes to bed hungry and 95% of these are people who live in the formerly colonized countries. The white man's disregard for the black men has been just so amazing - even the West, wherever black people live, it has gone on for centuries and still goes on with segregation into the third world. Who invented this term World? I don't think we coined that term. We didn't relegate ourselves to the third position. Those who identified themselves as the First World, did and why? To exploit our resources beyond colonization so that, while politically free, we would continue to be dependent on them economically. We would be tied into their business, for their benefit, not ours!

CONCLUSION

I have to stop because of time, but in conclusion: Your Theme is: "Strike A Rock: Defying American Apartheid." Our theme in 1956 was also similar but we said, "If you strike a woman, you have struck a Rock". Can you really say it with confidence? "If you strike the Gamaliel Foundation (or one of our affiliates) you have struck a rock?"

If not, then you need to organize - that's what we did. I believe that the Gamaliel Foundation has the potential to be that Rock, but do you have the courage to organize, take risks and make that declaration to each other today? The declaration is: If you strike the Gamaliel Foundation, you have struck a rock!

I thank you!

Congregational  development