Special Hearings — Political Party — 1998-05-06

MURPHY MOROBE: Chairperson, I think just to help Mr Moosa, because this question is to the first question that was asked about incapacity and as to whether that was a matter of concern because some of consequences that arises from the concerns of the last question would be seen to be a direct consequence or how that actually panned out.
 Now at some point in the history of the UDF we had made a recognition that the organisation was growing at such a pace and such a rate, that we were drawing so many new members into the organisation and the whole question of organisation became a central focus for our concern and consideration because we realised that whilst at the core we had a very strong body of disciplined and committed activists but we had a very strong sense that on the edges we were beginning to pull in other people who were not necessarily of the same schooling politically and of the same commitment but the part of the process is they'd been drawn into the movement.  
 The question was, how do we deal with this because this concerned us greatly and at the time being incapacitated by various detentions, arrests and burnings, we had to then proceed by approaching this in the only way which the UDF tended to do, by taking a political approach to it because we did not have the equipment and the machinery to put people in jail or to lock people up, so we thought that we had to approach this politically.  
 And hence if you look at the slogans, the slogans that the UDF designed at some of these points were also intended in some way to begin to address these questions.  We had a slogan that said: "From Protest to Challenge".  Now that in itself had a very strong element of confrontation in some ways but we also realised that that part of the slogan had drawn so many people into the organisation that our documents - some of it you would have already amassed, we would have documents that actually detailed the political content that we wanted to put into the slogans, where we then actually said - I think in one of the conferences, the 1986, we came up with the slogan: "From Protest to Challenge, from Mobilisation to Organisation", where we underlined the importance of organisation as a key disciplining element of the modus operandi of the organisation, because with organisation comes greater political education, comes greater infusion on disciplined modes of engagement by our activists.  
 And the approach then was to say: we have to actually take this across the lengths and breadths of the country and to our affiliates so that that must inform their perspective and their points of departure so that any measure of what people do would then be based on the understanding of that context.
 So it is then in that sense that when one proceeds to deal with questions relating to the popular forms of undisciplined activists, as it was said, who contributed to making the country ungovernable, as to whether that was tolerated and encouraged, that one then has to understand that in the context of our own recognition of this dilemma that was facing the organisation and what we might then do to actually begin to correct it.  
 So for me, that gives you a context of our initial concerns and our initial consideration as to how we might want to go about it.  Perhaps Mr Moosa might add then on the question relating to ungovernability and undisciplined activists who contributed to making the country ungovernable.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Morobe.   Mr Moosa?

MOHAMMED VALLI MOOSA: I think one must make separate points here.  That there may well have been undisciplined persons who were engaged in actions to make the country ungovernable but not all actions aimed at undermining the ability of the apartheid regime to rule were a result of undisciplined actions.  I think that one must distinguish between the two.
 And a call to make the country ungovernable and to render apartheid unworkable was not necessarily a call to chaos.  So I think we must distinguish between the two.  In some cases you had a situation where a maximisation of chaos was viewed as rendering apartheid unworkable.  We of course never held that view and that is why we had the slogan which said: "From Mobilisation to Organisation".
 We were always of the view that organisation was the key to success and the key to a heightening of the struggle.  We did not want to find ourselves in the situation where the leadership of the liberation struggle was unable to direct the struggle and to martial those who were engaged in the struggle but we certainly were of the view that the point had been reached where it was becoming more and more possible in the '80's to render apartheid unworkable, to make it more and more difficult for the State to rule in the old way.  And perhaps the most stark example of that was the defiance campaign in the late '80's where we had embarked upon a campaign to defy apartheid laws.  
 And you may recall that large numbers of person needing, black persons needing medical attention presented themselves as patients to white hospitals, people organised to bathe on beaches that was not allocated for their skin colour.  Some of those person you associated with very well.  That was all part of the defiance campaign.  We wanted to show demonstrably that the apartheid regime had in fact lost the ability to rule the old way, that it was possible more and more to defy the regime and to render apartheid unworkable.   And in that sense I think that ungovernability is not necessarily the same as maximisation of chaos.

CHAIRPERSON: What I'm going to do is, after each cluster of questions have been posed by Mr Mpshe and the answers have been given, is to refer to my colleagues if they wish to add anything at all.  Mr Ntsebeza?

MR NTSEBEZA: Perhaps one wants to also get a sense of - I think one accepts that there was the agenda to render the country ungovernable and I think the liberation movement did not and ought not to apologise for that, it was part and parcel of dealing with a regime that was unacceptable.
 I think the latter part of his question was seeking to know to extent there is considered that there was an element which together with the liberation movement was engaged in maximisation of chaos as you put it, but which quite clearly was not necessarily part of the liberation movement.
 Now, to what extent did that element contribute to the success of the political agenda, in other words what sort of percentages can you say?  Was it more the undisciplined section or more the disciplined section directly under the control of the political leadership of the liberation movement, that you can credit for having brought about the ungovernability of the State?

MURPHY MOROBE: Chairperson, by and large the struggle certainly during the period of the existence of the UDF was being, I would say guided by organised disciplined groups of people, institutions and organisations that were clearly politically motivated and that worked within the broad strategy of the liberation movement.
 And the indication of this really has been the success of some of the biggest mass campaigns that this country had ever seen, and that could only have been done if your forces were well organised and disciplined I would say and therefore some of the campaigns which Popo spoke about.  But throughout the period and even throughout the period of the banning of the UDF when euphemistically operated as the MDM for example, that we were able to continue to organise mass campaigns that captured the imagination of the people.  
 Quite often, where there was chaos which communities responded to negatively we believe would have been the work of the enemy and agents of the enemy, we ourselves certainly discouraged that.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Lekota?