Special Hearings — Political Party Hearings — 1996-08-20

MRS SUZMAN: Yes, I am going to summarise this Mr Chairman, because there is rather a lot to be said on apartheid legislation as you well know.
 And the period covering your brief particularly, from 1960 to 1990, is the period when most of this legislation was passed.  Though I must say at once, that some of the legislation were provided for racial discrimination, actually predates the Commission's brief and even the election of the National Party government.
 We have race discrimination in South Africa under colonial system, under the old British government there was indeed race discrimination, but of course what the National Party government did, was to systematise this racial discrimination, into an ideology which covered all inter action between the races in South Africa.
 Thus we had the creation of separate states for each black ethnic group in the Republic, the ultimate so-called solution envisaged by the National Party government under grand apartheid, in other words, we would end up with no black citizens in South Africa.  All blacks living in the Republic, would in fact be identified with an ethnic homeland and would loose South African citizenship.
 We had the Population Registration Act of 1950, which introduced a rigid system of race classification, based on appearance, acceptance and repute and it provided for the compilation of a register of population and the issuing of identity cards.
 This really as the basis of the whole apartheid system, the Population Registration Act, commonly known as Race Classification Act and it in fact determined the opportunities or disabilities that individuals would live with.
 Whether they would end up as first, second or third class citizens of South Africa.  It determined where they could live, go to school, which Universities they could attend, which jobs they could get, which hospitals were opened to them and even where they would be buried.
 Of course it went further, it determined which person they could marry as far as colour was concerned, and race, and indeed even which person they could have sexual relationships with according to race and colour, which was of course the old Immorality Act and the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act.
 Then we have the brand apartheid which set aside these four homelands, the so-called TBVC countries, that is Transkei, Bophutatswana, Venda and Ciskei.  Four out of the then homelands, opted for independence.  The remaining stayed as self-governing States.
 Then of course blacks living outside these homelands, were strictly regulated by the Black Urban Areas Consolidation Act, passed before the Commission's mandate in 1945, which required persons to carry passes to produce them on demand, to register with administration offices etc.  I asked a question in Parliament as to how many people had been arrested under the Pass Laws, which were by the way abolished in June 1986 under P.W. Botha's premiership, and the answer was 500 000 people.
 And I was told by a National Party MP that I asked these questions in order to embarrass South Africa abroad and I replied it wasn't my questions that embarrassed South Africa abroad, it was the government's answers that embarrassed South Africa abroad.
 And with practically every instance, exposure of the inequities of the apartheid system, revealed that the system went so far into the lives of citizens, as to make the lives of black citizens almost unbearable in South Africa.
 And I might say it was not only black citizens who were affected, the administration of coloured, so-called, and indians were also affected by various disabilities and registrations, including where they could live in terms of the Group Areas Act, where they could go school in terms of the Coloured Persons' Education Act and Indian Education Act.  The extension of University Education Act of 1959 which of course restricted people who were not white, from going to the white universities.
 What jobs were available under job reservation, and what amenities they could enjoy, such as cinemas, restaurants, beaches, park benches, etc. under the Reservation of Separate Amenities Act of 1953.
 In other words, what the NP government did sir, was to codify all these regulations which affected the lives of black, so-called coloured and asian people in South Africa.  I have mentioned the  Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act, and there are of course other Acts which are too numerous really, to mention, but which are mentioned in our submission to you.
 Then of course there was the important repression of civil liberties during this time, and that too predated 1960 and indeed some measures can be traced back to the earlier colonial times.
 But again from the passing of the Unlawful Organisations Act, we had one law after the other, put on the Statute Book, which affected the civil liberties of the citizens of South Africa.
 ... legislation of the Communist Party was banned and remained so until 1990.  Individuals could be banned, listed, prohibited from attending gatherings, excluded or confined to certain areas, prohibited from performing certain acts or communicating with any person, were obliged to report to police stations, prohibited from practising law or from belonging to other organisations.
 The sentences of persons could also be arbitrally extended beyond their release date as indeed happened in the case of Robert Sibukwe.
 During the 1960's we had the series of measures providing for arbitrary detention at the discretion of the Minister of Justice.  The three most notorious of course were the General Laws Amendment Act of 1963 which was predated by the way by General Laws Amendment Act which introduced house arrest for the first time, with Helen Joseph being the first victim and the Progressive Party organised a huge mass meeting in protest against the house arrest of Helen Joseph.
 And of course it was also the Sabotage Act of 1962, the same Act which made sabotage subject to the death penalty for the first time in South Africa.  Then there was the General Laws Amendment of 1963, the infamous 90 day Detention Law, which of course meant that arbitrally a person could be arrested, was not tried in a court of law, due process was ignored, the rule of law was ignored, and a person could be held at the discretion of a senior police officer or the Minister.
 I might add calling it a 90 day law, was a misnomer, because case after case came to my knowledge, when I was the lone (indistinct) of people who were being held for two 90 day periods and some even for three an done person beyond a year.
 So the 90 day law was not really the 90 days, it was really indefinite detention and this I might say, was made totally clear by the passing of the Terrorism Act of 1967, which allowed indefinite detention in solitary confinement and I might add, both those laws, the 90 day law and the terrorism act, we opposed only by me in Parliament on behalf of the Progressive Party.
 We do not know really how many people were detained in terms of these provisions, it certainly amounted to tens of thousands.  We knew that they were subjected to mental and physical torture, solitary confinement in itself is a form of mental torture.
 Many people, at least I think it is something like 90 people were killed, many others committed suicide in suspicious circumstances, slipping on a cake of soap, falling out of a window at John Vorster Square, and so on, and they were interrogated by the police, very often in ways that could only be described as total brutality.
 And indeed sir, it was the revelations of a member of your Commission, Dr Wendy Orr, which revealed what was happening down in her part of the world, and which led me and other members of the Progressive Party to make personal investigations of what was happening in other jails, as far as detainees were concerned.
 One of the worst features of these Bills was that State officials were indemnified by law for anything they did in terms of the 90 day or the terrorism Act, they were indemnified providing that they could say that they did it bona fide, very difficult to prove that they did not do it bona fide.
 Then we had new categories of political offences, which were created, vaguely and widely defined.   The capital crime of sabotage which was introduced in 1962, included provisions prohibiting the obstruction of the free movement of traffic within the definition of sabotage.  And then apart, as I said, from providing for indefinite detention, the Terrorism Act created again a capital offence of terrorism which included committing any act in South Africa with the intent to endanger the maintenance of law and order in the Republic.
 Freedom of association was limited by the Riotous Assemblies Act of 1956, which was repeatedly extended by the Gatherings and Demonstrations Act of 1973, again geographic limits were placed on normal activities of citizen protest.
 Then sir, we had the Prohibition of Political Interference Act, known originally as the Improper Interference Act and somebody suggested it might be confused with the rape and so its name was changed and it prohibited members of different racial groups from belonging to the same political party.  That was passed in 1968 and as a result of this legislation, the Liberal Party dissolved itself.  The Progressive Party, after concerned consideration and as a request of members of the party who were not white, continued to exist as a white political party and there is no doubt that this Act contributed in a significant sense, to intergroup suspicion and racial polarisation, it induced racial political mobilisation, rather than mobilisation against common interest, shared philosophies and values.  That was what that Act did.
 Now political repression and segregation were buttressed by a series of laws preventing public disclosure or the publication of information relating to the State's activities or of the opinion of political opponents.
 Newspapers could be banned in terms of the suppression of Communism Act while people who were banned or listed, were not allowed to be published in terms of the Newspaper and Print Act of 1962, newspaper proprietors were required to deposit a substantial amount with the State and that deposit could be forfeited if the newspaper was prohibited.
 Then there were the official secret Act, the Defence Act, the Police Act, the Prisons Act.  The famous Act which prevented newspapers from publishing information about conditions in prison and you will remember the famous case against the Rand Daily Mail and its outspoken editor, Lorry Gander and his deputy, Benjy Progman.
 Well sir, we have attempted to isolate and highlight major legislative instruments of political oppression, but this list is obviously not comprehensive.  It doesn't for instance deal with labour legislation, prohibiting the formation of unions and their right to strike until 1979, nor with the oppressive measures applicable in most homelands.
 It does however, I think, broadly anyway, describe the legalistic phase of oppression which operated in terms of laws passed by Parliament.  I might say that I am particular and the Progressive Party as well, we criticised for participating in Parliament.  It was said we gave legitimacy by being in Parliament.  Nevertheless, all the information which we managed to obtain by virtue of the mechanism of being in Parliament, through questions and speeches which were reported, I noted that all the people who complained about our being in Parliament, used the information thus obtained, both here and abroad, quite extensively.
 Now sir, the government had very wide powers and very little accountability.  And of course it was inevitable under these circumstances that the State would abuse its powers.  The powers that were then consolidated for the government was a cohersant power within the National Security Management System.
 It was established in 1979, it was a parallel and secretive security coordination mechanism into which all government agencies became involved to share total strategy against the total onslaught.  It was managed by key security related ministers, senior officials on the State Security Council and the NSMS was also certainly instrumental in allowing repression to become extra legal.
 It made regional destabilisation hither to a fairly ad hoc response to terrorist attacks into a coherent policy, it was almost certainly involved in sanctioning the organisation and arming of vigilante groups and we are seeing some of that right now, in this country, and it quite possibly orchestrated the establishment of third force elements operating at arms length.
 We can't of course prove any of these allegation conclusively, because the operations of this NSMS were and still are clothed in secrecy, but there is enough circumstantial evidence available to make these charges plausible and we do suggest that the Commission investigates the structure and the actions that flowed from it in detail.