Special Hearings — Political Party Recalls — 1997-05-16

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much General, we appreciate the points that you have made so clearly and so eloquently. I will now ask Advocate Mpshe to start.

UNKNOWN: Thank you Mr Chairperson. General the questions I am going to ask you flow forth from the memorandum you have handed in to us, especially the one dated 6 February 1997.  I am aware of the fact that there are a number of pages involved and I will quote from this submission.  I will give you the pages and the paragraph and you are welcome to read these parts before you answer the questions.
 Unfortunately my questions have been asked in English but I accept that Afrikaans is also an important language in South Africa. 
 General the first broad answer on the motives and perspectives of ethnic Afrikaners is quite crucial to the mandate of the TRC and requires some further clarification. In both submissions you highlight the lasting detrimental impact of the conflict between British Imperialism and the struggle for independence by the Boer Republics during the previous century.  May I kindly request that you elaborate briefly on the following statement found on page 2 of the second submission which, if we are not mistaken, should be read together with your response to question 20 on page 25 and 26 still on the second submission. I then quote what is said in that submission.
The result was war and trauma of a sort that have in a way not yet been resolved.
Now this is found on page 2 of your second submission, the first paragraph thereof. 
 And the next point will be a quotation again where you say,
Of course the entire development of the new phase of Afrikaner Nationalism can be explained this background,
that is on page 26,
namely that few non-Afrikaners seem to have cared and that the devastation and the agony of lost hopes relating to a just cause superseded personal grief and mourning.
As I indicated, page 25, paragraph 3 thereof and the last quotation from there, 
Under the circumstances of present day South Africa there is a strong revival of, trauma related nationalism amongst the Afrikaner.
That is on page 26 paragraph 3.  With this having been quoted to you General, then my questions would follow.
On what basis do you draw these conclusions if there is any documentary evidence or if there are people within or even without the Afrikaner community which share your views in this regard, may this be divulged to us?

GEN VILJOEN: Chairperson, what you're actually saying to me is that the Afrikaner, as I claim as a non-violent person, we had a violent reaction in 1899 to 1902 and then we, are you referring to a revival of the feeling of, or the perceived threat of isolation, of being overrun, being flushed by numbers?

UNKNOWN: Yes that is so.

GEN VILJOEN: Ja.  I would like to start off Chairperson by saying that this new reaction of the Afrikaner people, I have tried to explain comes from what we perceive to be the betrayal of the ethnic Afrikaner but the National Party.  It happened in the case of the Afrikaner and it also happened in the case of the former black homelands which were created by the National Party.
 Secondly, I would say that this newly activated trauma in the Afrikaner people comes from the rejection in the World Trade Centre of the Conservative views, a rejection not only from the National Party but also from the ANC.  In fact the ANC and the National Party joined hands in rejecting what the more conservative Afrikaner was trying to suggest for the sake of self determination, and they must immediately admit that at that stage we have been so sophisticated in our demands on what we really wanted to have for self determination as we are at the moment.  So the ganging up of the ANC and the National Party had really caused a sense of fate to the Afrikaner people.
 Then I would also say that the sacrificing of self determination of the Afrikaner with no substitute in the place thereof.  The acknowledgement of Mr de Klerk in London that he has sacrificed the self determination of the Afrikaner, that is a proof of it. Now I have referred to in my presentation, the one thing that we must never forget, is the strong urge within the Afrikaner to govern over himself. Over the three hundred years of our history this has been proved.  It started with the Free Burgers, a few years after Jan van Riebeeck landed in the Cape, then already at that stage, by then, remember where we came from.  We had in ourselves the spirit of freedom and at that stage they were not even prepared to accept the Netherlands East India Company authority, they wanted to govern themselves.  
 When we couldn't reach agreement on the Eastern Cape in the Border wars and we clashed with the British Government at that stage, we packed our wagons and we trekked to the north in order to find freedom.  When eventually we were confronted by the biggest power in the world at that stage firstly in 1880, we took up weapons to fight them. So we were sacrificing at that stage for the sake of our people, for the sake of being free to govern ourselves.  
 But then of course as I have also pointed the other points that I have mentioned to you when I quoted the explanations as to why the Afrikaner reacted in certain ways.  I think the dangers and the perception of international communism, the rejectability of conventional war methods or revolutionary methods that we have seen so far, I think the basic differences in culture, all those points I can mention Chairperson, as contributing factors towards what I have mentioned in there as a strong revival of the trauma-related nationalism amongst the Afrikaner.
 It is true that the Afrikaner has gone in the '60's and the 70's through a stage of materialistic advance, and it is true that in this period, the Nationalism faded away, but as soon as the Afrikaner is placed under pressure, this then again ignites and it will grow.  
 So this is the reason why we have come to this conclusion.  Is that more or less the answer or would you like something in addition?

UNKNOWN: Yes and no. Given the answer as you have done, does this perspective help to explain why relatively few Afrikaners today seem really prepared to take responsibility for the negative  consequences of this trauma-related nationalism.  Is it because they continue to see themselves as victims as we indicated by their attitude towards the work of the Commission?  Is it now explained by your answer?