later unrest regarding apartheid Flashcards
pv botha total onslaught total strategy, 1978-90 (15 cards)
Bereau of State Security
BOSS: established in 1968, legally institutionalized in May 1969 by Vorter in Public Service Amendment Act
Monitor national security, recognize potential threats to South Africa state
Name changed consistently, eg. Special branch of police, official security branch etc. Changed to Department of National Secuirty in 1978
Identify threats to the country – collect, evaluate, correlate and interpret national security intelligence information
Combat particular threats to the security to the republic
Involved in muldergate scandal (political scandal involving secret propoganda campaign to help censor south africa in the international postage / foreign countries)
National Intelligence Service
NIS - 1980
BOSS wasn’t able to collect suffiencient information due to the investigations of the muldergate scandal, BOSS officials shredded documents that were against them
sucession agency of BOSS, many of the staff had to leave however due to having the wrong roles
Focused on analysis and evaluation
Political and economic intelligence, counter intelligence, evaluation
NIS and Mandela
From 1984, secret talks with Mandela
Understand Mandela’s views with politics, but also could be to find out what Mandela knew about the ANC (how much information he had gotten)
1989 Talk between Botha and Mandela, –> Botha thought there was a chance for negotiable settlement
Features of UDF
United Democratic Front 1983 - UDF was sucessful because of its structure and how it differed from the ANC, learning from the ‘mistakes’ or shortcomings of the ANC and exploiting loopholes
it was not a political party (not like ANC) - so they could not be banned by the government
They supported general ideas of the ANC, but some of their actions / ideas that they adopted were not exactly in concordance with the ANC leaders, but they could not do anything about it because they were banned
Actions of the UDF
Responded to Botha’s policies and reforms
Boycotts, strikes, passive resistance
Consisted of many different groups (eg. Religious, communities, unions etc.) that were involved in this organistation
No leadership group, meaning that the security could not just ‘remove’ their leaders (like they did with the ANC)
–>Hydra, many-headed snake
UDF extremely successful, especially 1984 protests, eg. against the tricameral parliament
–> led to lots of violence and condemnation of Botha as a president
Started in eastearn cape but able to spread to many other areas due to its large nature
(long term) consequences of soweto
happened in 1976 - Debateable significance
International perception of apartheid regime was much more negative, due to the brutality and violence of the images
Led to imitation riots across the coutnry, reaching many different areas
Many more young people were involved in these riots, leading to them becoming involved politically and causing them to join ANC/MK (more to MK because they saw how violent the policemen themselves were doing)
Rejuvenated the organisation
Showed that the police repressing them (subduing by force) was not enough to stop the opposition and end the apartheid regime – reform was necessary
New Constitution (by Botha)
Tricameral Parliament - 1983
Botha proposed to introduce the Tricameral Parliament
Supposed to provide the image of blacks/indians in the government and having supposed power, without offering them any real power
Failed because everyone could recognise that the coloured wings had no real power and only whites did
Designed to provide the image that south africa was democratic (to westerners), although it clearly wasn’t.
Poor state of townships and ANC civil disobedience
1980s
Anarchic and disordered conditions of townships, damaged the ANC as well as the apartheid regime
Government gave control back to black town councils, but this often caused more harm because they were also murdered as they were seen as allies of the government (to some extent)
–>Black councillers were also corrupt
Did not solve any problems, only created more violence (also against black councillors – eg. Destroying cars)
Lots of showing of this violence on news, of them defying the state, helped to lower and discredit the status of the regime because they didn’t have a solution to the problems that were raised
–>They had no answers – meant that foreigners disinvested
Increased military investment
Government also improved/invested more into their military, meeded to make it a major military power
State Security Council: for control of the country itself (1982), to shut down resistance in the area
Armed forces 1981: to improve the defense force, adding 2 years of compulsory service for white south african males
Improved arms industry (armscor) and increased military spending to 3 billion in 1984
involvement with political affairs around surrounding countries, growing pressure
(government) Lost their “buffer states”, surrounding countries were starting to adopt different political ideas that did not align with apartheid
regime Needed to “destabilise” the opposition in the neighboring countries
–>Rhodesia, Mozambique, Angola
–>Set up anti-government opposition in these areas and supported these preexisting groups, hoping to reach civil disarray and weaken the government system
White Church Leaders
Dutch Reformed Church (all white) tried to provide theological / biblical justification for apartheid. (psychological fighting)
- tried to convince that it was God’s will to make the white race superior and the white race should outnumber the black people, with more power
Multi-racial churches in south africa opposed this, manipulating of evidence
Allan Boesak
Member of the ANC, organising member of the UDF
Arrested multiple times due to participation in demonstrations, protests, speech and connection with the public was restricted
Related / linked with church leaders
Boesak became a priest in the (colored wing) of the Dutch Reformed Church (1968) - despite his opposing beliefs with the antiapartheid nature of the church
1982 (he was president from ‘82-‘91) - persuaded members of World Alliance of Reformed Churhces to suspend membership of white south african churches, declared apartheid a heresy (contradictory to christian belief)
Accused of fraud in 1994 for misusing money donated to his charity, and convicted of theft / fraud – 3 year sentence
Desmond Tutu
First black archbishop of cape town
Spoke at Steve Biko’s funeral
Nobel Peace Prize in 1984, stuck to nonviolent protesting methods despite massacres and gov violence (eg. Sharpeville 1961)
He acted as a unifying figure, that was still at liverty
–>Most PAC/ANC members still in prison
Found connections with Bishop Trever Huddelston (UK), led to more internation awareness (with different faiths as well) and educated on the dangers of apartheid
Gained more international connections (due to Tutu), and his connections
Lead to britain’s disinvenstment (1980) - they refused in the 60s and the 70s
Significance of Churches
in reality the church forces wre not extrememely important in dismantling the apartheid regime – political/economic/military factors were much more important
–> be clear about this
