<>

CHAPTER SEVEN: RESISTANCE POLITICS IN RETREAT: CABALISM, THE ANC
UNDERGROUND AND GANDHI, 1985-1989

As a general rule there is not much we can do to change
or alter the objective conditions that militate against larger-scale
radicalisation of the Indian masses. But we must guard against
a view that calls for the abandonment of this sector as a crucial
component of the liberation alliance. We cannot and should
not "write-off" the Indian sector - that would
be a fatal political blunder.

The progressive forces in the Indian sector are acutely conscious
of the tasks and challenges facing us. We are concerned as
others in the democratic movement about the political retreat
of the Indian sector. But we remain firmly committed towards
intensifying our efforts, building our forces and consolidating
the active unity of the oppressed and welding the liberation
alliance into a powerful instrument capable of effecting radical
social transformation.

Introduction

Indian opposition to apartheid restructuring peaked with the
successful undermining of the tricameral elections. However,
the majority of Indians then retreated from resistance politics
and reversed the trend established between 1980 and 1984.
As resistance shifted into a "higher phase" amongst
Africans, a concomitant "lower phase" of Indian
resistance emerged. This actuality placed a strain on the
liberation alliance and raised again the question of the
limits and possibilities of Indian resistance at a time when
African leadership was emerging forcefully. The NIC maintained
that most Indians possessed a basic anti-apartheid consciousness
which could continue to serve as a foundation for political
mobilisation. However, they conceded that Indians had not
come to terms with the inevitability of African majority
rule and had not embraced a revolutionary outlook. This chapter
seeks to understand the retreat from resistance politics,
and argues that the reverse was hardly uniform and exhibited
several contradictory features. In discussing the growth
of ANC activity, it is necessary to consider why many Indian
activists turned away from working amongst Indians and gravitated
to either ANC politics or other sectoral interventions.

The emergence of debates (and the praxis itself)
around internal democracy and cabalism consumed the strategic
and institutional
energies of the NIC, UDF and its allied organisations. These
developments fostered a fractious organisational milieu that
contributed to the weakening of resistance; yet the withdrawal
of many from NIC work did itself contribute to this decline
in democracy and organisational efficiency. Heightening repression
also prescribed the limits and possibilities of activism and
encouraged the political withdrawal of many Indians. The ideological
control sought by the information censorship measures under
the state of emergency also contributed to the weakening of
political consciousness. In this context of insecurity and
political instability, powerfully evoked by the Inanda incident,
we examine the ongoing symbolic presence of Gandhi and the
insertion of the Indian nation-state as a component of the
political discourses and practices of South African Indians.
It is therefore necessary to assess the implications of the
NIC's attempts to mobilise Indian ethnicity, especially
since this strategy came from an organisation that was desperately
on the defensive from the very constituency it sought to organise
and deliver to the national democratic struggle.

The Inanda incident

While African resistance was intensifying nationally, provoking
the state to impose a partial State of Emergency in 1985,
Inkatha was determined to contain protests in Natal. The
assassination of UDF leader Victoria Mxenge ignited demonstrations
in many African townships in Durban in the early days of
August 1985. The students soon shifted the arena of their
resistance from the townships into the city centre with a
4000-strong demonstration which attracted students from black
and white higher education institutions and from African
high schools. By Durban standards, this was combat politics
at its height and signalled a departure from the tactic of
operating within the boundaries of legal protest. The police,
initially constrained by the presence of white lunch-time
shoppers, attacked the students and arrested twenty-one of
them. Over half the demonstrators and those arrested were
Indians. Significantly though, unlike the high levels of
Indian participation in the 1980 school boycotts in Natal,
there were negligible protests following the Mxenge assassination.
Only one Indian High school protested against the State of
Emergency, and even this action was relatively short-lived.

Days later,
in the settlement of Inanda, what started as an anti-state
protest, directly linked to the Mxenge killing,
developed into ethnic strife. One commentator observed that
two disturbed streams merged into an uncontained torrent. The
first was of local origin, the cumulative strife, deprivation
and uncertainty of the unorganised
poor; the second, the highly politicised revolt of the youth. What can be described
as "lumpen" youth from Inanda took up and led where the students
had left off.

The youth attacked what they perceived to be symbols of power, and some looted
Indian and African shops. This violence spilled over into attacks against Indian
homes in the area. Generally, attempts were made by Indians of all political
opinions to prevent a rise in hysteria amongst Indians. When panic spread to
Phoenix, leading to the formation of vigilante groups, residents realised that
this would only worsen the situation if Africans were killed.

The violence in Inanda can be traced to consistent
Inkatha attacks on UDF supporters. One study suggests that
Inkatha
meetings conducted before the violence included discussions
on "How to get the Indian out of Inanda" in order
to enable incorporation into KwaZulu. This study found that
no animosity between Africans and Indians was evident, a view
which was supported by the fact that certain Indian properties
were salvaged by some African neighbours before the mobs could
loot. A few rioters alleged coercion: "I was frightened
and concerned about my life and was forced to go with the mob...we
have lived with the Indians for many years and had no problems.
It is the tsotsis (thugs) that are causing the problems." Another
woman maintained that Indians "called us every evening
to watch television. We also ate together...I saw the Africans
take away some of the furniture, we could not do anything".

While many of the Indian victims experienced
feelings of betrayal and loss of trust, there were others
who felt differently.
One resident who lost his house "honestly believe[d]
that the unrest was not racial friction". Inanda cannot
be considered as a repeat of the 1949 riots. The scale and
the context were clearly different. The main resemblance was
the passive role played by police in the face of widespread
looting, arson and stone throwing. The events were triggered
by political action which was hijacked by criminal elements,
but they also found some resonance with Inkatha's earlier
anti-Indian agitation. Fatima Meer suggests that the Indian
residents were caught in the cross-fire of general uprisings
all over the country, and proposes that an aggravating factor
was that Indians left their homes before being attacked, thus
leaving them free to be occupied by criminal fringe elements.
Even the pro-Inkatha YS Chinsamy, commented that there was
no "racial conflict, only political issues which gave
vent to anger".

There were different racial responses to these events. One
survey showed that Africans became more radicalised, while
Indians and Coloureds became more conservative. In African
areas, support for Inkatha dropped and UDF support rose, whereas
in Indian areas UDF support dropped from 15% to 14%. The UDF
was probably hardest hit by the change in the attitudes of
Indians, particularly with regard to their perceptions of violence.
Only 1.8% of Africans blamed the UDF as compared to 8% of Indians.
Most Indians were unable to make a distinction between Inkatha
and the UDF. The political world in which these organisations
existed was far too distant from their own realities, particularly
since the UDF had not succeeded in weaving itself into the
social fabric of Indian working-class existence. While 41.4%
of Africans believed Inkatha had fanned the trouble once it
began, only 2.5% of Indians blamed Inkatha. Conservative political
forces gained from the events, with Rajbansi and the HoD displaying
high visibility with the assistance of police protection during
the disturbances. This conservative turn was reflected in the
fact that 53% of Indians proclaimed support for P.W Botha.
Africans saw the targets of the unrest as the government (46%)
and informers (28%). Coloureds saw the targets as businesses
(39%) and Indians (27%); and Indians saw themselves (45%) and
businesses (26%) as the primary targets. These differing views
may be attributed in part to government propaganda aimed at
evoking fear and a retreat away from solidarity with Africans
into the white laager. Inkatha was also constructed as a moderating
and controlling force in the unrest. Some believed that these
riots stemmed from a small proportion of Indians embracing
tricameralism.

The history and consciousness of Indians prior to the riots
allowed a racial myth to be created out of an occurrence which
was not racially-orientated. The comparison of the losses inflicted
are important: Africans experienced 70 deaths and the looting
of 200 African businesses, whereas 4 Indians died and 44 Indian
businesses were affected. However, across the class divide
fear had found a home - a fear that would persist for the next
decade at least. One indication of this fear (and self-interest)
was the submission of a memorandum by Indian farmers calling
for their incorporation into KwaZulu rather than the loss of
their properties in Inanda.

Inkatha, clearly aided by the state's ideological and
coercive apparatus, attempted to win the support of Indians
through calling Indian-African solidarity meetings with Rajbansi.
This conservative alliance also condemned the UDF and NIC for
fomenting the violence. The media gave prominent coverage to
these articulations and confirmed for many the UDF's
complicity in the violence. The NIC accused the government
of attempting to blame them for instigating the Phoenix-Inanda
disturbances and the ensuing violence. NIC leaders rigorously
asserted that they had not been involved in promoting unrest
or in any activity that was unlawful. These denials were ignored
by the electronic media and received limited press coverage.
The HoD and Inkatha, however, contended that they consistently
eschewed violence as a political weapon, unlike the implicit
support the UDF offered to the ANC's armed struggle.
Thus, with the weight of the conservative media it was relatively
easy to exonerate Inkatha and attribute blame to the UDF.

During the Inanda uprisings residents felt
deserted by political leaders. Rajbansi's promises of leading the affected
residents to Inanda to acquire their remaining belongings was
never realised. Meanwhile, the UDF and the NIC were unable
to present any alternative support to the affected residents.
Columnist Ameen Akhalwaya enquired why AZAPO and the UDF, "which
claim to have large followings, do not hold any public meetings
with residents to diffuse the situation and help organise protection?" Substantial
criticism centred around the failure of the NIC to provide
aid, and several letters to newspapers accused the NIC of doing
nothing for the Inanda victims. However, UDW students and various
youth organisations did collect food and clothing for the victims
and attempted to present an alternative view of what had transpired
in Inanda. Nevertheless, Rajbansi accused the students of "fanning
the flames of unrest". The UDW-SRC president responded
by accusing Rajbansi and his colleagues of doing the same by
supporting tricameralism. The NIC was also unable to prevent
the subsequent eviction of the Inanda victims by the Durban
City Council for failure to pay rents, despite a previous agreement
with the Council for a period of leniency in recognition of
the residents plight. It was against this background of organisational
ineffectiveness that the NIC was forced into a sharp retreat.

The Inanda
riots and other township violence underlined the failure
of the tricameral system. A leading business figure,
Chris Saunders of Tongaat Hulett, admitted he was wrong to
support the tricameral parliament since it had
in fact created more problems and solved none, with unrest
spreading...in Natal to areas such as Lamontville, Chesterville
and Inanda where peace had in the past prevailed. The first
step in the process of moving to a common and shared society
is to release Nelson Mandela and his colleagues, unban political
organisations and create the necessary psychological conditions
for meaningful dialogue with the true representatives of the
people.

While the Inanda violence looms large in the
consciousness of many Indians (but less so than the events
of 1949) and attracted
the interest of some academic observation, it is a mere footnote
in the overall chapter of the violence in KwaZulu-Natal that
has its beginnings in 1980. Magyar suggested that the Inanda
conflagration revealed Indians to be a political minority entrapped
between the deteriorating relations of the dominant white and
African communities. He predicted that the outcome of "this
inter-nationalist struggle will affect Indian people directly",
yet at the constitutional level, Indians still exercised virtually
no initiative. Inanda showed that participation in the new
parliament had not engendered greater national security for
the Indian voting constituency as an ethnic minority.

The Inanda riots also exposed the serious organisational
weaknesses of the NIC. Its leadership was distant from the
people affected
by the riots, and it had no influence or grassroots presence
in the area that could calm anxieties. However, its relatively
small activist base in Phoenix worked strenuously to provide
relief for the residents who fled from Inanda, albeit under
the banner of the local civic and child and family welfare
society. The absence of the NIC leadership, with few exceptions,
was an indication of the ineffectiveness of the NIC and its
inability to protect and defend Indians. The class dimensions
of the conflict were complex. Much of the land was owned by
well-off Indians, but the vast majority who resided there were
in the same position as the African tenants. Inanda was one
of the few areas (and the largest) in South Africa where Africans
and Indians lived side by side, albeit reflecting different
class structures. However, poor Indians also lived in shacks.
Adam observed that the riots confirmed the state's success
in alienating the divided segments from each other through
separate institutions and different incorporations.

While it was mostly the Indian working-class
(and some traders and farmers) who were affected, it would
be accurate to say
that the Inanda incident reverberated across the class divide.
However, the middle-class remained quite secure and distant
from the Inanda events because of their geographical distance.
Even working-class Indians in Chatsworth were unaffected since
the township was largely Indian with very few African residents
living in immediate proximity. Nevertheless, rumours circulated
for days of an impending attack from the neighbouring African
township of Umlazi. Consequently, the impact of this event
on political consciousness was devastating. It aroused memories
of the 1949 riots, and bred fear, anxiety and confusion, causing
many to question their opposition to apartheid. The refrain "better
the devil you know than the devil you do not know" began
to find currency.

The spontaneous nature of these events found
the democratic movement unable to offer constructive direction.
The movement
learnt that "spontaneity" was capable of infinite
power if it harnessed mass social discontent and the tendency
towards mass action that could prevail in certain situations.
Equally, spontaneity could be open to misdirection and even
to manipulation by the state and forces such as Inkatha. These
events showed that Indian resistance organisations lost contact
with their constituencies by "running ahead"; that
is, they went faster and further than people seemed to want,
and advocated a course correct in itself but for which their
constituency was not adequately prepared. Meanwhile, the African
leadership appeared to "lag behind"; that is, they
failed to go as far as the people were prepared to go. It was
expected that the sound leadership of organisations would steer
a middle course and endeavour to obviate both errors. Nevertheless,
the absence of common objective conditions in oppressed communities
greatly exacerbated the problem.

I have argued elsewhere that, youth organisation
leaders in the African communities sometimes "lagged behind" youth
in their constituencies whereas Indian and Coloured youth leaders
tended to "run ahead" of their constituencies driven
by their desire to emulate what they saw as the more desirable
political practice that prevailed among African youth. This
phenomenon was facilitated by increased contact between youth
leadership in the different racial groups. The reverse occurred
too, as African leaders became aware of the limitations of
united action across the racial divide. This realisation tempered
their own analyses and militancy, and sometimes led them to "lag
behind" their constituencies. These questions also confronted
the ANC as it forged ahead with the development of its internal
infrastructure.

The rise of the ANC and the shift to the underground

By the late 1970s many Indian activists saw themselves as part
of an informal ANC underground. Some only formally joined
the ANC in the mid-1980s or later but often saw themselves
as ANC rather than NIC operatives. For many, the NIC was
simply a convenient front. As one activist put it: "For
us, it was more important to do [ANC] work." Many Indian
middle-class activists were supportive of the ANC's
military vanguard approach and felt that there was a need
for concerted armed propaganda campaigns, given the ideological
hegemony of the state. Others also believed that an armed
seizure of power was a real possibility. During this period
the ANC argued that the build-up phase was approaching its
climax and that insurrection was now properly on the agenda.
Several thousand copies of such ANC statements were distributed
in Natal by the underground propaganda unit led by Abba Omar
a former UDW student leader.

One of the challenges facing the ANC was to articulate its
political and military interventions in an appropriate manner.
In late 1985, ANC operational units attempted to develop an
integrated political-military underground command structure
in the greater Durban area. The implementation of the plan,
code-named Operation Butterfly, was overseen by Ivan Pillay
and supported by a network of pamphleteers in Durban; among
them were students Mo Shaik and Abba Omar. Shaik also maintained
contact with exiled Ebrahim Ismail Ebrahim, who came back into
the country illicitly to solicit recommendations from the underground
for the 1985 Kabwe Conference. The ANC underground in Durban
thus included the network around Pravin Gordhan as well as
other formal political units. One of the MK machineries in
Durban falling within the Swaziland operation was headed by
Dr. Vijay Ramlakan. The military machinery in which Ramlakan
was involved comprised more or less half African and half Indian
members and covered much of Greater Durban. It was larger than
the Omar-Shaik propaganda unit, which numbered only 13. Many
of these underground agents were members of the NIC and distributed
ANC literature employing a similar NIC pamphlet distribution
network.

In the late 1970s the ANC recruited mainly
those from middle-class backgrounds, with disproportionately
Gujerati merchant-class
roots (and mostly Muslim). There was no specific discriminatory
intention behind this demographic picture, which was facilitated
by Indian social structure and kinship/trust ties. While caste
was largely irrelevant in popular discourses, the legacy of
caste privilege now manifested itself in class terms. There
were at least two earlier attempts to set up ANC political
underground structures in Chatsworth in the early 1980s. Sydney
Moodley of neighbouring Merebank was deployed in Chatsworth
where he operated until he fled in 1981. Merebank had a rich
history of ANC involvement with several local activists having
fled into exile. However, Ramlakan, whose own roots were in
Chatsworth, pioneered the formation of ANC MK units. The well-known
Lenny Naidu unit came into existence in the latter part of
1984 and trained within the country. All its members were high
profile local youth and civic activists who were frustrated
with the slow progress of Indian mobilisation, who felt that
Indians must also be willing to sacrifice their lives to the
ANC military effort, and who were largely uninspired by the
leadership and programme of the NIC. Historically all these
activists were of indentured roots and contemporaneously they
were from working-class backgrounds. However, these units and
those providing infrastructural support were smashed by the
security apparatus after operating for between six months and
almost two years within the country. Lenny Naidu and four others,
including the writer, fled the country in early 1987 after
spending several months underground. Another unit member turned
state witness, and Derek Naidoo, Jude Francis and Ramlakan
would later join several African comrades in trials that led
to sentences on Robben Island. Ramlakan's trial presented
an important picture of Indian involvement in the ANC at a
military level. The fact that Ramlakan, a person of humble
working-class roots who had qualified as a medical doctor,
added further poignancy to the trial. While these events may
have contributed minimally to radicalising Indians, they showed
Africans that Indians too were prepared to make sacrifices.

In later years activists from Chatsworth and
several other working-class areas joined the ANC underground
structures as
repression increased and mass mobilisation became less viable.
During this period, some NIC-linked underground operatives
dedicated their efforts to ANC work or moved into other sectors,
mainly trade unionism. These withdrawals, which included people
who fled the country, had a debilitating effect on the NIC.
In 1988, when Lenny Naidu was murdered together with other
African youths in a hit-squad assassination near the Swaziland
border, police restrictions deprived Chatsworth activists of
the opportunity to use his funeral as a means to promote the
ANC. Only 200 persons were allowed to attend both the funeral
service and the burial. Notwithstanding these restrictions,
prominent newspaper articles about Lenny Naidu's assassination
evoked some sympathy for the activist, his family and the movement.
However, fear reigned supreme and there was no outward expression
of these feelings. Non-racialism briefly triumphed as there
were joint services for those who had been killed in the ambush.
Only a few Indians attended these joint commemorations, but
nevertheless the Ramlakan trial and Lenny Naidu's assassination
both inserted the ANC into the political consciousness of Indians,
evoking a multiplicity of responses.

The operational relationship between the ANC and the NIC was
important. While at a formal level there was only an historical
link, there was great overlap between ANC and NIC activists.
Ashwin Desai observes that:

The 'dual role' of underground and NIC activism...created
problems within the NIC. The NIC membership was a motley crew.
Hindus and Muslims, capitalists and workers, young and old
all found a home in the NIC. It was broad-based with a broad
appeal. Often ANC operatives tried to run the NIC as if it
were a Leninist party. There was to be strict party discipline
and decisions were to be made along the lines of 'democratic
centralism'. It was probably this kind of mentality that
led to the marginalisation of many older NIC figures and to
the subsequent charges of cabalism which were levelled by them.

Inevitably, the contradictions in 'exile politics' manifested
themselves in the NIC since different cells reported to different
ANC leaders: Mac Maharaj was based in Lusaka, Ismail Ebrahim
and later Ivan Pillay operated out of Swaziland, and the Pahad
brothers worked from London. Desai suggests that the absence
of co-ordination amongst these three groupings was probably
a result of geography as well as the power dynamics of exile
politics. Different cells battled around the strategic orientation
of the NIC, with each grouping believing "they were the
authentic voice of the exiled ANC". The combination of
these conflicts and a range of other criticisms from the rank-and-file
NIC activists around issues of strategy and internal democracy
took a heavy toll on the organisation. Activists in the early
1980s spoke quietly about the existence of a cabal, because
they did not want to expose divisions in the organisation publically.
As problems intensified the word cabal became one of the best-known
within the national resistance lexicon.

Cabalism and the decay of resistance politics

Several conflicts characterised NIC and UDF politics, including
the relationship with the tricameral parliament, the question
of whether there should be a reconsideration of the boycott
position, the issue of appropriate responses to the detentions
of leaders, the moves for unity between AZAPO and UDF, and
the attempts to increase worker participation in the UDF.
At a local level, these tensions manifested themselves differently.
For example, some Chatsworth activists adopted an antagonistic
position towards the potential of "control by the town
grouping" led by Pravin Gordhan; and there were concerns
about the absence of working-class leadership and the fact
that youth and women were not sufficiently recognised as
independent sectors of struggle. (See Table 7.1) It was in
the youth sector that criticism reached its peak; these processes
have been analysed in my earlier work.

Conflicts such as these confused and alienated several new
activists who were being told that while unity was the greatest
weapon, in reality disunity prevailed. The full scope of this
disunity of the Indian left is worth examining. First, there
was the division between ANC-aligned Indians and non-ANC aligned
Indians. Secondly, the non-ANC aligned Indians were divided
into PAC, AZAPO and APDUSA/NUM. Thirdly, there were those Indians
who held an independent worker position. This group, dismissed
as anti-ANC by the hegemonic grouping within the NIC, began
to gain ANC acceptance after the formation of COSATU in 1985.
Fourthly, the divisions within the ANC/NIC supporters were
intense and related to organisational strategy, personality
clashes, methods of accountability, internal democracy and
ideological positions.

The ideological splits within the Indian left, often had more
to do with semantics than substance, much like the splits which
plagued the white left, particularly in Johannesburg during
the mid-1980s. The main conflict was disagreement over the
choice between a one-or two-phased struggle. Those who subscribed
to the view that the struggle in South Africa was one continuous
struggle for socialism were opposed by those who believed that
the first phase should concentrate on the struggle for national
liberation, while still supporting socialism. These antagonisms
were not neatly compartmentalised. They had several overlaps
and the political allegiances of many activists were disparate,
diffuse and multiple. For example, many saw themselves as NIC
and ANC activists from 1980, but by 1983 they also became supporters
of the emerging trade union movement which was viewed as not
being in opposition to other left organisations. There were
several debates within various informal circles about what
it meant to be anti-AZAPO. This was accentuated in 1982 with
the release of prominent BC activists from Robben Island. However,
it can be argued that none of these left political debates
affected the life of the majority of Indians, and that they
were self-indulgent preoccupations of disconnected activists.
It was the conflicts within the NIC that had the greatest relevance
for Indians.

In October 1987, a unique workshop of Chatsworth
activists examined a range of criticisms pertaining to the
NIC. These
deliberations are valuable as an indication of the contradictions
between activists working and living amongst Chatsworth's
working-class (though some activists were becoming middle-class)
and the leadership of the NIC, who resided mainly in middle-class
suburbia. The organisation was criticised for failing to transform
itself into a mass-based organisation despite having had several
opportunities since the 1980s. It lacked day-to-day grassroots
contact and "functioned in alienation of the people".
It was based primarily on the participation of student activists
or middle-class elements and professionals. The area committees
(ACs) were weak, ineffectual and almost non-functional, while
the absence of proper branches made it difficult for ordinary
people to participate.

Activists argued that if proper branches existed through which
people in Chatsworth and Phoenix could feel part of the organisation
and to whom the organisation would be accountable, then activists
would be in a better position to defend the organisation and
themselves during the state of emergency. The organisation
enjoyed an element of protection which would derive from its
mass character. Being essentially an activist organisation,
it had become easy for the state to isolate and neutralise
its influence among the people. Furthermore, representation
within the Executive and Organising Committee (OC) was not
based on elections by the areas. Individuals were chosen or
co-opted onto these structures willy-nilly and this was considered
to be undemocratic and no longer tolerable. It was noted that
the Activists Forum (AF) and the Area Committees were used
for consultations with activists. However, the AF was criticised
since no prior knowledge existed of the issues to be discussed
at these meetings. Consequently, no real discussions took place
in ACs and this led to individual viewpoints being put forward
without proper democratic discussion in the areas. In any event,
the ACs expressed views that were routinely disregarded by
the Executive.

The political practice of the organisation
was also criticised, and it was alleged that the NIC lacked
a proper programme and
was too issue-orientated. Cliqueism and infighting were seen
as hampering progress. In particular, an observation was made
that the organisation's practice was dominated by a "Chemist
Grouping" (Pravin Gordhan was a chemist), and a few people
who met regularly at his pharmacy were believed to unduly influence
the organisation. Certain activists, because of personal loyalties,
built centralised control around this group. They had privileged
access to information and resources, and this tended to elevate
their position in the various areas without necessarily cultivating
the popular support of the local activists.

The workshop also expressed grave concerns
about the decision-making process of the organisation. Activists
argued that the AF and
ACs were used for rubber stamping decisions that had already
been taken by the Executive and Organising Committee. Branches
were requested to implement activities without first investigating
the feasibility of such proposals. Appointments of certain
persons to the OC and Executive were made without consultation.
Those who participated in the Executive and the OC did so on
an individual basis and did not carry the mandate of their
areas. There were also concerns about the accountability of
these personnel who seemed to serve permanently on both the
Executive and the OC. There was no process of recalling people
from these structures, nor were there adequate forums for criticising
these individuals when necessary. There was no mechanism through
which the NIC was accountable to the (Indian) "community",
and in general people were unable to question the functioning
of the organisation. The Executive and the OC were also not
accountable to activists.

The workshop also applied itself to the relationship
to other sectors and found that the NIC seemed to be "dominating
the comrades from the African sector". Activists felt
that some African comrades were "becoming Indianised".
There was little contact between the NIC and African comrades
with the resulting alienation of Indian activists. The UDF
had little or no support among Indian people, and in Chatsworth
it was seen as an African organisation. This was in part a
result of the kind of consciousness that some Indian activists
held. It was also felt that there was a lack of contact between
the activists and the leadership, resulting in poor co-ordination
of work at local level. There existed no established way in
which the "centre" dealt with the "periphery",
and because of the preferential treatment that certain activists
enjoyed, their loyalty was to certain leadership figures rather
than to the organisation as a whole. Many activists felt that
they were "mere pamphlet fodder" since they did
not learn much else besides how to distribute pamphlets. Those
activists who were theoretically advanced did not adequately
share their knowledge with others.

It was also noted that individuals who raised
criticisms of the organisation were ostracised and labelled
as being reactionary,
members of the Marxist Workers Tendency, BC, petty bourgeois,
individualists, CIA agents, ultra-leftists and so on. This
reality prevented activists from voicing even the most valid
of criticisms. It was suggested that since the OC itself was
being criticised for being undemocratic, it was therefore ill-equipped
to deal with the proposals and recommendations that activists
were making. There were also criticisms that the organisation
catered mainly for middle-class people such as doctors and
lawyers. The criteria used for the appointment of individuals
onto the Executive were questioned since, following the 1984
elections, a system of co-option had been used. Neither the
ACs nor the AF were consulted on these measures. It was felt
that within the Chatsworth AC there also existed cliques and
this caused divisions which were often related to a power struggle
between the "town" and "township" groups.
There was rivalry and disagreement over strategy and organising.
After the tricameral elections, some township activists aligned
themselves with the chemist/town grouping.

Specific criticisms were made against Shoots
Naidoo, a member of the Executive from Chatsworth. The questions
centred around
activists' security during the emergency. A high code
of discipline was expected from the leadership, and they were
asked to clear out their homes of any sensitive material. Activists
questioned how security police had got hold of CHAC files which
had been in Naidoo's custody. Those in detention around
June/July 1986 were shown these files, which included the names
of several activists, and this resulted in the detainees being
undermined when they attempted to conceal information. Furthermore,
no one was appraised of the confiscation of these documents.
Naidoo denied that any minutes were taken, but detainees maintained
that the minutes were written on graph paper used only by him.
The issue was left unresolved with a face-saving suggestion
that it would be addressed when further details emerged.

The workshop recommended that the NIC needed
a completely new structure. It was suggested that the OC
and the Executive
needed to be re-elected and made accountable to activists and
the community. Branches must be formed to enable ordinary people
to participate in the affairs of the organisation. The AF was
to be used primarily for education and consultation. It was
also considered to be important for the NIC to organise in
other sectors, for example among high school students. In the
wake of allegations of NIC ineffectiveness and disorganisation,
internal elections were planned for December 1987 to stem the
growing dissent within NIC ranks. The thrust for the conference
came from younger activists who had been actively involved
since the 1980 school boycotts and especially after the 1984
tricameral election boycotts. There was disagreement, though,
about whether the NIC revival could rely on the new activists,
since many of them were students and lacked stability and the
necessary "economic base" to maintain an effective
political organisation.

The chemist/town grouping acquired the name "cabal" because
of their immense control of and influence over the organisation.
A joke at one factory suggested that NIC policy under Dr Monty
Naicker was "just what the doctor ordered", but
under George Sewpersad, a lawyer, NIC policy was "just
what the chemist (in reference to Pravin Gordhan) ordered!" There
were claims that some senior NIC executives were being marginalised
and that this threatened to split the organisation. These executives
claimed that they were excluded from activities, seldom notified
of meetings, and were not consulted on key issues. On the eve
of the conference, these officials resigned because the meeting
was to be held clandestinely. They claimed, furthermore, that
the election of office bearers had been predetermined by the "cabal".
Farouk Meer refuted this, stating that branches had made nominations
for officials, and that this should not be considered undemocratic.
He threatened legal action if the accusations continued. The
conference then degenerated into an exercise in bad public
relations.

The secrecy of the conference was aimed at
accommodating "underground" activists.
Delegates were picked up and taken to the venue, and while
there, they were restricted to the hall and not allowed to
make phone calls. The way the Conference Organising Committee
operated invited several criticisms: it was claimed that they "went
along their task in secrecy and the effects will only be felt
when the rulers of the cabal tear down the entire membership
in their grand design to keep the country under their feet".
The priority given to the participation of a few, albeit influential,
activists on the run from the Security Branch in preference
over the benefits of a much needed public AGM was a miscalculation
which would hinder the NIC's resuscitation, especially
since the NIC recognised that they had
not always functioned democratically. Certain individuals banding together
have exercised undue influence on its activities. The leadership has been disunited.
Personality conflicts have been rife. The lack of internal democracy has contributed
to its paralysis.

Overall, there was clearly a need for greater unity, a broadening
of the NIC-support base, and the need to review strategy in
the light of changed conditions after the Inanda riots and
racial incidents on the beach-front, as well as the state of
emergency.

The fracas surrounding the NIC conference and the cabal, dominated
the local press in the first half of 1988, while the second
half of the year was dominated by the LAC elections held in
October. There was considerable displeasure at the ousting
of M.J Naidoo, and a letter from a worker delegate to the NIC
conference stated that the NIC:

is no longer entitled to be one of the custodians of the Freedom Charter. This
viewpoint is being expressed in my factory...My fellow workers are saying that
what the state failed to do with M.J. Naidoo, a top congress leader, the NIC
cabal has succeeded in doing by isolating him from the NIC.

Questions were also raised about the central
role of Hassan Mall and Hassim Seedat (who was elected treasurer),
since some
viewed them as collaborators for their role in HoD-controlled
institutions. Although communal or sectional thinking hardly
found a space in the NIC vocabulary during this period, questions
around MJ Naidoo's ousting were inevitably in the minds
of many working-class Indians. Naidoo, a south Indian Tamil-speaking
Hindu of indentured roots, was marginalised and believed that
preferential treatment was given to Seedat and Mall, who were
of north Indian, Muslim and merchant class roots.

The NIC's stature continued to plummet
with popular assertions that the government had not banned
the NIC because
the cabal had already stripped it of all its vitality. One
letter-writer asked why the NIC had stopped public meetings
in Phoenix and Chatsworth, and why they had said nothing about
the recent bannings, rent increases or the rising unemployment.
Another letter alleged that the NIC, as a result of the cabal
allegations, had lost all credibility:

From the time of the conference and to date they have lost credibility and
remain a poor runner, trailing behind community organisations trying to regain
that lost credibility.

A further embarrassment was inflicted on the NIC by one of
its high-profile supporters who opted to contest the LAC elections
partly because of the snub he had received from the NIC. In
any event, there was speculation about whether the NIC would
participate in the LAC election itself. For the state and its
allies, it was essential that the coming LAC elections were
successful. This became clear when they passed legislation
allowing special votes to be cast in the last two weeks leading
up to the election. Organisations were also prevented by emergency
regulations from calling for boycotts.

The influence of the cabal extended further
than the NIC. Archie Gumede suggested that in the UDF some
activists were
using coercive tactics, alleging that democratic decisions
could not be taken until Mandela was released. It was suggested
that the cabal's technique of achieving consensus was
based on the idea of "coercion now, internal democracy
later". Some believed that just as M.J. Naidoo was "liquidated",
so too action against Gumede would be set in motion because
of his exposure of coercion by activists. The Inkatha-aligned,
Ilanga newspaper sought to portray the UDF as anti-Zulu and
Indian-controlled, and claimed that it had evidence of a cabal
within the NIC that controlled the UDF and the MDM. Sewpersadh's
refutations sounded less than convincing: "There is no
foundation to the allegation that the NIC or a cabal controls
the MDM. This is a gross travesty of truth."

A magnanimous analysis of the cabal phenomenon would proceed
as follows. There was a shift in political space from the bannings
of BC organisations in 1977 through to 1985 and a tightening
up of legal space again until 1989. First of all, those in
the leadership were unable to make these shifts as creatively
and astutely as was necessary. Secondly, the imperatives of
executing important, urgent tasks called for the best skills
that were readily available. Often these belonged to middle-class
activists who were known and trusted by the dominant grouping
within the NIC leadership. No conscious attempt was made to
exclude activists from Indian working-class areas or indeed
African leadership more generally.

A less generous analysis might suggest that there was a propensity
to control both the underground and legal resistance in Durban
(and the province) and the resources that came with that control.
While the possibility of severe state repression was omnipresent,
the anticipated change in political fortunes also meant that
those seeking a long-term political career might risk repression
in order to position themselves strategically for the longer
term. While we might speculate that perhaps a combination of
both sets of reasons enabled the emergence of the cabal, it
is important to assert that those who came to be associated
with the cabal were deeply committed both to the NIC and the
ANC, and had served the movement for several years. However,
what they failed to recognise was that the struggles of the
1980s had also generated a large number of activists, including
those from working-class neighbourhoods, who shared an equal
if not greater commitment to the Congress movement. Most importantly
they were unable to make space for the effective incorporation
of these newer activists into the NIC. A greater weakness was
the failure of this leadership to encourage Indians actively
to engage in the various non-racial sectoral organisations
and to link civic organisation to the broader political struggles
of the moment.(See Table 7.2)

We should pause here to comment on the apparent preponderance,
disproportionate presence and hence influence of Indians in
prominent positions in various leftist organisations, even
though the vast majority of Indians did not share these attitudes.
One reason is that of non-racialism itself. Indian activists
saw themselves as black and as South African, and believed
that they should participate in the struggle not as Indians
but as blacks. So, for example, when Jayendra Naidoo moved
from participating in civic work in Indian areas to working
in trade unions, which meant working primarily with African
workers, he saw no contradiction. The high visibility of Indians
in leadership (not withstanding their small numbers) must also
be attributed to their greater access to education compared
with that of Africans. (See Table 7.3)

Women and resistance

The NIC conference also failed to promote leadership by women.
The conference convenors were criticised for using constitutional
reasons to disallow the appointment of an additional woman
to the executive, especially since an "instant" amendment
to the constitution was allowed to enable Coovadia to become
the fourth vice-president without necessitating a vote. A
letter by a NIC woman activist attacked the NIC's male
chauvinist approach and asserted that
under its bachelor president George Sewpersad, and dominated by the cabal [they
have] given women only a token representation on its executive where Ela Ramgobin
sits. On behalf of the youthful NIC women activists I want publicly to record
our feminine protest. Gandhi and Monty Naicker gave women the respect due to
them, but not the cabal which is totally male. [They] ignore the Valliamahs
of today and reject Gandhi as irrelevant in an age of violence.

While the criticism of the NIC's failure
to respond specifically to issues affecting Indian women,
particularly
working-class women, was valid, the observation that Gandhi
was considered irrelevant was fallacious, as we shall see later.
Furthermore, it is hardly accurate to say that Monty Naicker
and Gandhi were expressly committed to leadership by women.
The constant referral to history to justify contemporary positions,
irrespective of factual inaccuracies, enjoyed much currency
in NIC politics. AZAPO, meanwhile, fared relatively better
in the promotion of women leaders. Even though its support
base was small amongst Indians, the fact that it was committed
to developing an accountable branch structure saw several women
assume leadership positions. Where NIC branch structures existed,
women were again represented disproportionately. It was amongst
youth organisations that the most concerted efforts were made
to promote women leaders. For example, by 1986 the leadership
of a Chatsworth youth organisation, Helping Hands, included
more women than men, and later saw the Presidency being held
mainly by young women. More importantly, it was youth and civic
organisations rather than the NIC that incorporated gender
issues into their programme of work.

At the UDF launch in 1983, the Natal Organisation
of Women (NOW) argued that women's triple oppression marginalised
women in South Africa. NOW called on all women to bring their
organisations into the UDF and fight together with the men
against oppression, exploitation and sexual discrimination.
They also argue