Dr. Abdullah Abdurahman died on 20 February 1940, at the age of 69. The news came as a great blow to the African People's Organisation (APO) and to many Coloureds, despite the forewarnings offered by his earlier illnesses. The tremendous public response his death evoked testified to his considerable standing in black, and indeed national, politics in South Africa. Tributes and eulogies poured in, from white politicians such as General J. B. M. Hertzog and J. C. Smuts, from leaders of the main black organisations in the Union, and from dozens of small APO and TLSA branches. The Sun expressed the fears of many that with Abdurahman gone, the Coloured people would have no protection from 'the chicanery of white politicians and their Coloured stooges'. The Standard described him as the 'greatest Coloured South African that ever lived'. Imvo Zabantsundu (Black Opinion) similarly lauded Abdurahman's leading role in black politics, and the constancy with which he had sought to advance the rights of all blacks. Abdurahman's funeral cortege through the streets of Cape Town attracted one of the largest crowds ever seen in that city, with estimates of up to 30 000 people attending, while the City Council provided a guard of honour along the route. Clearly, whatever Abdurahman's failings, at the time of his death he still retained widespread popularity amongst many Coloureds. After 35 years in the APO, Abdurahman remained the single most eminent figure in Coloured politics.

Indeed, Abdurahman looms so large in the history of organised Coloured politics in the first half of this century that for the historian he threatens to blot out all other features of the political landscape. A cultured and highly educated man, he had an impressive physical presence, with his ascetic and dignified appearance. He possessed a penetrating intellect, great strength of character, tried and tested leadership qualities and organisational abilities, and seemingly inexhaust­ible political stamina. He was also an accomplished and often moving speaker. But he was no saint. Often intolerant of opposition, jealous of political rivals, and blind to some of the failings of his political philosophy, he tended to hold the centre stage to the exclusion of his devoted cohort of lieutenants, men such as Reagon and Matt Fredericks, whose hard work and devotion freed him from much of the drudgery of day-to-day administration. But whether one admires Abdurahman or not, there can be no denying his pivotal role in Coloured and, to a considerable extent, black politics generally in South Africa.

Yet Abdurahman remains a largely ignored political figure in South African history. Those who did not forget him often tended, on both the right and the left wings of the political spectrum, to revile him. To many Nationalists Abdurahman was at best a stooge, and at worst a paid agent of the SAP or UP. To Communist Party supporters he was, wittingly or unwittingly, the dupe of capitalist interests, intent on protecting only the rights of the Coloured petty-bourgeoisie. To later Coloured radicals he was a traitor who, with his policies of compromise and negotiation, and with his reliance on appeals to and electoral support for white liberal politicians, blinded the Coloured people to their real oppression, and to [heir unity of interests with other blacks for so long - hence the contemporary term of opprobrium 'Abdurahmanism '.

In fact there is little evidence to support the accusations that Abdurahman used his position and influence for personal gain, or that he deliberately misled Coloured voters and encouraged 'Colouredism' at the expense of black or working-class unity. All too frequently, such judgments emerge either as half-truths or as reflections of the self-interest of the authors, or of an ahistorical view of Coloured politics. The accusation that Abdurahman bought and sold the Coloured vote requires supporting evidence; it also sometimes implies a deeply patronising view of the Coloured voter.

The absence of any of Abdurahman's private papers and correspon­dence hampers investigation of these allegations. It does seem that the SAP refrained from appointing candidates to contest Abdurahman's seat on the Provincial Council. Indeed, in 1933 a South African Party (SAP) MP explicitly declared that Smuts had issued instructions to this effect. But on several occasions between 1914 and 1940 Abdurahman's Provincial Council seat was opposed, as was his City Council seat, by candidates from other parties besides the SAP. On each occasion he soundly defeated his opponents. For instance in September 1939, only a few months before Abdurahman's death. James La Guma decided to contest his seat on the Cape Town City Council in the municipal elections of that month. With the National Development League (NDL), the National Liberation League (NLL), the Non European United Front (NEUF), the Communist Party and the Standard all united against him, Abdurahman humiliatingly defeated La Guma with 1083 votes to 263. In addition, there is little evidence that Abdurahman -'sold' the Coloured vote to the highest bidder. It seems highly unlikely that the Coloured voter, in a secret ballot, could be led sheep-like to the polls in complete disregard of his own interests and concerns. The history of the Coloured franchise shows that in most cases. Coloured voters supported those parties who they believed could best serve their interests. This is why Abdurahman experienced difficulty in trying to counter Coloured support for the Pact regime. What then of Abdurahman's role as a stooge of the SAP and the United Party (UP)? Here there is more ground for concern, for by the 1930s both the UP and the Nationalists agreed on the maintenance of white supremacy, and supported the civilised labour policy, social segregation for all blacks, and political segregation for Africans. Abdurahman himself repeatedly criti­cised this trend. But he gave credence to the allegations made about him through his close relationships with some white politicians, and his desire for the incorporation of 'civilised' Coloureds into the existing white-dominated society, even if at the cost of patronisation by his white allies, and even if this meant assimilation as social inferiors. This desire was shared by many of Abdurahman's supporters too. It reflected the wider ideological assumptions and material interests and aspirations of the Coloured elites, rather than the stupidity, cupidity or criminal neglect that is usually attributed to them by present-minded critics. The sections of the Coloured elites who formed the mass base of the APO's membership indicated their agreement with Abdurahman's views by regularly, and usually unanimously, re-electing him as president at the general conferences.

In many respects Abdurahman epitomised the urban Coloured elites. He was wealthier than most of them, with a flourishing medical practice which, in 1934, brought him an income of £5 000 a year, a considerable sum for those times. He owned a car, a yacht, a holiday cottage, and a house in a middle-class residential area of Cape Town. Financially, it would seem, he did not need the bribes of white politicians. It was his great leadership abilities, political shrewdness, and his moving oratory that enabled him to shape and articulate the interests and aspirations of Coloured (and sometimes black) elites in a way that gathered him wide support and a prominent position in black politics. The Coloured elites in the APO had interests that would be endangered by revolutionary mass action or socialist revolution. They desired integration into the existing white-dominated capitalist structure, and had their (often meagre) privileges and property to lose. And the swift repression which greeted the radicalism of the Western Cape African National Congress (ANC), and to a lesser extent of the Industrial and Commercial Union (ICU), showed the dangers of confrontationist policies. In addition, the APO and its leader remained loyal to the principles of nineteenth-century Cape liberalism, and to the politics of protest rather than challenge.

Indeed, the key to Abdurahman's personality and political philosophy lies in the fact that he was the quintessential nineteenth-century Cape liberal, down to his unqualified admiration for middle-class British standards of 'civilised' behaviour. The motto 'equal rights for all civilised men' summed up his political creed. Cape and British liberalism in the nineteenth century had emancipated the slaves, established the maxim of equality before the law, and maintained the principle of a non-racial franchise. Throughout his career in politics after 1910, Abdurahman sought a return to these principles. He was not unaware of the hypocrisy that frequently underlay the liberal protestations of many white politi­cians. But when he made his appeals to justice and fair play, he was not speaking in a vacuum, but to assumptions shared, if only at the level of theory, by 'liberal' white politicians. Since the Progressive, Unionist, South African and finally the United parties contained the greatest; number of this dwindling breed, those were the parties Abdurahman supported.

The APO, as an elite organisation, with particular interests and concerns, and acting from definite ideological assumptions, had to operate within the boundaries of 'constitutional' actions. This left it dependent on the limited franchise rights open to Coloureds in the Cape. In their use of these rights the APO members had little alternative. Theirs was increasingly a choice between evils; naturally they opted for the lesser. Given the Nationalists' unequivocal support for total segregation, then-decision to support the UP - which promised at least to protect existing Coloured rights in the Cape - was a rational choice. But by then the range of choices open to the APO had become so narrow that it rendered these strategies largely ineffective. To growing numbers of the younger Coloured elites, the APO's policies seemed merely to buttress white supremacy at the expense of other black peoples.

Finally, there is the question as to whether or not Abdurahman and the APO fostered 'Colouredism' - a false sense of a separate Coloured 'racial' identity - and in doing so split Coloureds from their African brethren, assisting the divide-and-rule strategies of the white rulers. Clearly the APO and its president did seek to mobilise Coloureds as Coloureds. This formed the whole raison d'être of the APO's strategy. Equally clearly, the result was to strengthen a sense of a separate Coloured identity amongst certain sections of the people described as Coloureds. But for both the APO and its leader a separate Coloured status always remained something imposed by racially prejudiced whites on a people who shared white culture, language, religion and often values as well. The APO leadership never missed an opportunity to ridicule the absurdity of theories of white racial 'purity' and highlight the arbitrariness of the boundaries between Coloured and white. Their strategy represented a pragmatic acceptance of prevailing prejudices, and an attempt to work within the limitations imposed by those prejudices towards the ultimate goal of a non-racial South Africa.

Against the background of an industrialising, increasingly urbanised South Africa in which political coalitions were increasingly seen in terms of ethnic alliances (whatever the class interests that underlay such alliances), the pioneers of organised Coloured politics saw a Coloured identity as the most effective means of rallying those so described to defend and advance their interests as a group. The Coloured elites who supported the APO were too small and diverse a group to unite purely on the basis of shared class interests. Mobilising them around a Coloured identity would overcome the colour, religious, geographical and language differences that divided them, and might attract support from the wider Coloured community, rural or urban, worker or lower middle class.

On the other hand, the APO always rejected any view of Coloureds as a separate 'race', and remained committed to the principle of equal rights for all civilised men. Abdurahman's speeches and actions on behalf of black unity, particularly during the Pact era, reveal no desire to protect Coloured rights at the expense of those of the Africans, or to discourage black unity. Geography, demography, cultural and language differences, and inter-organisational rivalries explain why the APO - as an organisa­tion based in a city where over 90 per cent of the blacks were Coloureds, and in a province where 80 per cent of Coloureds lived, and with a 'Coloured' leader - not surprisingly remained a Coloured organisation. Attempts in the 1940s to change this very soon foundered on these realities.

What is particularly remarkable about Abdurahman's political career, apart from his often prescient oratory, is that he never failed to see the full implications of legislation which, although not overtly discriminatory, proved so in practice. His warnings about the South Africa Act and Pact civilised labour legislation in particular stand out. In every case his predictions proved his Coloured critics wrong. His insistence on compromise and peaceful negotiation left him vulnerable to the charge that he was a stooge. But his speeches and his unwavering opposition to segregation show that he was no puppet of white politicians. His political career reveals a talent for organisation and a capacity for sustained, and usually thankless, hard work and personal sacrifice. Often vain, and usually intolerant of criticism, he nevertheless was widely revered by his Coloured supporters, and he led the APO to heights of popularity never before, and seldom since, attained in Coloured politics.

Abdurahman's last conference speech in 1939 provides a clear picture if his beliefs and policies. Revealing his nostalgia for the pre-industrial Mieteenth-century era of Cape liberalism, he reviewed the Coloureds' Jecline since the 'betrayals' of 1902 and 1910, declaring that the 'age of .hivalry, tolerance and kindliness' had given way to a new era of 'fear, of unreasoning suspicion, and of ... blind prejudice'. Segregation, he warned, would ultimately breed a black counterpart to Malanite nationalism, equally intolerant and directed against all whites. Neverthe­less, he urged Coloureds not to adopt 'foreign' political doctrines of violence: 'An objective secured by violence has never yet been permanent -a victory won by lawful methods backed by a consciousness of right and a determination to win, and by appeals to reason and justice, which, though now somewhat at a discount, are not yet dead, is final and lasting.' This admonition serves well as an epitaph to Abdurahman's political career.

Although Abdurahman's death delivered a blow from which the APO never fully recovered - so dependent had it become on his leadership and abilities, even without this loss the organisation was in considerable difficulties by the 1940s. Its continued failure to advance Coloured rights, and the ever-growing pressures for the segregation of Coloureds from whites, had cast increasing doubts on the efficacy of its strategies and on its assumptions about the nature of South African society. Despite his deep commitment to the APO and his strong organisational abilities (so evident in the APO Burial and Building Societies), Reagon as acting president after Abdurahman's death proved either unable or unwilling to revitalise the organisation. Instead he led conventional APO protests gainst specific segregation measures. And he failed to summon another APO general conference, or to respond to ANC and Cape Indian Council requests to revive the Non-European Conferences. He did lead a deputation on behalf of Transvaal Coloured political, welfare and church organisations to the deputy Prime Minister, Deneys Reitz, in 1942, to request the extension of the Cape franchise and other rights to Coloureds in the northern provinces, but predictably without success.

In May 1942 Reagon died suddenly (some say he committed suicide), leaving the APO once again leaderless. In the interim the Western Cape branches met and elected Dr Francis Herman Gow of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, a man with a record of strong concern for Coloured social welfare issues, as acting president of the APO in June 1942. Gow began to revitalise the organisation, touring all four provinces with the APO organising secretary to revive APO branches. For Gow the alleviation of Coloured socio-economic distress took priority over the longer-term goals of political rights. He had close links with the white liberals associated with the Coloured-European Council in Cape Town.

He convened an APO conference for January 1943, and in negotiations "with the government and Cape Town white liberals, proceeded to launch the organisation on a new path - one which, in early 1943, transformed the whole nature of Coloured politics in the Cape. In the bitter struggles that ensued, many APO members came sorely to miss the diplomacy and leadership Abdurahman had provided.

Taken from :

Lewis, G. (1987). Between the wire and the wall: A history of South African 'Coloured' Politics. Cape Town: David Philip, pp. 198-204