South African History Online

30 November 1992

Chief Phalha,
Distinguished guests,
Dear comrades.

We have come to your village, your region, to help highlight how hard your
life is. Getting enough water, firewood, food is a daily battle. On top of that
you have experienced an unrelenting drought. Seed for planting is in short
supply. Cattle have died. Rivers have dried up.

Recently, and it would seem for the first time, South African television has
shown pictures as horrific as those regularly flashed on our screens of Somalia
or Ethiopia. Emaciated children, youngsters too weak to concentrate - and this
in a land that exports food and drought relief.

It is scandalous and cannot be allowed to continue.

While we accept that there has been prolonged drought in many parts of South
Africa - and fortunately rain has begun to fall - the problems that afflict our
communities, particularly all who live in rural areas, are not a result of
drought. The root of the problem lies in the decades of apartheid.

We have been forced off the fertile land that once was ours. We have been
forced to accept homeland administrations, many of whom have been manipulated
and controlled from Pretoria. Now we are told that more land is being
transferred (given) to some of these homelands, including Lebowa. Certain chiefs
will be given land while others were not even consulted. Meanwhile the majority
of rural people remain landless and poor.

Vast sums of money have been used to build parliaments in the veld, casinos
and and pleasure resorts for white South Africans. Very little of that money was
used to build roads, dams, irrigation systems, boreholes, schools or to provide
electricity.

Grave responsibilities rest on our shoulders. The immediate task facing us is
to ensure that no one experiences famine in the midst of plenty. The millions
provided for drought relief must reach the people. Drought relief cannot be used
for party political purposes. It must not be used to strengthen the National
Party, or to increase the hold farmers have over their workers. Nor must it be
used to feed bloated bureaucracies instead of the people.

We will do everything we can to ensure that this region in particular, which
has been hard-hit for so long, obtains the kind of drought relief programme that
will help build for the future. We must also ensure an end to any form of abuse
or corruption around drought aid.

The ANC sees its responsibility to you and future generations as being one of
bringing peace and democracy to South Africa. People only grow and become
productive in an atmosphere that provides for their well being. We are
determined to provide such an atmosphere.

And top of the agenda is to bring peace to our land, to end the war that is
waged, directly and indirectly, against the people.

The ANC initiated and committed itself to create and work within the National
Peace Accord in an effort to bring about peace. We have met, and continue to
meet, all leaders in our country. We met with Heads of State and the United
Nations, the Commonwealth and the Organisation of African Unity to ensure that
international monitors were stationed in South Africa to help stop the
killings.

We regard the ending of violence as critically important. Any loss of life is
a tragedy. For too long the lives of black people have been regarded as cheap.
We want to ensure that the life of every human being, black or white, man or
woman, is recognised as being precious.

We know that one of the main purposes of the violence is to make democratic
elections impossible. But we are determined to ensure that the first ever South
African one-person, one vote elections are held. Such elections, where every man
and woman, irrespective of colour, who is 18 years and over can vote for the
organisation and representative of their choice, must be for a parliament that
will draw up a new constitution.

This will be the first democratic constitution for South Africa. It must
restore to all our people their pride, their rights.

We want a framework for our country that guarantees the future, with a Bill
of Rights, an independent judiciary, an army and police force that know they are
there to serve the people, the land, not hound or persecute them. The ANC has
developed policies on health, education, economics, the environment, science,
technology and housing that are designed to address the historical injustice
black South Africa has experienced and lay firm foundations for a prosperous
future.

Many governments and international investors want to contribute to the
reconstruction of South Africa. But they will only do so when elections have
been held that brings about an Interim Government of National Unity. They, too,
know that democracy is the only answer for this country.

Decisive and bold leadership is required from all South Africans to steer us
through the transition. It is precisely to end the suffering of our people that
we are engaged in negotiations with the De Clerk regime. An extensive meeting
begins tomorrow, where we are determined to achieve results. And we want to
emerge from that meeting with a firm election date.

To build this future requires undoing past injustices. It has been that the
homelands, both independent and self-governing, will be reincorporated into
South Africa. And this should go together with the development of strong
regions, so that we can do away with the massive imbalances that exist between
urban and rural areas.

These are, in brief, the challenges that face us. It therefore gives me great
pleasure to be part of this sod-turning ceremony to set in construction of a
dam. Freedom will be hollow if it does not bring with it a better life for all
who have been most deprived.