The Individual, Auto/biography and History in South Africa

spite of UMSA’s tenuous existence. This time, it was no longer directed at projecting the
movement, but was geared, almost tragically, towards defending the fragile façade that
was left.
In 1975, UMSA was made to marshal its biographic defences when accusations against
Tabata resurfaced outside the political movement in 1975 in a review of Southern
African liberation movements published in The Guardian. Based on information given to
them by former UMSA member Scrape Ntshona who had been expelled three years
before “for security reasons”, The Guardian reported that Tabata had been “suspended
from office” in 1974 for “suspected maladministration of funds and general failure”, and
suggested that his reputation had become “distinctly tarnished”. After “a protracted
period”, The Guardian agreed to offer an apology to Tabata, which they published in
their paper in 1985. In their statement of apology, The Guardian affirmed that Tabata had
been Unity Movement president “continuously since 1964”, and that he was “a major
and respected figure in the resistance movement”, who had “devoted a lifetime” to
freeing South Africans “from white domination and exploitation”. 124 Once again it was
the narrative of Tabata’s political biography that was the main issue in dispute, and the
resources of the declining movement were marshalled in the defence of the President’s
integrity and in the maintenance of his political biography. Indeed, it may be that
Tabata’s promise to forward ‘a few documents’ to UCT to correct ‘political distortions’
were part of this ‘biographic maintenance’.
In the mid‐1980s, amid renewed efforts at political mobilisation and the building of
political movements inside South Africa, new political structures emerged on the
political scene claiming to build on a Unity Movement legacy. In 1983, one of the
organisations that participated in the forums of the Cape Action League was APDUSA,
represented by released Robben Islanders, Frank Anthony and Bobby Wilcox. This
Honono. It also announced a decision that Tabata would “repeat his tour during the upcoming spring”,
and that what was required was “not just thousands but millions of dollars”.
124 The Guardian, 18 February 1975; Norman Traub to Ciraj Rassool, 8 November 1995 (author’s
possession); ‘Mr I.B. Tabata’, Statement by The Guardian, 5 February 1985 (author’s possession). I would
like to thank Norman Traub for forwarding me a copy of this document and information on this matter.
480