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I * blacks' • commitment to tha defence of capitallaa In South Africa against *tha eterxiet throat'- But this aaa only possible through tha cloaaat cooparation bataaan tha atata and 'tha prlvata aactor' - la monopoly capital. Thua tha Total Strategy Oootrina > began to create tha basis for an a*plici* alliance bataaan tha military and monopoly capital. In lata 1977 tha national aanapaaant and \ Oayalopaant Foundation convanad a aaating of kay •business leaders', aanlor military officers, and Papartaant of Labour offlclala, to 'enable aach group to understand tha othara' naada*. Chaired Jointly by tha Chairman of a leading bank and a senior ! Oanaralr tha aaating aaa hald In caaara, undar tha cloak of tha Official Secrete Act. 36 [ At praclalay thla stage of now direct allltary • intervention in political struggles althln tha atata, laadlng buainaaaaan alao bicaai dlractly and stridently lnvolvad In a Caapalgn for reform. Tha chairman of ! Senlam published a awlngaing attack on tha government'a economic policies, characterising thea aa 'A Fraaaay to DPaaMdaa) , > Tha influential Financial tail arguad that In tha face of govarnaent paralyaia, organlaad and co-ordinated *Bualnaaa Powar' aaa j aaaantial to aava 'South Africa* (la capitallaa) \ froa tha nuaaroua crlaaa confronting it, Uoraover, : in thla parlod ahan behind tha patant immobility of tha government important ahlfta ware taking place In j tha traditional political allgrwwanta of tha capitalist class, tha bourgaola oppoaltlon partiaa aara under going a process of dramatic ra-allgnaant. After yaars of political atarlUty. tha official oppoaltlon United Party finally oollapaad into a merger with tha adniacula Daaocratic Party to fora tha Haw Republic Party. Large matera of United Party aPa rafuaad to Join thla NAP and eventually allied thawaalvaa with tha Progressiva Rafara Party which had already takan on board aailaa froa tha Unitad Party. Tha PAP changed its naaai yat again to tha Progressive Federal Party, and aigniflcantly aatarad tfoan lta libaral progra—a to aaita it aara acoaptabla to a eide range of bourgeois interests. Zn October 1977, Voreter callad an early General El so t ion out of ahloh tha W> eaargad alth an avan teors aassive Parti aaantary majority and a aubatantlally aldanad baaa of political aupport. Campaigning aa tha only party capable of dealing with tha multiple crises facing South Africa, tha aP for tha firat time aon support froa tao furthar aodal forces - larga nuabara of EngUah-apaaking patty bourgaola ehitaa, and significant sectors of business which had pravloualy aupportad tha now defunct Unitad Party. Ironically hoaavar, far froa> producing bold political Initiatives, thla freer, electoral aupport simply intanaifiad tha political inartla of both Nationalist Party and Government by multiplying tha centrifugal forcaa pulling it In different dlractlona. Tha contradictiona and conflicts within tha party and govsmment vara coapoundad , and bacaaa a alta of avar aora intanaifiad political struggles, Inartla combined with lncraaaingly vicious and cynical repression aaaaad tha only oantrlpatal forcaa In tha NP. 36 Tha victory and consolidation of tha reformist tendency THE auldergate circus burat into tha open in thla context of paralyaia of both party and povamaant - a context which produced a staggering prollfaratlon of extra-party, cross-cutting organisations and agitation, largaly by business interests, Huldargata began aa a aariaa of proas rwvwlwtlons about tha misuse of funds in Mulder's Department of Information. Juicy detail followad Juicy details to ravaal a vast aall-financad and aacrat attaapt by tha Information Department to aatabllah both inaida tha country and internationally an apparently independent ccwamjnl cat ions network which would publlah 'objective' pro-govarnaant material, Parllaaant had no control ovar, or powar to revise tha uaa of thaaa funds. One of tha major projacta lnvolvad tha aacrat channallng of R7**dllion In atata funda to aatabllah an 'independent', pro-NP Engllah-languapa nawapapar - Tha Cltlian -* in oppoaltlon to tha libaral Band Dally wall, Tha revelations unleashed a massive outcry within ahita politics. Epithets about tha destruction of daaocracy and tha fraadoa of tha press, alnlatarlal corruption ate, abounded, Tha datalla are not significant here, but tha import of thla scandal la. At ona level , tha intense moral outrage ovar auldargata* avan in tha pro-NP Afrikaans newspapers, aaaaa absurd. Full bourgeois daaocracy has never axlatad in South Africa, so it could hardly have bswn said to hava baan daatroyad. Tha last vaatlpaa of tha Fraadoa of tha Press had baan aboil ahed In tha aarly 1960s, far woraa examples of collective and individual alnlatarlal corruption had occurred (such aa tha Agiiutti affair in tha lata 60a) with virtually no political consequences. Abuaaa uf poear by tha ruling party had occurred on a auch aora massive scale, to be easily dismissed - and defended by aoaa of tha nawspapara now howling 'corruption' - aa balng •in tha national lntaraat*. Indaad Mulder had dafandad tha operations of hia Oapartaant in thaaa pravloualy halloaad taraa. So why did thla particular brouhaha aasuai auch aonuaantal proportions? Tha anawar auat ba aought in tha aany-lavallad character of tha crisis confronting tha South African atata and ruling class, crlaaa In tha face of which tha govarnaant. appeared politically paralyaad. Thla paralyaia did not grow out of any lack of political all! on tha part of individual politicians, but ataaaad froa tha balanca of claaa forcaa within tha NPt tha natlonallat government and tha atata apparatuses. Thus, ahan tha report of tha Auditor* General ravaalad tha first lrragulariUaa in tha accounta in tha Oapartaant of Information, tha pro-reform forcaa aara presented with an ideal opportunity to attaapt tha political dlacradltatlon of tha aajor politician of tha right, tha Unlatar of Inforaation Or Connla Mulder. Tha Uuldajgata incident la significant not for tha degree of political corruption involved, but in tha way in which it aaa used aa a oatalyat to effect a raallgnaant of political forcaa. Most significant rsrs la the wanner In ahlch tha . leaks about Oapartaant Of Information practices aara aada, and tha aay In which thaaa leaks aara than turned into the raw material of a political vendetta against tha right wing of tha NP, Huldar in particular,
end Vorster by implication. Although it is impossible to be sura on this, it la widely taken aa established fact by Afrikaner intellectuals with close links to the Cabinet that the first leaks to the press eera provided by unitary Intelligence. The Minister of Defence and Cape NP leader, PV Botha, eould probably not neve been personally Involved in these leeks, but eaa known to be angry with the loss of RW a of the approved Defence Budget, now transferred to the Information Department secret fund. Once the initial leaks had been made, they were relentlessly pursued by the Englletwlanguage newspapers of the Argus and South African Associated Newspapers groups. Owned ' Jointly by the Anglo-American Corporation and the largest banks, these press groups mere clearly hounding Mulder as but part of the wider campaign to effect vital reforms necessary for the restoration of capitalist growth* But even more significantly, after some hesitation, the enti- Hulder compaign was taken up in the Afrikaans press, and particularly in the newspapers of the official Cape hP press group, Ojg Nanionale Pers. In the Transvaal too, Nationalist newspapers began to pursue the matter, though the official Transvaal NP organ, Ola Transvaler. did everything possible to protect Mulder and claimed he was not involved in the ebuses * bleming it all on the Secretary of Inforaetlon. Or Eachel Rhoodie. This involvement of the officlel Nationalist party press in a campaign agelnst a government Minister (and by implication against Vorster himself) was unprecedented. It Indicated Just how deep were the divisions within party end government, end the lengths to which the reformers were prepared to go to discredit the right. Further evidence of this lias in the belief of the ebove-amntioned Afrikaner intellectual aources that once the affair began to unravel cruclel dlscloaures to the press were made by the wives of (unspecified) Ceblnet ministers. The 'English press* had long been depicted es the greatest enemy of Afrikaner nationalism. Horn it became the crucial medium in which a decisive confrontation between factions in the hP was fought put! Just as the effalr seemed to be building up to a crescendo, Vorster dramatically announced his resignation on 'health' grounda. He wes followed soon afterwards by the head of BOBS, General Hendrlk van den Bergh. In retrospect, Vorster's resignation and that of Van den Bergh seem to have bean prompted by two interrelated factors. Firstly, mm was later revealed, both were deeply involved in the schemes elaborated by the Department of Information. Ware this to coma out whilat Vorster was still Prime Minister, the political demoge would have been lmmenaa. Vorster aust have realised ^iet In such a case he could not rely on support from the mhole NP. If he were elevated to the State Presidency however, even his opponents in the NP would be forced to protect his peraonel position. But secondly, again it seem* clear that Vorster was attempting to pre-empt the complete reformist diacredltetion of the right wing of the party with which he eaa now Identified* If he rmslgnad early, before the full detaila of the scandal broke, there was a strong chance thet Mulder mould be eble to succeed hie, thus forcing the reformists Into en ettaok on the party through the position of ite leader, rather than on an Individual minister. Vorater's preference for Huider was open* In the run up to the leadership election, BOBS leaked (distorted) Information favourable to lajlder to the press - but it was published only in the Tranavaal W organ. Die Transvaler. Vorster**, ploy very nearly succeeded. Hed Huider been able to maintain discipline in his Transvaal NP ha eould 1 have been assured of the Premiership by virtue of the Transvaal majority in the caucus. Out by 1976, so deep were tha class conflicts within the NP, particularly within the Transvaal, that Mulder wee unable to control the party he led. Defying all party precedent, protocol and discipline, another Tranavaal Minister, AF (Pik) Bothet put himself forward as a candidate for tha National Leadership of the Party* This split tha Trenevaal vote* ensuring (es eas later admitted to have been the aim} the defeet of Mulder mod the election to the Notional Leadership of the Cape page 14 leader end Minister of Defence, P» Botha (no relation). This drawing off of tha Transvaal reformist vote from Mulder was shown to have been decisive when, in tha election for e new Tranavaal leader consequent on Mulder's enforced resignation from that post soon afterwards t tha conservative candidate, Or Andrlea Treurnlcht, trounced tha reformist Minister, SP Botha (again no relation). Thus the long campaign of press revelations and judicial enquiry fatally weakened tha conservative wing at a crucial moment of the struggle for dominance both within tha NP and the government. The defeat of Mulder marked a significant shift in the balance of claaa forces orgenlsed by the NP gua party under the banner of Afrikaner nationalism. By now Afrikaner business hed effectively established itaalf as tha dominant force In the allience. Through Bothe It announced ite Intention to abandon some of the hallowed policies of thle alliance, policies which before brought support from white workers and certain strata of the petty bourgmolaie. But it cannot be too strongly emphasised that this eas no simple struggle Internal to Afrikaner nationalism. Afrikaner capital erne eble to establlah its political dominance within the NP over the other forces in the nationaliat alliance only because of broader political support outside of the- NP from other bourgeois organisations and institutions, and the ermy itself. On its oen, the reformist wing of the NP would not neve been able to defeet tha conservatives and achieve the almost total diacreditatlon of tha right eing. To do so, it eaa forced to rely on, and indeed play a relatively minor role in, e breeder campaign by various bourgeois political groups (but partlculerly the prase) egeinst ths right wing of the Nationalist Party. Thue, tha defeat of Mulder not only marked a decisive shift in the belence of forcea within the Nationalist Party end government, et enother level of politics it represented e now open allience against elements of the NP on the pert of elmoat all crgsnlsetlone of the capitalist class.
Page 1 and 2: nr mm 1982 !'V V \ 1 i • » * s
Page 3 and 4: » DETENTIONS: Rabie Reports JUBT t
Page 5 and 6: dominate In South Africa. In these
Page 7 and 8: Ma+i-lightwd soee of the IMUN invol
Page 9 and 10: Baper* (LK8), beceuoe of *ta anti-u
Page 11 and 12: [DETENTIONS: Investigating Inquests
Page 13 and 14: peg* 11 officially performed post-m
Page 15 and 16: page 13 unless Inflicted beforw daa
Page 17 and 18: I 0-B« 15 INTRODUCTION TO POLITICA
Page 19 and 20: pega 17 oppressed BOTH by capital a
Page 21 and 22: I suthors' contention thmt it il ox
Page 23 and 24: Q ' analytical tools*( like role th
Page 25 and 26: page 2& •officiant nuebers of the
Page 27 and 28: gar. rgthnicjty: the ordinary peopl
Page 29 and 30: particularly •egaa, end hence wor
Page 31 and 32: £o natch 'their transport to gat h
Page 33 and 34: &C..31 to work in protest against t
Page 35 and 36: [fmgn 33 mturn to th«lr homes In t
Page 37 and 38: paga 36 - _ ' Fane Qeorge dibhole,
Page 39 and 40: peg* T/ appellant c la lea overrule
Page 41 and 42: 'ruling •tunic group'» or eo*eti
Page 43 and 44: in the 1960s extended the process o
Page 45 and 46: and othar claaa forces, began to cr
Page 47 and 48: movement (In collaboration with the
Page 49 and 50: 1939, but aoaa aaabars of the Natio
Page 51: An Important caveat needs to be wdi
Page 55 and 56: of thit Cape party organisation and
Page 57 and 58: ^ — :—: __. * party, In «n ett

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