Document 30 - W. M. Tsotsi, “Presidential Address to the All-African Convention Conference”, Edendale, 14 to 16 December 1958

From: South Africa's Radical Tradition, a documentary history, Volume Two 1943 - 1964, by Allison Drew

Document 30 - W. M. Tsotsi, "Presidential Address to the All-African Convention Conference", Edendale, 14 to 16 December 1958

It is once more my pleasant duty to address the delegates and visitors to the Conference of the All African Convention, 1958. When at our last Conference in December, 1956, I suggested that we might not be able to meet in conference again, some people might have thought that I was a pessimist. The failure of the All African Convention to hold it Annual Conference last year, owing to Herrenvolk interference, must indicate to us that we shall not always be able to meet as we like. There is no reason to hope that the virtual ban on meetings imposed by the ruling class on the majority section of the population in the rural areas, will not eventually be extended to the organisation which is representative of that section. The awareness of this fact must surely impress on us the urgent necessity of using the vital opportunity afforded us by this Conference as profitably as we can, bearing in mind that we must never forget that the whole African, indeed the whole Non-European population of this country looks to this Conference of the A.A.C. for leadership and guidance in the period of crisis immediately ahead of us. I would appeal to all the delegates here to conduct themselves in the deliberations at this Conference with the grave seriousness and restraint consistent with the dignified status of the All African Conference.

The two years which have passed since our last Conference have seen the rapid implementation of recommendations of the Tomlinson Report, that blue-print of the preservation of the so called "Christian Capitalist Civilization" for the Herrenvolk, and the prevention of the development and extension of a free modern capitalist economy amongst the Non-Europeans by placing them in a Procrustean bed of tribal backward-ness. In order to fill up the yawning gap which is thus being created in the country's economy, the ruling class has embarked on a form of state Capitalism for Non-Europeans only.

[”¦] the Government through the South African Native Trust is by far the largest private owner of Non-European occupied land; through its labour bureaux the largest recruitment and controller of Non-European labour and one of its largest employers. Very soon through its projected Development Coordination the Government will be the largest financier of African enterprises. This Development Corporation will be a huge concern "for promoting capital formation through commercial institutions". It will establish a "Bantu Commercial Bank" a "Bantu Savings and Credit Bank", a "Bantu Insurance Company", a "Bantu Building Society" etc. And all this under the shameful pretence of a new economic trusteeship which asserts that "the Bantu must be guided to construct their own economy in their own soil, in their own milieu and out of their own spirit and energy and to move forward along the path of their own civilization according to the tempo of their own ability to develop".

The deux ex machina which has been set up to convert the African section of the Non-Europeans into a valuable asset in the Verwoerd & Co. Development Corporation (Pty) Ltdis the Bantu Authorities. It will be one of the functions of these Authorities to crush the rising African professional and business class which demands a share in the economic power based on capitalist democratic rights, and to create a new African intellectual and business man who will submit to "traditional Bantu Principles" in all his professional and commercial dealings. In other words a Quisling type of African teacher and trader will be mass-produced through the Bantuised Schools which will be strictly controlled by the Government through its Native Commissioners, policemen-intellectuals, policemen-chiefs and headmen etc. The stage has been set for a vital clash between a Herrenvolk-tribalist bureaucracy on the one hand and representatives and organisations of the people on the other. [....]

The basic reason why the ruling class is determined to exclude the Non-Europeans from sharing in the economic wealth of the country is that the non-Europeans as a section must be made to produce that wealth for the Herrenvolk. [....] The poverty of the people is a necessary instrument of the Herrenvolk policy; for rather than starve to death the people will go out to seek work and will accept a mere pittance for wages in order to preserve life.

Let us consider briefly the methods and extent of this impoverishment. I shall refer only to the more glaring instances. It is generally known that the creation of land hunger is one of the chief methods employed by the Herrenvolk for the exploitation of Non-European labour. [....]

By far the largest extent of land in the "Reserves" is Crown land and the African people who occupy it are Government tenants subject to payment of an annual rental. Less than 50% of the African males in the reserves have been allocated small residential sites (and some of these arable land) with little or no security of tenure. The vast majority of the men and practically all the women have no land which they can own or occupy except as dependants or subtenants. By means of the Betterment Areas Proclamation which is being applied piecemeal the Government has terminated all rights of occupa­tion of Crown land including the grazing of stock except on approval by South African Native Trust Officials. The Trust has virtually seized the people's land and is busy redividing it. In terms of the Tomlinson Report, "a revision of the system of land tenure is regarded as one of the pre-requisites of the stabilisation of the land in the Bantu areas and the full economic development of their potential". To achieve this aim the land in the reserves is being redivided. The vast majority of those comparatively few peasants who occupy any land at all are being deprived of their land which is to be re-allocated as "economic units" under conditional title to a few African farmers on a full-time basis. The vast majority who constitute a landless population are to be shifted to so-called rural villages which will have all the evils of urban locations with respect of a living wage to off-set them. In the meantime the landless are not even allowed keeping stock in the "Betterment Areas". [....]

It must be observed here that in terms of the white paper on the Tomlinson Report, "The Government is not prepared to do away with tribal tenure of rural land and to substitute individual tenure based on purchase nor does it propose to give preference to individual acquisition of land above tribal and Trust purchase in the released areas."

The landlessness and homelessness of the African population is no better in the urban areas than it is in the rural areas. The ruling class has steadfastly set itself against this permanent urbanisation of the Africans in the industrial and mining areas the so-called European areas - even though the economic interests of the country demand it. The result is that the African in these Urban areas is not made to feel at home. A large proportion of the African workers is migratory. [....]

We must realise that all the landlessness, poverty and homelessness of the African people which I have described above has been possible because of the exclusion of the Non-Euro­peans from the Government of the country. Because of their lack of political rights because of their non-citizen status, the majority section of the population has been outlawed and foredoomed to a life of perpetual servitude. It is for this reason that the fight for full equality occupies a central position in the 10-Point Programme of the N.E.U.M.

It is therefore much to be regretted that there has arisen of late within the Unity Movement a tendency to minimise the importance of the demand for the full franchise. This tendency has been the chief cause of the development of internal theoretical differences within the Movement, differences which have now reached a climax and can no longer be concealed. As early as 1954 in my Presidential address to the A.A.C. I warned the Movement against this development in the following words: - "In such periods of comparative inactivity that solidarity within the ranks which is engendered by the prospects of immediate battle is often lacking. Differences of opinion assert themselves and temporary ideological groupings begin to appear. Although such differences and groupings are unfortunate, and sometimes undesirable, they are as inevitable to the growth of a healthy political movement as toxins in the life of the human organism. The transformation of the groupings into organised and closed factions is an evil which must be avoided at all costs. The art of leadership consist precisely in preventing such a development.

Ideological differences within the movement may be inevitable and may even constitute a necessary part of its dialectic, but petty jealousies and rivalries for power and position are quite unnecessary and intolerable and those who indulge in such mean practices do not deserve a place in our leadership and must be ruthlessly cast out of it. It is the duty of all of us in the liberatory movement to refuse to be party to the squabbling of rival groups and to expose those who do not scruple to indulge in personalities and cheap gossip in order to feather their own nests. Unless we perform our duty in this regard the movement is bound to suffer. [....]

First of all I wish to state that the division has arisen as the result of the fact that certain individuals and groups within the movement are dissatisfied with the 10-Point programme of the N.E.U.M. They consider that this programme is very inadequate for the solution of our political and social problems in South Africa. What creates confusion is that these opponents of the 10-Point Programme instead of condemning the programme outright pretend that their views are consistent with it. To denounce the 10-Point Programme would put them beyond the pale of the N.E.U.M. and render them without a political home.

[”¦] In order to underline the fundamental implications of this tendency I shall quote extensively from a remarkable pamphlet written by a spiritual member of the group who is an avowed enemy of the N.E.U.M. There is this added advantage in quoting from this publication, namely that it is written under a pen name. The identity of the author is therefore presumably unknown to all of us and there is less danger of the cry of “Informer” being raised by those who are richly endowed with a persecution complex. I refer to the roneoed pamphlet "It is time to awake" by R. Mettler which purports to be a criticism of I.B. Tabata' s "The Awakening of a People", a book that is recognised by us in the Unity Movement as correctly setting out our political ideas.

R. Mettler makes no bones about attacking the 10-Point Programme from many angles. Basically his criticism is that "The existing programme of the N.E. U.M. exposes the aspirations of the African Middle Class." He criticises the resolution on the programme passed at the 1943 N.E.U.M. Conference to the effect that all our disabilities economic educational, social, cultural flow from the lack of political rights and that our struggle is therefore chiefly political. R. Mettler asserts that this attempt to separate political subjugation from economic exploitation "runs throughout the documents of this development and leads eventually to the false positioning they take up in all situations. Surely our lack of political rights flows from our separation from the ownership of the means of production” he profoundly concludes. Then again Mettler states: "[....] In so far as the N.E.U.M. is not firmly based on the working class its ideology must lead it into the political emptiness that characterises its past history." It will be observed that Mettler’s strictures as quoted are identical with those of the revisionists within our ranks except that the latter substitute the "existing leadership" for the former's “existing programme” of the N.E.U.M. Another fact which must be noted is the belittling of the demand for political rights which the N.E.U.M. regards as pivotal in its programme.

R. Mettler is very outspoken in his condemnation of the demand for the Franchise which we consider being the most important of the 10-Points of our programme. He says, “We must state without equivocation that in the alliance between the middle class and the workers in the liberatory movement a programme that is based on the vote as the first point denotes the ideological hegemony of the petty bourgeois politicians [....] Mettler again states "It is a fact that the National Movements throughout Africa are stressing these political claims. Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana was fond of saying, "seek ye first the political kingdom and all things shall be added to you. "The people of India, Indonesia, Ghana and others have been given the vote and yet these countries are still based on exploitation and the basic struggles continue." [....]

The revisionists within our ranks consider that the 7th Point justifies this so-called leftist interpretation of the 10-Point Programme. On the other hand R. Mettler finds this point equally obnoxious. "It is also no accident that the N.KU.M. proposes the re-distribution of the land (even if by vote in Parliament) and yet will not dare to mention the factories and the mines. The former, radical as it is, is still consistent with the building up of a capitalist country while the latter would imply a conflict with Capitalism ...The authors of the 10-Point Programme have not told us how they will achieve this democracy if the rural workers do not first seize the land ... There has been no clear cut programme put forward that demands without equivocation the re-alloca­tion of land. To talk about the vote when the problem is the redivision of land is futile."

Even at the risk of being called names such as "Herrenvolk hirelings" we have to point out to our enemies whether within or without the Unity Movement that the seizure of land and its redivision is not part of the 10-Point Programme. When we talk of "acquiring" land in Point 7 we mean and have always meant lawful acquisition within the framework of the capitalist society of which we are part.

The whole basis of the attack on the 10-Point Programme is the denial of the reality of colour oppression in South Africa and consequently the denial of the necessity for a National liberatory movement. On the contrary the National problem is viewed as simply a class problem thinly covered over with colour wash designed to conceal its identity. The expressed aim of the N.E.U.M. is to liquidate the National oppression of tie Non-European in South Africa [....]

The implication of the identification of Herrenvolkism with capitalism cannot be fully understood except in the light of the liberal concept of "White capital and Coloured labour". Expressed in other words the idea is that in South Africa the Whites are the capitalists and the non-Whites the workers. R. Mettler states this idea as follows: - "The ruling class resident in South Africa is generally speaking white. Equally in broad outline the non-white people are predominantly workers. The exploitation of the working class has been covered up by colour oppression". Although Mettler does say that "There is an overlap of classes which transcends the racial barriers" it is clear that his whole outlook on the class struggle in South Africa is not free of racialism particularly in the light of his other allegation that in isolated cases the worker (read: the Black) can support the right instead of the left and the capitalist (read: the White) can support the left. Mettler lends support to this contention by the following statement "The white intellectuals are completely isolated from the working class by both class and colour differences and thus tend to lean over heavily towards the ruling class. The non-white intellectual on the other hand is in close physical contact with the worker and feels the brunt of oppression himself. He thus leans more towards the people". In other words Mettler sees the class struggle in South Africa as the struggle between Black and White. The same attitude of damning the White working class as Herrenvolk and therefore capitalist is apparent in the statements of the young so-called leftists in our movement. Basically this idea springs from the influence of African nationalism. This theoretical mistake is inevitable if we seek to deny the bourgeois character of our national liberatory movement on the fatuous ground "We already have a capitalist society and thus are not struggling to make a new capitalist society".

The correct theoretical analysis of the position is set out in the "The Awakening" as follows:-"But in the conditions obtaining in South Africa the clear-cut class divisions have been obscured. The Herrenvolk have elaborated a means of re-enforcing economic exploitation with all the vicious machinery of racial oppression". The correct deduction from this statement is not that we should ignore racial oppression because it is an instrument of oppression. That would be as foolish as to say in warfare we must ignore the bomber and concentrate on the bomb. Rather must we fight racial oppression and strive for political equality for, to quote from the Awakening once more, "Without political equality it will never be possible to speak of working class unity, and without working class unity it will never possible to fight exploitation....The trade Union question in South Africa presents itself primarily as a national (political) question and only secondarily as a class question. The second cannot be evolved independently of the first".

We have to accept the concept of stages in the liberatory movement otherwise we will continue to confuse Herrenvolkism with capitalism and thereby create unnecessary theoretical misunderstanding. But R. Mettler is so hostile to this idea that he does not scruple to distort it. He says, "our perspective is not the mechanical one of stages in which we will first achieve the 10-point programme and build up a state wherein we can start a new struggle based on a new Trade Union Movement". We need only state that there is nothing mechanical about the concept of stages. We have to view the struggle in motion and where and how one stage ends and another begins cannot be predetermined in a mathematical fashion. It will depend on the dynamic of the situation and the relationship of forces.

Our view of the trade Union question as primarily a national political question has already been stated. The revisionists have attempted to confuse the issue by falsely stating that we do not want to see the trade Union Movement built up and strengthened. It is certainly not our task as a political movement to form trade Unions. This would be sheer econimism. After all even Mettler realizes the true function of trade Unions because he says: "The trade Union Movement will have to be built up in the coming period. We must clearly state that the trade Union's primary purpose is to fight the economic struggle (our emphasis). That is, it has to fight for improved conditions in the factory ... But the trade Unions are not a substitute for a political movement and as the workers need a political party to serve their own interests to put forward their aspirations, a mass worker's party must be formed." If this is what the revisionist want, let them say so openly. A workers' political party will be welcome to affiliate to the liberatory movement just as the ex-communist party was, provided that it accepts the programme and all that it stands for.

Mettler is very forthright in his attack on the federal structure of the N.E.U.M. "When the N.E.U.M. called for interracial Unity" he says, "the slogan was progressive. Today the needs are for a movement without racial barriers and a name such as ‘Non-European Unity’ no longer serves the needs of the liberatory movement. A movement that ties itself in advance to a specific organisational form runs the risk of ossification and to have made the federal structure as constituted today an article of faith in the N.E.U.M. is a sign that ossification has indeed set in.” Mettler adds that "the federal structure would be permissible if it allowed for a federation on class grounds but in actual fact it has become a federal body first on racial grounds which must today be rejected." Mettler then goes on to advocate the formation of a unitary organisation "in so far as it is opposed to the current cumbersome racial division."

I have quoted extensively from R. Mettler not because I consider that his views are in themselves worthy of consideration but firstly because he is obviously hostile to the N.E.U.M. and its 10-Point Programme and secondly because his views are identical with those expressed by certain individuals and groups within the movement. The inference which I seek to be drawn is that these individuals and groups are also enemies of the N.E.U.M. If they deny this accusation the onus is on them to show how their views differ from those of Mettler.

[”¦] We have to appreciate the danger to the movement of giving the revisionists free hand to propagate their views from our platforms and our organs. It is not merely a question of creating division and strife within our organisations, bad enough though that is. Much more serious is the betrayal of the organisation to the Herrenvolk fascists. To give the 10-Point Programme a leftist interpretation, no matter how cockeyed is to bring the whole movement within the definition of statutory communism and to run the risk of it being made an unlawful organisation within the meaning of the Suppres­sion of Communism Act. It is difficult to resist the inference that this is a consummation which many of the revisionists would devoutly wish as offering an easy method of escape from the hazardous tasks which presently devolve on them as members of the liberatory movement.

The lessons of the Treason Trials do not appear to have been sufficiently learnt by some of us. It is well known in liberatory movement circles that the majority of the persons who are members of the organisations involved in the Treason Trials are simple workers or peasants to whom the idea of mock elections could never have appeared subversive. Yet a few of these people have to stand their trial on a charge of High Treason precisely because a false coloration of leftism was imparted to their organisa­tion by a few politically advanced petit-bourgeois intellectuals. All of us know that the tribalists of A.N.C. and the merchants of the S.A.I.C. are incapable of demanding the "liquidation of capitalism, equal distribution of wealth, common ownership of the means of production, land mines and factories," and yet the record would appear to indicate that that this was part of the programme of these organisations. This sort of thing inevitably happens when a few so-called “leftist” theoreticians seize control and leadership of the people’s organizations and proceed to impose on them ideas that are inconsistent with the aims and objects of the organisations and are in advance of the standard of political consciousness reached by the generality of the membership. The result is that in time of crisis the progressive facade breaks down and the political fraud is exposed. Then begins the splitting up of the organisations into the respective political groupings of its membership from the extreme right to the extreme left.

It was in order to avoid such an eventuality that the N.E.U.M. adopted a minimum programme and a federal structure. Mr. I.B. Tabata correctly states the position on the "The Awakening of a people" when he says:- "The Problem was to create a mouthpiece of the whole of the African People, a forum from which their voice could be heard. It was obvious that no single party could fulfil this task. A single political party cannot represent a whole community or race, for the mere fact of belonging to the same race has nothing to do with a man's political affiliations. In any given community people share different political ideas ranging from the extreme left to the extreme right - Any attempt therefore to form a unitary political organisation or party was doomed to fail. Further no one party could claim to represent tribalists, nationalists, internationalist and liberals and at the same time integrate and attend to the specific task of industrial workers, farm labourers, peasants, professional classes etc. Yet the very crux of the problem was to find a form of organisation which would meet the demands arising out of twofold oppression - National oppression and class exploitation”. The tragedy of the situation is that the internal differences should arise at a time when the need for the unity of the oppressed is greater than ever. At this very moment when the rest of Africa is beginning to awake and cast away the imperialism and colonialism which has held it in thrall for centuries, when the cry for independence and self-determination is ringing with ever-growing insistence throughout the length and breadth of the "dark continent". At this time, moreover when in our own country the most down-trodden of all, the African peasants and workers are beginning to show fight. Just at the moment, I say, when the influence of its leadership should be felt throughout the continent of Africa, the N.E.U.M. must be rent asunder by divisions inspired by a few ambitious people in and around its leadership. This is a situation which must try to remedy at all costs. If at this conference we cannot achieve a unity of ideas we must achieve a unity of ideas we must at least a clear demarcation of differences.

Those whose politics consist of stereotyped slogans and cliches will no doubt raise their eyebrows when I say it is our duty to guide and not to condemn categorically the emergent African nationalism. We have to recognise that in so far as it is genuinely anti-imperialism and anti-colonialism, African Nationalism is a progressive political force. It is only when African Nationalism degenerates into racialism i.e. is anti-white, anti-Coloured, anti-Indian and when it is tied to the apron strings of imperialism and is the latter's agent for the economic exploitation of the colonial peoples that it has to be condemned and fought. [....] To safeguard against such a development we have to implant in the minds of the poor peasants and workers who constitute the majority, the desire for an effective say in the control and direction of the destinies of the countries which can only come about as the result of the extension of full political equality to all. Political history has shown no other method of ending economic exploitation except through political control by the majority section of the population who, in a capitalist society are inevitably the workers and the poor peasants. Once the importance of political rights has been driven home to the common man he will take the necessary steps to achieve these rights, and, armed with this new power he will proceed to put an end to exploitive relationships in society. [....]

In conclusion let me express the hope that theoretical discussions, important though they are will not take up too much of the Conference's time. The more vital questions affecting the practical struggles of the people against political emasculation and economic ruin must take precedence. The large delegation of peasants present at this conference must not be allowed to go away feeling that their attendance has not been worth the trouble and expense which it has entailed. Let us therefore settle down to the business of this conference namely to build up a movement which will be resilient and powerful enough to withstand and finally overcome Herrenvolk oppression, and so change this beautiful land or ours from a prison camp to a free society where all may live with dignity and justice.

(Issued by the Lady Frere Soya, Secy. J. B. Vusani Box 40, Lady Frere).