Top Issue 1-2024

10 June 1999 Edition

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South Africans back ANC again

The crushing victory of the African National Congress (ANC) in last week's South African elections indicates that there is life after Nelson Mandela's retirement. The election also marked a significant increase in support for the party from the mixed and black population.

Thabo Mbeki, the ANC's new president of South Africa, is ready to initiate a further series of reforms to end the endemic poverty and unemployment that affect 42% of the country's black population.

While the ANC won in eight of the nine South African provinces - 66.35% of the votes, which translates into 266 seats out of the National Assembly's 400 - the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) of Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi obtained the majority of votes in its stronghold of KwazuluNatal. Inkatha is now the third political force in South Africa, with 8.58% of the total vote. With relations between Inkatha and the ANC improving under the leadership of Mbeki, it seems that both parties could be running KwazuluNatal together.

The Democratic Party of Tony León came second in the elections, and sources from this political grouping announced they are already contacting representatives from the National Party, the party of former South African president F.W. De Klerk, now retired from politics, and the United Democratic Movement (UDM) to agree on opposition policies in the National Assembly. Political analysts have pointed out that the UDM, a party recently created, could become a political reference for the future, as it is supported by part of the white population despite being headed by black politician Bantu Holomisa.

For Mbeki, it was important that the ANC reached the two-thirds majority in the National Assembly that would enable his party to change the inherited 1996 constitution, eliminate the last remains of the defunct Apartheid system, and allow the elected government to distribute economic power more evenly. The party failed by a margin of just one seat to gain that required majority of Assembly seats, meaning that constitutional change will have to be made in agreement with other parties. South Africa is still one of the countries heading the rankings of economic inequality, only surpassed by Brazil and Guatemala.

More than 18 million people registered to vote in the election, with candidates for 15 political parties competing for the 400 National Assembly seats, the 90 positions for the Provincial National Councils and thousands of local government seats in the nine provinces of South Africa. Four-kilometre-long queues and hours of waiting at polling stations were met with patience by an electorate which remembers how, just five years ago, they were not allowed to take part in a democratic process.

The Association of West European Parliamentarians (AWEPA), which sent 40 international observers to five provinces, congratulated the South African government for the ``freedom throughout the electoral process, the lack of censorship, intimidation and violence''.

Thabo Mbeki


Thabo Mbeki was born in June 1942, like Nelson Mandela into a Xhosa family in the Transkei. His father was a teacher with two university degrees, and later in his life he was to share prison with Mandela. His mother was a member of the Communist Party. Thabo went to a school founded by Presbyterian missionaries. By 14, he was active in the ANC youth league and was expelled from the school for organising a strike. As his father was being sentenced to life imprisonment along with Nelson Mandela, he was sent to Sussex University. Mbeki and his comrades in Britain travelled throughout the island lecturing on the anti-Apartheid movement, discovering that not only South Africa was ridden by racism. In 1966, Mbeki completed his master's degree in economics and worked as an ANC official in London until 1969. Afterwards, he spend some time in the Soviet Union for military training, and later, after marrying Zanele Dlamini in 1974, put it into practice in Swaziland. During the 1970s and 1980s, Mbeki built up a network of international contacts and masterminded the campaign against Apartheid. At the same time, he was an important player in the onset of dialogue with the South African regime. In the post-Apartheid South Africa, Mbeki has built up a good relationship with the Inkatha Freedom Party leader, Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi, who could become deputy president in the new government.


Indonesia flirts with democracy



After 40 years of tyrannical dictatorship, the Indonesian state may be on its way to democracy. On Monday, 7 June 1999, 130 million people from Indonesia and the occupied territories were given the opportunity to vote to elect 462 members of the Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat (House of the People's Representatives, DPR). Although it could take weeks to know the final results, the victory of the Indonesian Democratic Party (IDP) of Megawati Sukarnoputri - daughter of Sukarto, who founded the Indonesian state - was being celebrated by the Indonesian population, who want to leave behind the dictatorship imposed by former president Suharto through his party Golkar.

Although opinion polls and initial results point to an IDP victory, the peculiarities of the Indonesian political system could displace this party in favour of Golkar if the government's candidate, Habibie, is elected president. This would happen if the Golkar party obtains sufficient seats to add to the 38 seats taken by army representatives. Then the president of Indonesia is elected by the MPR, an assembly which includes another 200 representatives from professional bodies, ethnic minorities and religious groups. In previous undemocratic elections, these 200 added representatives were selected by Suharto.

It also remains to be seen how the election results will apply to the policies of Indonesia on the occupied territories of Aceh, West Papua or East Timor.


Irish neutrality in tatters



The nomination of Javier Solana, general secretary of NATO, as European Union Foreign and Security poilicy chief did not come as a surprise to anyone after calls by the new EU Commission President Romano Prodi for the creation of an European army. The appointment was made during the summit of European Prime ministers in Cologne and the nomination was strongly supported by those countries which have backed or directly participated in NATO's bombing of Serbia. Only Italy and Greece, who criticised NATO's action against Yugoslavia, opposed.

The election of Solana clearly indicates that the EU is moving towards a more militaristic approach in its foreign policy, choosing the face of NATO as the face of its Foreign Affairs department.

Sinn Féin EU candidate Sean Crowe said that the Dublin government's support for Solana's appointment made tatters of the state's claim to be maintaining Irish neutrality.

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