It’s a tremendous change for the better because they’ve gone through a period when they attacked and denigrated me constantly. Apparently under pressure from radicals, the ANC decided to make me one of their main agenda points and to try and ruin my credibility. They did not succeed, and I think they’re starting to realize it was a mistake. The international community is telling them it is folly to walk the road of conflict and to go ahead with the vast mass-action campaigns they have planned. I also think there are leading figures within the ANC who realize time is of the essence and there is no alternative to a negotiated settlement. I have two years left of my mandate, and I don’t foresee we can ever have an election again under our present Constitution. Therefore, that is the maximum time frame in which to get an inter-im-a transitional-constitution and government in place. And preferably also a parliament in place.
We are convinced that not only leading members of the Communist Party but a few other radicals within the ANC were involved in the breakdown [of talks] and that since then they have a d a dominant role with regard to decision making. We would like to see the ANC putting distance between themselves and the South African Communist Party. I don’t think the ANC is a political movement with one clear philosophy, bound together by common beliefs and common principles. I think they have fundamental and deep differences in their own ranks, and sooner or later, when they move toward what they should become, a political party, these will come to the surface.
The Goldstone Commission [an independent investigative body] made a finding that no evidence has been presented to them with regard to a “third force.” I have never had any specific evidence submitted to me indicating the existence of a so-called third force. Obviously, individual policemen or two or three or four have, as they do across the world, become involved in violence against their orders and against government policy … The fundamental problem with regard to the violence lies in black-on-black violence. And in many cases it relates to a power struggle between the ANC and Inkatha [a political party led by Zulu chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi].
I don’t just represent a minority. I’m fighting to represent the majority … [But] we must have a constitution which will prevent the misuse of power by any majority. That is not equivalent to continued minority domination-it is not equivalent to apartheid or is not equivalent to apartheid or to asking for a blank veto for minorities. In my party’s proposals, we’re leaning heavily on many principles enshrined in the American Constitution, [such as] the two-chamber system. We believe in strong regional government. We believe in a strong bill of rights. We believe that the British system where with 51 percent of the vote you have 100 percent of the power is a good system for a homogenous society but not for a complicated country like ours. Some black South Africans are as different from other black South Africans as Frenchmen are from Germans. The best way to accommodate this is devolving meaningful power and authority to regions.
I’m still confident we’ll overcome the temporary breakdown in negotiations and the negative results of the mass-action campaign. But if you blow hot and cold about negotiating-today you threaten and intimidate and tomorrow you want to sit down and talk again until you don’t get exactly what you want and then you go to the streets again– that’s not negotiating.
