Gandhi's Legacy In South Africa

By J. N. Uppal

Gandhi’s work in South Africa has all along been viewed in the context of his efforts to stem the tide of radical discrimination suffered by the immigrants from India. He had, no doubt, concentrated all his energies on the limited task of protecting the interests of his energies on the limited task of protecting the interests of his own countrymen. However, the high visibility of the Passive Resistance Campaign Organized by him and his associates could not but attract the attention of the Black intelligentsia. Conceivably, this was one of the factors that ultimately brought about the birth of the South African Native National Congress (Later renamed the African National Congress) in January 1912 to unite all the Blacks across tribal divisions to defend the rights of the native population.

Initially the activities of the ANC were confined to petitions and deputations, comparable to what the Indian community had been doing up to 1905 under Gandhi’s guidance. But between 1906 and 1913, the Indians resorted to active defiance of the oppressive white regime by way of passive resistance that soon got elevated to its more sanctified form, Satyagraha. The Climax was reached in October 1913 when the coalfield laborers in the neighborhood of new Castle put their tools down and went of a strike. The most dramatic part of this action was the striker’s trek from New Castle to Charlestown to court imprisonment by making unauthorized entry into the Transvaal for onward match to Johannesburg for reaching to Tolstoy Farm, if they were allowed to do so. This campaign ultimately led to the negotiated settlement arrived at between Gandhi and General Smuts in 1914 and the passage of the Indian Relief Act which was euphemistically describ3ed as the Magna Carta of the Indian settlers in South Africa.

The first mass action undertaken by the ANC was the noteworthy resistance put up against Pass Laws, somewhat similar to the movement launched by Gandhi in 1907 against the Asiatic Registration Act in the Transvaal. Thousands of men and women threw away their passes and courted arrest. Many were sentenced to imprisonment with hard labour. Those were fined refuse to pay and choose to go to jail. Many were roughed up and injured by mounted policemen and also attacked by white vigilantes.

As for the Indian community, subsequent to Gandhi’s departure form South Africa, the spirit of the 1914 accord remained unworn during the war year. But after the return peace, there was another wave of anti-Indian agitation in the Transvaal. The Pretoria administration promptly went in for a new law in 1919 that severely limited the rights of Indians in that province to acquire landed property and set up new enterprises. It was this new onslaught that led to the founding of the South African Indian Congress (SAIC), which brought together the leaders of the provincial bodies and raised a loud protest against the legislation in question. The whites, on the other hand, considered this law too mind and wanted the Government to combat the ‘Indian menance’ more effectively. The Asiatic Inquiry Commission (1920), appointed by the Government in view of the growing tension on both sides, recommended a plan of repatriation (apparently voluntary) and reaffirmed the principle of segregation. Thanks to Gandhi’s increasing influence in his own country, the repatriation (apparently voluntary) and reaffirmed the principle the segregation. Thanks to Gandhi’s increasing influence in his own Country, the interventions on behalf of the Government of India were more prompt and vigorous, but these were of no avail. General Smuts, who, after Louis Botha’s demise, were of no avail. General Smuts who, after Louis Botha’s demise, succeeded him as Prime Minister, had turned his back Louis Botha’s demise, succeeded him as Prime Minister, had turned his back upon the policy he was guided by in 1914. He had now a lurking fear that equal rights for Indians would lead to the demand for similar rights by the native population and that would make it difficult to sustain white domination.

In June, 1924, the Nationalist Party led by General J.B.M Hertzog in alliance with the Labour Party defeated the more moderate South African Party (SAP) headed by Smuts and came to power. By the time this change took place, the prevailing social environment had brought the ruling white’s prejudice against Asians as well as Blacks to a very high pitch. The growing class of white before about the non-whites competing for the available jobs, particularly so because many of the employers found it more economical to employ the later. The Colour Bar Act (1926) practically reserved certain sectors of the mining industry semi-skilled jobs to have a proficiency certificate which the Asians and the Blacks would not be easily granted. The white colonists exercising unbridled political power had come to look at the Asian settlers as well as the African Blacks in unambiguously adversarial light and kept them at bay. Even at this stage, the Asians and the Blacks had not realized the need of getting together to resist the white tyranny.

The economic strangulation and social alienation were proceeding side by side by side. The Natal Indians were bitter against the regime because of a new which took away their municipal franchise. Soon, thereafter, the Union Government came up with the Areas Reservation, Immigration and Registration Bill Besides introducing more impediments and Registration Bill. Besides introducing more impediments in the way of immigration and enjoying fresh registration of Asians all over South Africa, the proposed bill subjected them to Government of India led to a Round Table Conference between Representatives of the two governments. Its outcome was the Cape Town Agreement of 1927. In return for the Government of India giving its support to an arrangement for assisted voluntary repatriation or re-Government agreed not to go ahead with the bill. The assumption was if the Indian population could be reduced; there would not be much room left for any further trouble. The Indian community also accepted this arrangement mainly because the agreement included and assurance for taking all possible steps to provide educational and other facilities to the Indians who were left behind. Soon, however, this uplift clause proved to be nothing more than a mirage.

Gandhi had been closely following these developments. He even had a hand in the appointment of V S Srinivasa Sastri as Government of India’s first Agent-General under the Cape Town accord. When he arrived in South Africa in June 1927, C.F Andrews, who had come to share Gandhi’ s concern with whatever happened in this country, was already there. One important aim was to inculcate among the Indians in the adopted country and to build up a spirit of understanding between them and South Africa’s native population.

All in all, it was a period of drift which continued up to the mid-thirties. The younger Indians, who were imbued with more strident ideas were not satisfied with the trade union movement had come in close contact with the Africans and had been influenced by the non-racist elements among European activities. The organized the liberal could discuss national issues of common interest. Their ranks were strengthen in the late 1930s with three newly trained medicos from Edinburgh University-Dr. Yusuf Dadoo, Dr. G. M. Naicker and Dr. K. Goonam - who got drawn into active socio-political work and soon because the backbone of a more radical movement. It was this injection of new blood that enabled the SAIC to deal with the situation that had arisen in the country after the formation of the United South African National Party. General Hertzog handling the Union government now had Smuts as his second in command. The latter had by then completely yielded to the forces of reaction and had come to accept the policy of rigorous segregation.

What was in store for the Indians became clear in 1939 with the passage of a new law binding Asians in the Transvaal to their existing premises for residence and business. Gandhi who even at this time was in touch with the changing situation in South Africa sent a cable to Smuts: ‘Why is the agreement of 1914 being violated with you as witness? Is there no help for Indians expect to pass through fire?’ The SAIC had planned another resistance campaign but decided to hold it off because of the gathering war cloutis.

The outbreak of World War II again brought about a parting of ways between Herizog and smuts, with the latter emerging as the helmsman. For the Dominion Party which formed part of the new coalition government headed by Smuts and had its principal base in Natal, there was no issue more important than that of preventing Indian penetration into European areas. Even while the Indian troops were playing a spectacular role on the battlefields in the Allies’ fight against fascism, another form of the same evil was taking shape in South Restriction Act of 1943 was passed, permanently decreeing the pegging this restriction had been ordered in 1939 as an interim measure was called, not to be quite amenable to Smuts’ idea of gradual change, had gone ahead with extension of the Act to the whole of Natal. The Indian population of the province, getting wary of moderate leadership. Was turning to the militant group of the upcoming younger leaders who were itching for a fight.

The Indian problem had nearly reached its boiling point when Smuts was faced with break-up of his coalition, with both Dominion and Labour parities trying to exploit the situation to their advantage. Wanting to assuage European as well as Indian public opinion, he came up with the Asiatic Land Tenure and Indian public opinion, he came up with the Asiatic Land tenure and Indian Representation Act (1946). The Indians, on their part, could have welcomed a truncated franchise at the cost of losing the rights of land purchase and residence according to their need and convenience. They rejected this offer of franchise as ‘a miserable half load’. They called it the Ghetto Act.

The SAIC, now led by Dr. G.M. Naicker in Natal and Dr. Y. Dadoo in the Transvaal, instantly launched a passive resistance campaign with its prime focus turned upon Durban. The Satyagrahis, both men and women, pitched their tents in the prohibited areas. Before the authorities could order any counter measures, some white miscreants, taking law into their own hands, raided the camps, pulled down the tents, molested the passive resisters and tried to terrorize them into submission. The Satyagrahis put up with this hooliganism without any retaliation. When the Borough police did intervene, they offered themselves for arrest. At the trial proceedings they would in the Gandhian style plead guilty refusing to pay fines, they would opt for going to jail. After serving their sentences, they would get back and rejoin the crusade. The number of persons who courted imprisonment went up to about 2,000.

At this time, India’s liberation from British rules was not too far away. Yet Gandhi had so many thorns in his side: on e of them was the turn of events in South Africa. He called upon whites throughout the world to remember the path that Jesus Christ had shown to the world. He even reminded them that if the great Saviour were to descend on earth and go the South Africa, he would have to live in a segregated area. The Government of India expressed its displeasure by recalling the Agent-General besides breaking trade relations with the Union. The Ghetto Act became an important landmark in South Africa’s history; brought that country’s racist policy under UN scrutiny. The most significant fall out of the Ghetto Act was that the passive resistance launched by the Indians against the Act brought them closer to the South African Blacks. The ANC, which had so far been committed to constitutional methods, was now in a state of ferment under the influence of its Youth League. When the then leaders of the Congress saw the Indian Satyagraha at work, they realized in what direction it was necessary for them to move. Thus, around the time when the Indian community led by the SAIC had been seized by the second wind of Satyagraha, the ANC also had undergone radicalization. Both the Congresses were now ripe to work in collaboration with each other. In 1947, Dr. A.B. Xuma, president of the ANC, arrived at an understanding with Dr. Naicker and Dr. Dadoo that they would together fight for full civil and economic rights. Their joint declaration of 9th March 1947, known as the Doctors’ Pact, for the first time brought the Blacks and the Indians in South Africa on a common platform.

The Indian campaign, even while it attracted a great deal of attention, had failed to yield any concrete gain. The SAIC leadership, following the Gandhian tradition, chose not to embarrass Smuts too much at a time when he had to concentrate on his electoral contest scheduled for 1948 and, therefore, suspended the Satyagraha programme. It was a good move even in terms of practical politics, because the non-whites had much to lose if the Smuts’ Party was thrown out. In any event, the hard nosed Nationalists led by Dr. D.F. Malan went to polls carrying an unambiguous label of their blatant segregationist policy viz., Apartheid. They did not hesitate to denounce Smuts as a ‘British today.’ Thanks to their mobilization skills, they were able to gain an edge over their opponents. With their victory, through by a narrow margin, began the darkest period of South Africa’s colonial history. Soon after assuming power, the Nationalists, determined to refashion launched a legislative blitz aimed at removing all loopholes left by the ANC’s ranks had been reinforced as a result of three members of the Youth League- Walter Sisulu, Oliver Tambo and Nelson Mandela challenge that the non-whites were faced with, the ANC the SAIC and the CPSA (Communist Party of South Africa) together decided to observe 26th June 1950 as National Day of Protest. The callousness with which demonstrations against the Apartheid laws were met with was to be the normal pattern of repression in the coming years.

Before long the repressive measures went beyond all limits of tolerance. In June 1952, the ANC assisted by the SAIC, organized a countrywide Defiance Campaign in the form of civil disobedience in which Nelson Mandela played a leading role. There were no elements of violence in this programme. The entire campaign “was of an almost religious character. The influence of Gandhi’s ideas of self-sacrifice as a way to political success was very evident….” (Rober Ross, S Concise History of South Africa, OUP, 1999). Nearly 8000persons went to jail. One side effect of this campaign was the formation of the Congress of Democrats (CoD), a radical white group imbued with a new vision of human rights, irrespective of race, colour or creed. In December 1952, Albert John Luthuli became ANC’s President General. He sincerely believed and never tired of emphasizing that the task before the Congress was not that of throwing out the whites but that of building a multiracial society. Deeply steeped in the Christian liberal tradition, he was in every sense a true Gandhian. The Apartheid regime, rather than deal with him in a spirit of accommodation, banned him for one year from all political activities. Later in July 1954, he was banned for two more years. Despite these restrictions, Luthuli continued to guide the younger line of ANS leaders, most of whom shared his firm belief in non-violence and the need of a multiracial front against Apartheid. The high water-mark of his vision was reached in 1955 when a Congress of people (CoP) was jointly convened by the ANC, the SAIC, the CoD and the SACP (South African Colonial People’s Organization00 at Kliptown, a village near Johannesburg. Attended by about three thousand elected representatives of different races, including a few Whites, the Congress adopted the historic Freedom Charter declaring inter-alia that South Africa belonged to all those who lived in the country.

The events of 1955 had opened a new chapter in the history of South Africa. The ANC was now pulsating with a new life. This became evident from what happened at the mammoth demonstration organized by the ANC Women’s League and the Federation of South African women in August 1956 to resist the extension of pass laws to non-white women, vulnerable not only to greater harassment by the police but sexual assaults as well. The Nationalist Government was now apprehensive of a rising tide of revolutionary activity. Within a few months its security system embarked on elaborate punitive action against high-ranking leaders of the various organizations that had come together. It began with the arrest of Albert Luthuli and 155 others in December 1956. After prolonged scrutiny, 91 of them were prosecuted for high treason and violation of the suppression of Communism Act. Cases against 61 of them had to be dropped and 30 others remained under trial until March 1961 when the court acquitted all of them. The proceeding meant a great deal of harassment for the ANC leaders and workers and the long drawn out case attracted extraordinary attention the world over.

In the meantime, Dr. Hendrich Verwoerd, who came to power in 1958, was determined to surmount all impediments to keeping different ethnic groups as separate entities. One of the measures taken by the government was to lay out a framework for establishment of separate educational institutions for Africans, Asians and other colored people. Another legislation passed in 1959 aimed at creating separate ‘homelands’ for the blacks based on the reserves carved out for them. The sole aim was to confine every sub-community to its own limited territory, each one to serving as a reservoir of migratory labour to be drawn upon by the white areas according to their needs.

With the ANC committed to its policy of non-violent and multi-racial democratic ideals but having failed to make any headway in its struggle against Apartheid, the staunch believers in African nationalism and more militant groups splintered off in April 1959 to form the Pan African Congress (PAC) led by Robert Subutwe. Although to start with the new body had no plan for armed rebellion, there was considerable scope for outbreak of violence in the given situation. From time to time, trouble would flare up for one reason or the other. There were riots in the Transvaal Natal as well as in the Cape. Black women irked by fresh attempts to chain them into the pass system Government had only one answer to these happenings more and more not uncommon. Everyone got a jolt when Albert Luthuli, known for his commitment to a policy of conciliation, received orders confining him to his home in northern Natal for five years.

The very same factors, which had caused the hardening of white obduracy, had lent new vigor to the non-whites’ resistance. The ANC was wanting to start a major campaign to build up pressure for abolition of the much-hated pass system. The PAC, in its anxiety to steal a march over the tired old veterans, made a pre-emptive bid to organize countrywide demonstrations against the pass laws. In most cases, the protest marches to the police stations for courting arrest went on smoothly, but in some places things got out of land. At Shaipeville, a Bantu location thirty miles south of Johannesburg, the police contingent, instead of dealing with the situation coolly, opened fire on the demonstrations killing 69 and causing injuries to about 180 others including women and children. This tragic occurrence that took place on 21st March 1960 the very year that was proclaimed Africa Year by the United Nations outraged the conscience of all right mined people in every part of the globe. Albert Luthuli calmly gave a call for amends for what had happened banned the ANC as well as the PAC, declared a state of emergency and put nearly 2,000 leaders under arrest. The outburst of world-wide condemnation had no effect on Dr. Verwoerd who remained adamant in his policy of separate development of different racial groups. Apartheid was for him more than a political strategum: it almost had the sanctity of religion.

The South African Government was left against when Albert Luthuli was awarded the 1961 Noble Peace Prize. The civilized world could not have snubbed it more forcefully than by bestowing this honour on the untiring upholder of the case of non-racial democracy. Ironically by this time the ANC and the PAC leaders had sunk into such deep despair that they could no more hope to keep the liberation movement alive by sticking to non-violence with Gandhian passion. The transformation of the Union of South Africa in May 1961 into a republic outside the Commonwealth had left them absolutely frustrated because it was precisely on the Apartheid issue that Dr. Verwoerd had broken up with the leading Commonwealth statesmen. If the white rulers of South Africa were ready to pay this price to go along the path of Apartheid, could the non-whites ever expect their non-violent struggle to meet any kind of success? This black outlook compelled the ANC as well as the PAC to think of adopting some other means. It was in this background that two new covert organizations came into existence in 1961-62. Umkhonto sizwe (Spear of the Nation0, led by Nelson Mendela, largely comprising members of the old Congress Alliance, resorted to the destruction of selected installations with studied care to cause no harm to the people. Similarly Poqo, an offshoot of the PAC, engaged itself in acts of sabotage.

What happened subsequent to this turning point and up till the final denouement is a long, complicated story, no part of which could scale down the significance of the remarkable perseverance with which the likes of Dr. A. B. Yuma, Walter Sisulu, OliverTombo, Nelson Mandela, Dr. G. M. Naicker, Dr. Y. Dadoo and above all Albert Luthuli had followed the path of non-violent struggle on Gandhian lines against the tyrannical perpetrators of an abomnibnable form of racial fascism for nearly half a century. With the Government determined to crush with naked force their non-violent struggle, the non-whites were left with no option but reconsider their future strategy. In case of Albert Luthuli, the universally acknowledged apostle of Gandhian vision, even half-hearted acquiescence to the use of violent means as a last resort could not have come about without wrenching his conscience.

Source: Anasakti Darshan, Volume-2 No.1 January-June, 2006