With thanks to Brian Witbooi of The Herald in Port Elizabeth
Tuesday, July 30, 2013
Monday, July 29, 2013
Bloemfontein Launch
Ruth First and Joe Slovo: New book launched in Bloemfontein
Maricelle BothaBloemfontein - Activist couple, Ruth First and Joe Slovo, were leaders of the war to end apartheid in South Africa. In keeping with the goals and objectives to ensure that the memory and legacy of the liberation struggle is not forgotten, Alan Wieder has written a book commemorating the role played by this activist couple.
Wieder launched his book called Ruth First and Joe Slovo in the War to end Apartheid in Bloemfontein this week. He says to truly understand democracy one needs to know the people who fought for it.
Wieder is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of South Carolina and has also served at the University of the Western Cape and Stellenbosch University.
Link below for part of the interview
http://www.ofm.co.za/article/134372/Ruth-First-and-Joe-Slovo-New-book-launched-in-Bfn
Final South African Launch
Yesterday I did an interview at 786 Radio in Cape Town -- it will be broadcast in the next few weeks. This evening is the last South African launch -- 5pm for 5:30 pm at Clarke's Bookshop on Long Street in Cape Town. I WILL BE IN CONVERSATION WITH ALBIE SACHS.
Saturday, July 27, 2013
Bloemfontein Launch
Thursday I combined a research seminar for faculty with a launch of the book at the University of the Free State. Two days in Bloemfontein hosted by the Education Faculty and Jonathan Jansen were both warm and alive. Besides the seminar/launch, I had the privilege of speaking with both masters and doctoral students who asked great questions on research methodology
Wednesday, July 24, 2013
The Herald - Port Elizabeth
HERALD ARTICLE
Shaun Gillham gillhams@timesmedia.co.za
PROLIFIC American author, academic and apartheid researcher
Alan Wieder launched his latest work, the first extended biography on freedom
fighters Ruth First and Joe Slovo, at the latest edition of The Herald NMMU
Community Dialogue, held at the Red Location Museum last night.
The launch of the book – entitled Ruth First and Joe Slovo
in The War Against Apartheid – came as Nelson Mandela Bay, South Africa and
people around the world celebrated Mandela Day.
Wieder, an oral historian who lives in Portland, Oregon, has
worked on oral histories of political resistance in apartheid South Africa
since 1999. He spent more than 20 years on the faculty of the University of
South Carolina and has also served on the faculties of the University of the
Western Cape and Stellenbosch University in South Africa.
Wieder addressed a full house at the museum, while sharing a
dialogue with the audience and Fieldmore Mapeto, who is the former regional
head of the ANC's armed wing Mkhonto weSizwe, and museum acting deputy director
Mpumezo Ralo. He told the audience that he began researching Ruth First, the
wife of Joe Slovo, during 1991 and after discovering that there were no
comprehensive books about her and her husband.
Wieder describes his book as "the first extended
biography of Ruth First and Joe Slovo and a remarkable account of one couple
and the revolutionary moment in which they lived".
Outlining his research methodology for the publication,
Wieder said he drew heavily on primary and secondary sources, but also on an
extensive oral history he had collected over many years.
"I interviewed 83 people, who included the likes of
Ronnie Kasrils. I spoke to Ronnie for a collective 16 hours for material on the
book," Wieder said.
He was able to tell the couple's story after speaking to
people who knew them as children, as teenagers or for their whole lives, he
said.
Wieder spoke at length on various important events in the
lives of the late South African Communist Party stalwart and his wife, who was
notoriously killed by a letter bomb dispatched by agents of the apartheid
government in 1982.
Following his address, Wieder opened the floor to questions,
many of which revolved around Slovo's views on socialism in the South African
and broader context and the personal and ideological relationship between Slovo
and First.
Sunday, July 21, 2013
London Launch
Talk and Book Launch: Ruth First and Joe Slovo in the War Against Apartheid
29 November 2013, 17:30 - 19:30
- Organised by:
- Institute of Commonwealth Studies
- Venue:
- Room 349 (3rd floor)
- Venue Details:
- Senate House, South Block
Malet Street
London WC1E 7HU
Description
“Ruth First and Joe Slovo in the War Against Apartheid” by Alan WiederRSVP: olga.jimenez@sas.ac.uk
© Institute of Commonwealth Studies School of Advanced Study, University of London
Saturday, July 20, 2013
Port Elizabeth Launch
Launched
Ruth First and Joe Slovo in the War Against Apartheid tonight at the
Red Location Museum in Port Elizabeth. Respondent was Eastern Cape MK
Commander and labor organizer Fieldmore Mapetho. This was nothing like
either the Johannesburg or Cape Town launch. The conversation was
current and political and reminded me of descriptions of UDF struggle
meetings in the 1980s. It was a total learning experience - truly a
remarkable evening.
Tuesday, July 16, 2013
Monday, July 15, 2013
Links: International Journal of Socialist Renewal
Exclusive excerpt: 'Ruth First and Joe Slovo in the war against apartheid' (Monthly Review Press)
The following is an excerpt from Alan Wieder's new book, Ruth First and Joe Slovo in the war against apartheid, published by Monthly Review Press. It is posted with the kind permission of Monthly Review Press. Readers of Links international Journal of Socialist Renewal are urged to order a copy HERE.You can download the excerpt HERE (PDF), or read it on screen below. Nadime Gordimer's foreword is available at HERE.
July 14, 2013 -- Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal -- Ruth First and Joe Slovo, husband and wife, were leaders of the war
to end apartheid in South Africa. Communists, scholars, parents, and
uncompromising militants, they were the perfect enemies for the white
police state. Together they were swept up in the growing resistance to
apartheid, and together they experienced repression and exile.
Their
contributions to the liberation struggle, as individuals and as a
couple, are undeniable. Ruth agitated tirelessly for the overthrow of
apartheid, first in South Africa and then from abroad, and Joe directed
much of the armed struggle carried out by the famous Umkhonto we Sizwe.
Only one of them, however, would survive to see the fall of the old
regime and the founding of a new, democratic South Africa.
This book by Alan Wieder, the first extended biography of Ruth First and Joe Slovo,
is a remarkable account of one couple and the revolutionary moment in
which they lived. Alan Wieder’s heavily researched work draws on the
usual primary and secondary sources but also an extensive oral history
that he has collected over many years. By intertwining the documentary
record with personal interviews, Wieder portrays the complexities and
contradictions of this extraordinary couple and their efforts to
navigate a time of great tension, upheaval, and revolutionary hope.
A truly remarkable work. Alan Wieder shows himself as a writer equal to their life story, their inspiring bravery in action and self-analysis.—Nadine Gordimer, author, activist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature
Demonised by apartheid, Joe and Ruth were revolutionary heroes for black South Africans. They were formidable opponents in word and deed. This absorbing account does them justice and illuminates the complexity and richness of their often stormy relationship and extraordinary times.—Ronnie Kasrils, anti-apartheid leader and solidarity activist; former Minister of Intelligence in South Africa; author, The Unlikely Secret Agent.
Wieder’s book enlarges and enriches our understanding of the lives of First and Slovo, their intense and turbulent relationship, their personalities and impact on others, and their various roles as lawyer, journalist, underground operative, researcher, teacher, author, political and military leader, negotiator and cabinet minister. The evocation of the Johannesburg left during the 1950s—Gillian Slovo called them her parents’ Camelot years—is vivid and well-observed. Ruth, Joe, and their circle combined commitment and camaraderie with conspiracy and concealment—and also with carelessness and complacency. The account of tensions between the ANC and SACP, and Joe’s efforts to reconcile African nationalism and socialism, is nuanced and important. The discussion of Ruth as writer-researcher and researcher-teacher makes use of earlier evaluations, but goes beyond them in an important assessment of her work as an academic engagé.—Colin Bundy, former principal of Green Templeton College, University of Oxford.
It has been a real privilege for me to read Alan Wieder’s book. It brought me back in touch with two remarkable and complex people and activists. Ruth First and Joe Slovo emerge from this book as flesh and blood human beings facing monumentally difficult decisions. Each of them, and those dearest to them, paid a high price for their respective life choices. Yet Ruth and Joe’s integrity and full-throated commitment to a different kind of South Africa not only played an important role in doing away with the obscenity that was apartheid, they also represent a clear road not taken in post-apartheid South Africa. This book evokes a vital period which became a focus of myth-making rather than the kind of clear-eyed, honest history Ruth and Joe would each have ultimately have deemed essential.—Dan O’Meara, author, Volkskapitalisme, and coauthor, The Struggle for South Africa.
To the Movements he led, he was known by his initials. JS. His last name had become anthemic when the mostly black guerilla army belted out “Joe Slovo” in song as they marched on parade or executed sabotage missions in the secret war against apartheid. You can’t really appreciate South Africa’s transition to democracy without knowing why Nelson Mandela relied on his sense of strategy and how his bravery inspired a revolution committed to non-racialism. He was a communist known for red socks and a willingness to make compromises with capitalists that sealed the path to freedom. And just like Nelson’s relationship with Winnie made him stronger through his long years in confinement, Joe’s often tumultuous relationship with his wife and comrade Ruth First, a brilliant journalist and analyst, until her assassination, helped define the discourse of the ANC’s painful years in exile. Now Alan Wieder has plunged into their past of domestic and political struggle to share their story with the scope, context, and detail that it deserves. And we all will appreciate his commitment and style in critically respecting their contributions and bringing this dynamic duo alive as the complex, loving and caring people they were.—Danny Schechter, founder and director of South Africa Now, director of six films on Nelson Mandela
Alan Wieder
is an oral historian who lives in Portland, Oregon. He is distinguished
professor emeritus at the University of South Carolina and has also
taught at the University of the Western Cape and Stellenbosch University
in South Africa. In the last ten years he has published two books and
numerous articles on South Africans who fought against the apartheid
regime. Nadine Gordimer is a South African writer and activist. She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1991.
You can download the excerpt HERE (PDF), or read it on screen below.
Saturday, July 13, 2013
Links
Various excerpts and interviews are no surrounding the book. Truthdig ran an excerpt from the first chapter, I did a video interview for Polity Magazine, and Guernica published Nadine Gordimer's foreword. The links are listed below:
Thursday, July 11, 2013
AIDC Launch Organizers
Russell Dudley (r) and Andre Marais organized the Cape Town launch -- thanks to both of them.
Cape Town Launch
Yesterday evening was the Cape Town launch at the Alternative Information Development Centre (AIDC) in Observatory. It was a great setting as the Centre does social justice organizing and education. It was most special for me because people I interviewed, colleagues, and long-time Cape Town friends and even some of their children turned out for the event. Of course, there were also people I didn't know who participated. Different than the Johannesburg launch, this was open-ended with me being the oral historian and interviewees like Myrtle Berman, Judith Head, Gonda Perez, Pallo Jordan, and Ronnie Kasrils both telling stories about Ruth and Joe and analyzing their writings, ideas, and actions. Other people spoke and asked questions and the evening had the spirit of the book -- stories and analysis on the extraordinary, revolutionary lives of Ruth First and Joe Slovo.
Sunday, July 7, 2013
Wordsworth Bookstore in Cape Town
This could not be better - book is in the window next to Ronnie Kasrils' Armed and Dangerous
Saturday, July 6, 2013
Thandi Lujabe-Rankoe
Thandi Lujabe-Rankoe was an ANC leader during the struggle against apartheid in Tanzania, Zambia, Egypt, Nigeria, Botswana, and Zimbabwe. Then between 1988 and and 1994 she represented the ANC in Norway where she hosted Madiba when he won the Nobel Peace Prize. After 1994 she was the South African ambassador to Tanzania and then Mozambique. She attended both my lecture and launch, and Joanie and I were privileged to spend time with her in Johannesburg.
Thursday, July 4, 2013
Wednesday, July 3, 2013
Lilliesleaf Talk - July 2, 2013
Last night was my first book event in Johannesburg. I was privileged to be part of Lilliesleaf's 50th year commemoration of the Rivonia Raid that subsequently led to the Rivonia Trial where Walter Sisulu, Nelson Mandela, and others were sentenced to life in prison. Below is the written version of the talk.
Like Ruth, Joe was a mentor of young people throughout his
life. In Ruth’s case, it began at The Guardian at the end of 1946.
She mentored young African journalists who joined the paper in the 17 years she devoted to The Guardian. Ruth First had a powerful effect on students,
both formal university students and others whom she mentored just as she had
during her time at The Guardian. Included were students at Durham
University as well as younger colleagues at
the Centre of African Studies at Eduardo Mondlane
University in Maputo.
Of course, mentorship was not always smooth and there were political
debates and issues that ran concurrently to the
examples of mentorship. There were some CEA researchers who believed that Ruth
First was too ideological and somewhat harsh in her critique of colleagues. Criticisms acknowledged,
the general spirit that came from the young researchers was that Ruth First
nurtured, sometimes intensely and other times gently, the work of other
researchers at the Centre of African Studies. John Saul was in the Department of Marxism and Leninism at Eduardo
Mondlane at the time and he spoke to this very
issue.
Similar
to Jeremy Cronin wondering what Joe might say or do – Albie Sachs would ask the
same about Ruth:
Speaking to the Present in South Africa: The Ideas,
Writings, and Actions of Ruth First and Joe Slovo
History and memory and how the past speaks to
the present is a topic that should continually be revisited – ongoing
conversations and analysis, of course, facilitate better understanding across
time spans. Yet, it is a difficult task
as each era is different and “history repeating itself” is at best an
historical trope. Even if historians
have no concern with the present time, what they write provides lessons on how
we live our lives. I think, however,
that you must be very careful when connecting the past and the present. Too often when we attempt the connection, we
glorify the past and demonize today. In
an article connected to the 50-year anniversary commemoration of the Rivonia
Raid and Trial, Nicholas Wolpe spoke to the best possibilities and uses of this
particular history. He wrote of the
importance of preserving the “history, memory and legacy” of the struggle and
the imperative of South Africa embracing “the ideals, beliefs and principles upon which our liberation struggle
was predicated. He concluded: “Equally it is important that we continue to celebrate and
draw lessons from the lives of those who shaped our country’s history and
contributed to the freedom and democracy we enjoy today.”
Not only are Ruth First and Joe Slovo people
“who shaped South African history and contributed to the freedom and democracy
in the country today.” They are
integrally connected to the house where we meet today – and thus both the
Rivonia Raid and the Rivonia Trial. Joe
helped plan the beginnings of MK right here and if he wouldn’t have gone out of
the country with J. B. Marks to gain support for the underground struggle he
would have surely been a defendant in the trial. Ruth visited Rivonia everyday and it was only
happenstance that she wasn’t here when the Raid took place. As everyone knows, she was subsequently
imprisoned for 117 Days and clearly
believed that she was going to be part of The Trial. In the case of Ruth First and Joe Slovo,
politicians and academics, some of them struggle activists, have opined on how
Ruth and/or Joe might have spoke to the actions of government and the growing
disparity that exists almost two decades after the first South African
democratic election in 1994. A partial
list of this group includes Zwelinzima Vavi, Jacqueline Cock, Jeremy Cronin,
and Jay Naidoo. And each of these people
provide questions and insights on how both Ruth and Joe might have led
differently than today’s leaders. Issues
included class disparity, unemployment,
sexism, outrageous CEO salaries, disparate housing, education and healthcare,
government and corporate corruption and hypocrisy, and censorship that were
antithetical to Ruth and Joe’s “values and moral principles” for “equality and
justice.”
The focus of
this essay is different. Rather than
trying to predict what either Ruth or Joe would say or do at the present time,
I would like to review some of their ideas, writings, and actions as historical
lessons for today. I refer to Jeremy
Cronin’s memories of Joe.
What would cde JS make of our current ANC, SACP and
Alliance? What would he have to say about our present government, or the
prevailing South African and international reality? There is always the
temptation to claim cde JS’s authority for whatever views we might personally
now hold – but, let’s concede it, none of us can say with any certainty what he
would have to say about our present.
Ruth First
could be thoughtful, contentious, generous, academic, intellectual,
revolutionary, and more. Joe Slovo was
tough, humorous, soft, harsh, congenial, thoughtful, political, musical, and
revolutionary. Ruth was sometimes
compared to Rosa Luxemburg. Her
commitment to the struggle against apartheid is given as testimony throughout
the interviews that I had with the people who knew her. Albie Sachs once described her as a product
of Lenin and the London School of Economics. Headlines from a newspaper interview with Ruth
during her London years read, “I am a Revolutionary.” Finally, her friend at the London School of
Economics and beyond, American Danny Schechter told me, “She was not playing
the revolution, she was making the revolution, or trying to.”
Everyone that I interviewed spoke of Joe Slovo
as a revolutionary. And one after
another of the young cadres who worked with Joe underground spoke of his total
commitment to a democratic South Africa.
This essay, like my book, provides examples
of their democratic, “peoples’ power” ideas, writings, and actions in the
struggle against apartheid. Ruth First
and Joe Slovo were both leaders among leaders.
They had different styles. They
had different roles in the struggle.
While it is impossible to holistically describe
the ways that Ruth and Joe speak to the present, it is possible to reflect on
their lives through selected examples.
As a journalist and then an academic, Ruth First exemplified Edward
Said’s dictum of “speaking back to power.”
And she did so with a ubiquitous resolve toward people power and
democracy. As she told John Heilpern in
the mid-1960s:
I
became a communist because it was the only organization known to me in South
Africa that advocated meaningful changes.
And because it wasn’t just a policy, but something positive. They wanted to do something. They were immersed in the struggle for equality. They were committed.
It is important to note,
considering the present moment, that although Ruth’s writing and lectures were
generally focused on the oppressors, she did not hesitate to also occasionally
take on the SACP or even the ANC. She
spoke loudly when the SACP, including Joe, supported the Soviet invasion of
Czechoslovakia in 1968. Pallo Jordan commented on the issue in the context
of Ruth’s depth, breadth, and political commitment and referred to her as a dissident communist.
One example of her critiquing
the ANC came when they banned the conservative newspaper Bantu World from covering an ANC conference. Ruth used the pages of New Age to remind ANC leaders of her own paper’s constant
harassment and bannings from the apartheid regime. This,
of course, is the type of voice needed today.
But most of Ruth First’s
“speaking back to power” was directed at the apartheid regime. From the late 1940s till the time she left
South Africa in 1964 her journalism exposed government horrors throughout the
country.
Ruth wrote her most famous story in 1951 on the
enslavement of Bethal farm workers. She
also exposed government seizure of black people’s land and other land rights
issues, township conditions, and political protests like the train boycotts,
bannings, and a series on how pass laws affected the lives of black South
Africans. One of the land rights
articles was titled “Africans Turned Off the Land.” Ruth reviewed a number of cases from
different regions of the country and used the voices of people whose land was
taken by the apartheid government. Ruth
First provided the same kind of reporting on the townships of Johannesburg.
With the activist Anglican
pastor, Michael Scott, Ruth exposed the slave-like conditions in Bethal. Ruth would expand on the story in several
articles and less than ten years later would report when slave-like conditions
were rediscovered at the area’s farms. She
witnessed police supplying forced labor to local farmers and revealed the
unsanitary dwellings where workers were forced to stay with little food or
water. They were paid 12 pounds for six
months of labor. Ruth wrote about the
conditions in The Guardian.
It is not every day that the
Johannesburg reporter for the Guardian
meets an African farm worker who, when asked to describe conditions on the farm
on which he works, silently takes off his shirt to show large weals and scars
on his back, shoulders, and arms.
Ruth published a series of Guardian articles under the headlines, “There
Are More Bethals.” Prime Minister Smuts
ordered an investigation that was at best a whitewash, something Ruth predicted
in The Guardian. She reported on government-farmer collusion
and photographed police incarcerating black people fleeing Rhodesia and
transporting them to farms in Bethal.
Joe went undercover and also helped in the investigations after accompanying
Ruth to observe black people being taken from the courts to the farms. Concluding this writing was a February 1950
article titled “The Worst Place God Has Made - A State of Terror in Bethal.” Again,
we might ask, in the wake of Marikana, do we need more of this type of
journalism today?
Obviously,
there are further examples of Ruth’s journalism that we might cite and connect
to events like Marakana, its coverage, as well as the recent government
restrictions on free speech and more. A
second element of both Ruth and Joe’s lives as revolutionaries is their
personal/political interactions and connections with comrades, friends, and
colleagues. Again and again the people
that I interviewed told me that Joe was able to have substantive and authentic
conversations with everyone. Pallo
Jordan recalled that “You
could talk and disagree and we had differences.
Joe was far less rigid about issues than his peers. Some say it was because he was married to
Ruth. To some of his comrades a
difference was a brawl.” Colleague at the bar, Jules Browde, viewed Joe as the
leader who was also everyman. “Joe was
first of all a fine human being. He
liked people from all walks of life and all shapes and sizes - all colors, made
no difference to him.” Browde and George Bizos both recollect Joe’s friendship
with Gert Coetzee, an Afrikaner Nationalist, who became a leading South African
judge and wrote a book titled, A Rational
Approach to South Africa Becoming a Republic, in the early sixties. Browde and Bizos agree that Joe's friendship
with Coetzee is an example of his humanity.
While we will discuss
negotiations and the sunset clauses shortly, might we again wonder how Joe
might have interacted as an elder statesman today.
Even when one looked back at
moments of inter-personal tension one had had with her it was also with the realisation that such tensions
were not arbitrary ones, that almost invariably something important, intellectually and politically, was at stake.
The seriousness of her engagement, the intensity of her concern,
could never be doubted. Nor, if
you were struggling to be as serious yourself,
could such moments
cast any doubt upon
her personal concerns, her compassion, her continuing solidarity in the next
round of whatever struggle, public or personal, was in train.
Joe’s tutoring also actually began
at home before leaving South Africa in 1963.
Ronnie Kasrils recalls viewing Joe as a teacher during Ben Turok’s
trial. It appears that in Joe’s life there were
always younger people whom he taught a great deal while at the same time
trusting their commitment and judgment. At
every stage, Joe recruited a younger deputy whom he trusted and respected, but
did not micro-manage. Initially it was
Obadi in MK, then Rashid in Special Operations, and finally Billy Cobbett at
the Ministry of Housing.
Rashid and Billy Cobbett both spoke of Joe’s ability to
truly engage. Rashid talked of Joe’s
propensity to interact with the cadres.
“Joe Slovo would come and talk to the cadres himself. He would be part of it. He would listen to it.” I should add that I
received the same message from many younger MK comrades. Billy Cobbett had similar experiences working
with Joe in the Ministry of Housing. On
his first official day in the office, Joe called a full staff meeting for two
in the afternoon. The meeting included
everyone on the Ministry staff – highest bureaucrats, secretaries, and
janitors. There were approximately 250
people, mostly white Afrikaners, many who still considered Joe Slovo a
communist terrorist.
Joe walks into the room, you couldn’t have filmed this,
everyone stood up. This is about Joe
Slovo, the most hated white man in the country for this audience, walking in as
their boss. He spoke to them for about
20 minutes. He told them a joke about
Che Guevara and they didn’t know who Che Guevara was. He told them a joke about Castro and Che
Guevara – Castro was the other bogeyman.
Then he tells them that we are going to work together and it was all
Kumbaya sort of stuff. He introduced me
and says things like my door is always open which no one believes because the
previous ministers’ doors were not open.
So while Ruth’s mentorship was more
formal and Joe’s more personal – both of their lives in that role portray the
importance of breadth and depth in ideas and actions that is an essential lesson
for the present. Both Ruth and Joe’s
publications in the 1970s – specifically The
Barrel of A Gun for Ruth and “No Middle Road” for Joe directly link to
South Africa today. Ruth First published
her book in 1970. The substance of the book
focused on Ruth’s ability to provide in depth case studies of military coups in
Nigeria, Ghana, and Sudan within the context of colonialism and the
decolonization of Africa. The book,
however, was groundbreaking in that it provided a description and critique of
post-colonial African leaders by an African socialist. As Ruth First stated at the outset of the
book, “Harsh judgments are made in this book of Africa’s independence
leaderships. Yet this book is primarily
directed not to the criticism, but to the liberation of Africa, for I count
myself an African, and there is no cause I hold dearer.” She emphasized her
point early in the book. “Power lies in
the hands of those who control the means of violence. It lies in the barrel of a gun, fired or
silent.”
Ruth
First exhibited a research strength that would be evident in her writing
throughout her life. She possessed the
uncanny ability to ask questions that combined societal, biographical, and
political issues. Ruth was masterful at connecting colonialism and
post-colonialism to the failure of progressive/radical change throughout the
African continent. She bares the
coopting of African elites by the West, including the United States, but in
final analysis her writing in The Barrel
of A Gun confronts independent African regimes. Once
more, might we picture Ruth presently doing the same in South Africa today.
Joe Slovo’s essay, “No Middle
Ground,” served as the “spark” for many young South Africans from the Soweto
generation to enter the armed struggle against the apartheid regime. MK veterans who worked with Joe in Maputo and
Lusaka in the eighties, all give credit to Joe’s essay as having great
influence on their coming to join MK after the Soweto uprising. Keith Mokoape noted Joe’s sensitivity to
young Black Consciousness (BC) cadres’ initial skepticism of the African
National Congress (ANC) and remembered taking “guidance from Joe” when he left
South Africa. Various people I
interviewed suggested that it was Joe’s influence that brought BC to MK. And Pallo Jordan mentioned that “No Middle
Road,” “would have an electrifying effect on young black South Africans who
would soon become part of the struggle against apartheid.”
At the time, clandestine copies of Joe’s essay were smuggled
into South Africa as pamphlets under pseudo-titles like “Wines Routes of the
Cape.” Joe reviews history and builds on
the SACP’s conceptualization of colonialism of a special type, that being internal
colonialism, to emphasize the need for a political-military revolution that
combines issues of class and race. In
addition, corresponding to the title of the essay, he underscores the necessity
of armed revolution on South African soil because the government had made any
type of negotiations or liberal reform impossible through its own oppression
and violence toward the South African people.
Near the end of the essay, Joe linked workers and students in the
country to the revolution.
If there was a goal for the essay, it was to facilitate an
acceleration of on the ground struggle in South Africa. While it would be an overstatement to
designate “No Middle Road” as the blueprint for armed struggle, the essay did
provide a theory-praxis foundation.
Joe’s words echoed Ruth’s continual criticism of herself and the struggle
in exile – why are we not taking the struggle home? In
some ways, “No Middle Road” comes right out of the house where we meet today.
It should be noted that “No Middle
Road” was a precursor to Joe’s writing
“Strategy and Tactics” and the Morogoro Conference. The latter is important for various reasons,
one being that it was the first of at least two occasions where Joe supported
comrades whom he respected and trusted but who were in dire trouble with MK and
the ANC. At Morogoro it was Chris Hani
and eight years later it was Pallo Jordan. Hani and comrades were disappointed with what
they viewed as corruption within the ANC leadership and the incompetence of the
Wankie Campaign. They wrote a
memorandum, often referred to as the Hani Memorandum that was submitted to the
leadership of the African National Congress. Reaction from the ANC leadership was
swift. Hani and the other signees were
confronted and suspended from the ANC by an ANC Military Tribunal in March
1969. The Tribunal is said to have voted
the death penalty for treason although that is not entirely clear. In any case, struggle stalwarts, including
Joe Slovo, came to their defense. In the
case of Pallo Jordan, he was accused as a traitor by MK security who among
other charges claimed that he had disparaged Ruth First. Again, it was Joe who challenged leadership
as he stood by Pallo’s side. Like Ruth,
Joe was willing to challenge other SACP and ANC leaders. Again,
a lesson for speaking back to power today.
There are many other examples of how
the writings and actions of Ruth and Joe might speak to the present time in
South Africa. When Ruth was assassinated
in 1982, there were numerous eulogies that we might cite. One however, by journalist Joseph Hanlon,
explained that while most academics would not understand, the murder of Ruth
First was a warning for academics. “They should not attend conferences like the
one Ruth organized, and they should not support or practice research or
teaching that calls for socialist transformation.” Is it a warning that should still not be ignored?
There are three further experiences
in Joe Slovo’s life after Ruth’s murder that I would like to discuss because
they speak loudly to South Africa today.
The first is his pamphlet “Has Socialism Failed?” The second is his part in negotiations and
finally, the last is his time as the Minister of Housing. In each case, and important for today, Joe
Slovo’s remarkable ability to interact with people is imperative – or maybe
better put, Joe was a politician who truly sought a democracy of the people.
“Has Socialism Failed?” was published as a pamphlet by the
SACP. Connected to the Gorbachev
revolution in the Soviet Union, and critically received by both SACP and non-Party
South African socialists, the essay served to nurture thoughtful political discussion
and debate. The document is 28 pages and
the underlying premise is that socialism without democracy is a contradiction
in terms. Joe went to great lengths to argue
that the merit of socialism over capitalism was not impugned by the failure of
Stalin and the post-Stalin Soviet Union or the other collapsed socialist
regimes. Instead, he asserted that the
bureaucratic, state socialism in each of these countries distorted the canons
through the practice of democratic centralism thus alienating and demeaning the
working class as well as other citizens.
As Joe was writing “Has Socialism Failed?,” he quietly told Allister
Sparks, “You know, I must thank Ruth for whatever extent I am a civilized
being.” Joe’s statement was potent due to his and Ruth’s long-term battles
about Stalin, the Soviet Union, and other communist leadership throughout the
World. Joe addressed the SACP’s responsibility
for accepting the Stalinist doctrine and went so far as to assert that saying
he and his comrades were misled provided an inadequate explanation.
In a gentle critique of “Has Socialism Failed?” Pallo Jordan
noted that besides vast evidence of SACP intolerance of dissenting views, The
Party exhibited “praise and support for every violation of freedom perpetrated
by the Soviet leadership, both before and after the death of Stalin.” Albie
Sachs had different historical reflections on the hardline position that Joe
and some others in the SACP publicly held for almost five decades.
We disbelieved the attacks on Stalinism because they were
saying that people like Moses Kotane and Slovo and J.B. Marks, whom we knew,
were these horrible deceivers and liars and blood-thirsty and power hungry
people. And we knew just the
opposite. If they’re lying about people
we know and things that we know, and their lies help to perpetuate apartheid in
South Africa and perpetuate colonial domination, then the lies must extend to
the slave labor camps and all the rest.
“Has Socialism Failed?” concluded with
discussions on the need of SACP collaboration with trade unions and a
democratic vigilance to assure the assent of “people’s power” in the new South
African state. There were two critical
reviews in The African Communist
questioning Joe’s thesis. What is
important about these reviews for the present is that the authors were still
unwilling to criticize Stalin or the post-Stalin Soviet Union. And while others were critical they did view
the pamphlet as an initial warning toward the SACP of the necessity of facing
their own history while reaching out to the people and organizations that
criticized The Party – again, a lesson
we need to pay attention to regarding government in general, in South Africa
and throughout the world.
In the later years of the 1980s, Joe
was well aware of the fact that informal negotiations or what Oliver Tambo
referred to as “talks about talks” had begun.
Joe gave a speech where he said, “National liberation implies more than
formal participation in the electoral processes and more than the replacement
of black faces for white ones in the Mercedes Benz.” In August 1992,
“Negotiations: What Room for Compromise?” was published in The African Communist. Joe
explained that compromise was inherent in successful negotiations – it was a
political process. He also asserted that
while it would be impossible for the ANC to achieve everything that the
struggle intended, it was a stage in moving toward democratic liberation. There were some premises that Joe viewed as
non-negotiable. Most importantly: (1) no
minority veto and (2) no permanent power sharing. He explained that the line in the sand had to
exist because concessions on these types of issues would block possibilities of
a non-racial democratic South Africa.
The next topic in “Negotiations: What Room for Compromise?”
provided the drama. Joe proposed a
“sunset clause” that called for compulsory power sharing in government for five
years. Although the “sunset clause” within
the context of the negotiations was first viewed publicly in Joe’s article,
there is some disagreement about who initiated the idea. Kader Asmal gave credit to Thabo Mbeki while
George Bizos claimed that it was Mandela’s himself. Most believed, however, that it was the
brainchild of Joe Slovo, the man Allister Sparks once referred to as “a sheep
in wolf’s clothing.” Joe had alluded to the idea in an April 1992 interview
with Padraig O’Malley.
We recognize that the day after a new flag flies over the capital
the economy is exactly the same as the day before and it can’t be altered by
decree. It has to be altered as a
process and the people you inherit on the day after are exactly the same as
they were on the day before when their enthusiasm and razzmatazz was calmed
down.
Whether originator or not, Joe was the perfect person to
promote the idea and there was great irony in the fact that the head of the
Communist Party, the KGB agent, the Red Devil, was the person proposing the
compromise. There was immediate debate
and discussion on the sunset clauses.
Winnie Mandela accused the ANC of being in bed with the Nationalist
Party. “The only thing red about Slovo
is his socks,” said one member of the SACP.
Dan O’Meara, however, spoke of Joe’s political acumen as it related to
the “Sunset Clause.”
Politics was not just about the hardline; it was about the
art of the possible. He had a very nuanced sense of what could be done and what
couldn’t be done in South Africa and in politics generally and that a bloodbath
might eventually bring complete black power in South Africa but it would
destroy the economy and ruin any possibility of South Africa becoming a decent
country. So by first of all saving the
negotiations with the National Party, Joe was one of the two most important
architects of the new South Africa.
Joe Slovo was well known for saying “we will snatch defeat
from the jaws of victory.” He was
reading Tony Benn’s Office Without Power
at the time and his thinking on the “Sunset Clause” was twofold. He knew that politics was an important part
of the negotiation process and that making state bureaucrats secure in their
jobs would ease much of the white opposition to negotiations and a democracy
premised on one person, one vote. Also
as a politician, Joe believed that the country needed the expertise of the
people that filled government jobs. He warned his colleagues, “We can win
political office, but we won’t have political power.” Thus, negotiations were
successful at least partially because of Joe Slovo’s ability as a politician –
because of Joe Slovo’s ability to talk to everyman.
There are
many stories surrounding Joe’s appointment as Minister of Housing. And those of you who knew him are well aware
of how sick Joe was at the time. That
said, his humanity in that role again exemplifies the dispositions that are
sorely needed today in South Africa.
With the help of Billy Cobbett and other people at the Ministry, Joe quickly learned the
political aspects of housing issues.
Less than two weeks after becoming Minister, he spoke at Parliament,
arguing that the government’s role was to orchestrate housing, but not to build
houses. This too is important to emphasize for the present as Joe’s position
was certainly not popular with many of his ANC and SACP colleagues. He also outlined the pressing problems and
differing views of the housing stakeholders.
Finally, he told the legislators, “The cornerstone of my approach will
be to seek an end to the undeclared war between communities, the state and the
private sector.” On June 9th, Joe repeated the message, albeit with
more detail, at a meeting of the Finance Week Breakfast Club. The meeting was at the Sandton Sun Hotel and
Joe concluded his talk with a struggle-like challenge.
Housing is not a privilege; it is a fundamental human
right. To live in an environment of
degradation is to produce a degraded people.
We have striven endlessly for freedom and liberation. Now it is time to deliver. The April election – in itself a miracle –
did not deliver liberation; it has only provided us with a launching pad to
build a liberated South Africa. The
complexity of our task is not an inseparable obstacle, it is an historic
challenge, which we must face and overcome.
And together we shall overcome.
Cobbett also recalled a visit to the Eastern Cape that
affected Joe very differently. The
‘trappings’ of government, the showy security that Joe abhorred, and corruption
were all part of this particular trip.
We flew down for example to the Eastern Cape with a few
shocks when we arrived – there were ten limousines lined up at the airport and
ten guys with submachine guns. And then we came to the premier’s house and
we’re just surrounded by bodyguards.
This Joe didn’t like at all. Then
we went with the MEC, the assistant minister, and he commandeered a helicopter
and we went and visited some small towns.
But there was this one amazing scene.
There was a group of people marking out plots for their own settlements
but these were not the poor. These were
people who arrived in 4 by 4s and in our view were taking advantage of the
change in circumstances to grab a bit of the pie. Joe directly challenged these guys. I remember him saying to this one guy and
feeling his suit, ‘My friend, your suit is more expensive than mine.’ Just wanting to make the point to this guy,
‘you’re not the poor. This is not why we
did what we did. We didn’t come into
power to enrich you.’
Joe Slovo died in 1995 twelve-plus years after agents of the
apartheid regime murdered Ruth First. I
would hope that their writings and their actions, reviewed today, as well as
your further memories, might be re-emphasized in the present moment. Dan O’Meara, who is cited above, recently
wrote to me saying:
Neither Ruth nor Joe ever believed that it
was 'we' who have made the world unlivable.
But rather 'them': the rich and the powerful who put private interest
and greed before public good. The
mendacious, small-minded tyrants whose inhumanity created apartheid in South
Africa and who have now given us the obscene worldwide apartheid that goes by
the name of globalization. Ruth and Joe
died trying to change the world; they died not in the arid despair of the mind,
but in hope at the possibility of change, knowing that only 'we' could wring
such change from the grasping bloody hands of 'them'. Unfortunately, that group of 'them' now
includes many of Ruth and Joe's (and my) former comrades.
O’Meara’s statement also parallels my purpose
in sharing Ruth and Joe’s stories. Their actions always confronted the vile
ruthlessness of power that initiated, fostered, sanctioned, and protected class
disparity and racism. Ruth’s work as a
political activist, journalist, writer, academic, and Director of Research at
the Center of African Studies, challenged commonplaces and injustices, class
disparity and racism, in South Africa and throughout the Continent. Joe, first as a radical lawyer and initial
member of the reemergence of the Communist Party, Chief of Staff of MK, and leader
of the SACP, combined strategy with action to fight unwaveringly against the
apartheid regime. Then, with the same
zeal that he employed as the chief strategist of the armed struggle, Joe was
first a significant and central player in the negotiations with the government,
and then Minister of Housing, all part of his breadth and depth in helping to
fight for a democratic, non-racial South Africa.
Often
one wonders, how would Ruth have responded and reacted and you can’t say for
sure. In terms of things going on—what would her critique have been? It is a
pretty fruitless enterprise except that the continuing reminder is to be alert,
to be critical, but critical in an engaged way. Critical not just in the
pleasure you get knocking down something that deserves to be knocked, but with
the view to improve, to advance.
To be alert, to improve, to
advance, is what I hope these stories from the lives of Ruth First and Joe
Slovo help us do – they provide many, many lessons for South Africa today.
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