Chris Hani(CH) prophetic interview with Padraig O Malley(POM) in 1992 during the CODESA negotiations on the ANC selling out, Economic interest groups and Two Thirds Majority POM Chris, let me start off with a kind of a personal question. You stepped down last year from a very prominent position in the ANC, what many people would have considered to be a very prominent position, where in the eyes of many you are worthy, as apparent to Mr. Mandela, you were certainly were the leading personality and dominant force within the movement. You left that to take over as Secretary General of the SACP, which in many circles, would have been seen as kind of a downward career movement. What motivated you? It is not many people who would give up such an obvious kind of proximity to power to take the head of an organisation that would not give you such a powerful position. What considerations led you to do so? It is true that I have been re-elected into the National Executive Committee of the ANC, probably receiving the highest votes, which was an indication of the people's confidence in me as part of the ANC leadership. Strangely many people have said that I am one of the heir apparents, I have never considered myself as an heir apparent. I thought that when the Communist Party needed somebody, I should assist for the simple reason that, I see the Communist Party, despite what has happened in other parts of the world, as a key vehicle in empowering the ordinary working people in South Africa, especially the black workers, who are so exploited and oppressed, and with the wisdom of hindsight, in terms of what I have seen in Africa, I have no guarantee that a movement, on being elected as a new government in future, will pay the necessary attention in terms of improving the lives of our people because I have seen a lot of revolutionary rhetoric in the past in a number of countries which was never really applied when there was a situation of freedom, of independence, and therefore I see the building of the Communist Party in alliance to the trade unions as a watchdog for democracy in our country because we have learnt important lessons from the Soviet Union, where a Communist Party has neglected to democratise the society. Strangely, and you won't believe it, but we in the party feel strongly about democratising the society, not in terms of the existence of our immediate party, but the existence of other democratic committees, so that it should never be left to the government to decide what the society should do, to decide the direction of society. I feel the people at every stage should stand up and defend their own interests where a government, for instance, is not tackling the socio-economic issues, where a government begins to favour the elite, to allow corruption and the accumulation of riches by a few people at the top and neglecting the very people really who carried the movement along in terms of the struggle against apartheid and white domination. POM Are you a subscriber to the school of believers to the fact that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely and that the Communist Party is one of those parties that will keep an eye, or watch over those who have the power to on behalf of the people? CH I really subscribe to the view that it is easy for those in the corridors of power to lock themselves up in their ivory towers, in their beautiful offices and lose the earlier perceptions which made them involved in the struggle. They get flooded and surrounded by the bureaucrats who conduct their own experiments in their offices away from the people. They get surrounded by powerful economic interest groups, internationally and nationally and locally and gradually you see their advice is sometimes based on their immediate circles. Therefore, if we have a vibrant movement on the ground, that movement cannot be ignored and therefore the party also wants to correct the mistakes which it has seen committed in communist countries, so that it does not become a party of elites and bureaucrats, but a party which is accountable to the people on the ground, the members, the workers, the poor in the cities and the rural areas. POM I want to relate that to the course the recent negotiations covered and particularly the arrangement or offer by the alliance ANC/COSATU/SACP alliance to the government of 75% veto threshold for provisions in the Bill of Rights and a 70% threshold for provisions in the constitution and it struck me, from abroad, that these are extraordinarily high provisions and many people perhaps in the ANC and certainly in the SACP would regard these concessions as a form of sell-out. (1) Do you think that has something to do with what you were talking about, like when elites get together and bargain things away from the people, that they start reaching accommodations with each other and; (2) do you think that if those concessions had been accepted by the government, that the alliance would have had real trouble selling them to the rank and file of the people? CH I want to take you back to CODESA talks. The 75% on the Bill of Rights was widely and comprehensively discussed by the entire line. There was a feeling that the Bill of Rights is an important document because it guarantees the human rights of individuals, prevents a situation where individuals become victims of a powerful state without protection from the courts and other mechanisms. So the alliance felt on the Bill of Rights, there was no problem about accepting 75%. But we went to CODESA II with an agreement that we were going to press for a two thirds majority in terms of the adoption of the constitution. But as you remember there was a deadlock, the government was refusing to budge. The government was insisting that on everything, the Bill of Rights and the constitution, it should be 75%. The ANC's Constitutional Commission was meeting the other side quite a few times before CODESA II in order to break the deadlock, so that would be possible to put before CODESA II an agreement coming from the Working Group II. The government was stubborn. Then a sort of hurried up meeting was called of the patriotic forces in CODESA, of which I was a part as the SACP. The party stood up very vigorously and opposed any form of concession. We said two thirds is a universally accepted standard in terms of adopting the constitution. We argued that after all that a two thirds majority is a later concession and it is going to be very difficult to get two thirds as shown by the Namibian example. It would demand a lot of work on our part in terms of mobilising the people, in terms of assuring that when elections take place for an Constituent Assembly, we actually have about 70% supporting our position and the position of our allies. We could have argued for 52% or 53% but you know a constitution is an important document, it must be all inclusive and therefore it must not be seen as a constitution of a political party, or political movement, but as a constitution generally of the majority of the inhabitants or the citizens of a country. Then some of our people in the ANC as well as some components of the Patriotic Front said that let us offer 70% in order to facilitate movement forward. We were defeated when a vote was taken, so our position was defeated. But after that we went to the ANC later and we said that we are of the view that there should have been a meeting of the tripartite alliance before the meeting of the Patriotic Front because the tripartite is part of the struggle in this country, and therefore it is important before you open up and not for us not to trust each other amongst ourselves. But you see, the government was foolish and it rejected that 70% and for us as the parties right now to get to the original position of 66%. We got a lot of flak from the ground from our members, both ANC and the party and COSATU, and the people were very, very critical of that concession. For me it was indicative of a growing tendency which we should avoid, of sometimes, you see, in a haste to reach agreements, we at the top sometimes find ourselves accepting positions which we are going to find very difficult to defend and justify when we confront the people, the members of our organisations. POM Why was there this emphasis on haste? CH There has been a feeling that we should reach an agreement with the government, by June we should have an interim government and we should facilitate a situation where we have elections for a Constituent Assembly by the end of the year, and I think that people felt that achieving that was important. That status was the one that brought this on, and we have learnt our lesson and I think all of us should have learnt that lesson. But you see negotiations should always be taken to the people. It does not mean that on each and every issue you go to the people, but on fundamental issues, crucial issues of the future, that must be taken to the people. Because you must avoid negotiating at the top where the bottom is not involved because agreements will have to be defended, leaders must defend those agreements if settlements are going to be durable. We never have settlements which are going to precipitate a crisis, and if settlements are seen by the people as a sell-out then there will be a crisis because the people will have seen the settlement as one between the ruling government and the leaders, a settlement that does not take care of the interests of the people. For instance, the people on the ground expect negotiations to focus also on their day to day problems, unemployment, poverty, schools, health services, etc. They want a government which, after it has been elected, should begin to focus on those problems without any hurdles or obstacles being placed on the way, and it is quite clear that the Nationalist Party government wants to prevent immediate movement on socio-economic issues once we have a post-apartheid government. It wants that government to refer every basic socio-economic issue, let us say, to them for approval, that is why they have brought forward the idea of a second house with vetoing powers. I am told now they are trying to drop it, and that is why they want 70%. Their calculation is that between themselves, Inkatha, Mangope and other groups they can have about 35% or 36% which they can use to block any serious legislation that begins to address the problems of the people. POM But just in the light of what you said, according to a 70% threshold, was in fact saying in return for a quick arrangement or agreement on an interim government and an election, we would give you a veto power. But what I don't get is your negotiators are clever people, couldn't they read into this situation? CH I don't want to be severe on our negotiators. They were juggling with sums and arithmetic, some of them were saying that there is a difference between 66.7% and 70% because of the 3% and yet when you look at the electorate of this country of about 80 million or 90 million that three point something percent actually is more than a million, a million voters. I think that they must have miscalculated, I want to be charitable. POM Particularly what surprises me more is on the Bill of Rights. My understanding was that a Bill of Rights would be used, coming from the principles of the Freedom Charter, would be used as a document to entrench the basic rights of housing, employment, health care, the basic issues of socio-economic conditions and that this would be one way of ensuring that they would never go off the socio-political agenda, and yet coming with a 75% was effectively saying to the government you get to veto the inclusion of this second generation of rights. CH And in fact you see the government was saying, and it has been very, very firm on this, that we want the Bill of Rights to include the protection of properties, and you know the property relations in this country. Property is in the hands of the minority and we feel that we should not allow a situation where property should be protected by way of an entrenched core of laws in a constitution, and we feel, the party feels that there should be a definition of properties. We have no problems about personal and non-exploitative property, but you see, in general we feel that property in general in this country can't be entrenched in terms of constitutional protection, because that ties the hands of a future government in terms of addressing the landlessness of the people, and for me, even this issue of 75% is not a closed issue. It is something that we should revisit and discuss. POM It should be, yes. CH Should be! POM I find it difficult to believe there has been quite a bit of discussion within the SACP where people have said, "OK, give it 75%, even though that means we will no longer get second generation rights, even though it means they probably will be able to veto all kinds of things on property rights", it is just difficult to believe. CH Well, there is an ongoing debate now on this question of property rights. We feel very strongly as a party that we cannot go along with entrenching the protection of property rights. We can only go as far as saying that, "Yes, entrench personal and non-exploitative property", but in terms of property in general, you leave the door open for negotiation with property owners, open for legislating, for instance, for the buying of land and certain property, open for a situation where we must have arbitration courts, because again we don't want a government which is just going to say, "We are grabbing so and so's property, we feel and we are paying this and this price." We feel that the owner must have access to an arbitration court, so that he should feel that he has had a say in whatever price. So that, let us say we want to buy some land as a government, because we want to distribute that land amongst people who are landless, and because of the nature of our revolution we cannot have a situation where we just grab, we want to negotiate, we want to buy, but we don't want obstacles to be set in terms of acquiring land which is not occupied or utilised, because some farmers here, and big business, like Anglo American and other companies, they are owning millions of hectares, and in most cases, or in some cases, they are not even utilising it productively. Therefore a government must have space to say that land is not utilised, we are going to buy it, we are going to procure it and negotiate for a price. POM So, would it be fair to say that in future discussions, the SACP will not accept a 75% threshold on veto threshold for a Bill of Rights? CH We will discuss it with our colleagues in the ANC and COSATU; we will come forward very strongly that this acceptance endorsement of 75% on the Bill of Rights will actually lead to a situation where the government of the day, a democratic government of the day will actually have its hands tied in terms of re-distributing land in this country, in terms even of not opening up some land for acquisition by small business, and we know that for a very long time, black entrepreneurs will have problems about getting land for their own business as well. It is not just a question of redistributing the land, there is the question even of making room for black entrepreneurs in the cities in terms of space and land, for their own business interests. You know, the land around Johannesburg, Cape Town, Pretoria and everywhere, is still in the hands of white land owners, white property owners and it is going to be very, very difficult, you see, to make land and space and property available for the up-and-coming black entrepreneur group. We are going to be under pressure from that group, even in terms of saying that we want a mixed economy, where private enterprise will play a significant role. The blacks in this country are going to say, but what are you doing about us? I am referring to the black entrepreneur group. What are you doing about us? We want to acquire in the cities so that we can also begin to start our own enterprises, and the government therefore must have room to address a historical grievance on the part of the black middle class or the part of the black entrepreneur group. POM Let me take you back to the reasons that you suggested that the negotiators made the concessions they did, i.e. they wanted an interim government quickly and an election for the Constituent Assembly by the end of the year. (1) Many people we have talked to say that the ANC, the alliance, or whatever, have an electorate apparatus in place that would ensure a high turnout in the black community, e.g. that maybe up to 25% of people lack any kind of document needed to vote when you are 18 years of age; (2) that in addressing this problem you will run into a cultural objection into having documents, it is another form of a pass book, you have to carry documentation around with you, it is something that is associated with oppression in the first place; (3) other people say that it makes me liable to start paying income tax, there are a whole host of things that have to be addressed, the mechanism is not there to target a vote and to pull out a vote, and that all of this must be in place before fulfilling your interests of having an election. CH That is true. I have had experience, serious difficulties in the preparations for the coming elections. The regime is better placed than we are, they come from a culture of elections. Most whites have been registered as voters, and yet the situation on the other hand within the black community is one of millions of people not even having documents like a book of life, or an identity card. The ANC, especially, is beginning to address this problem of registration, of educating people about the importance of elections. You must realise that very few of us, including, I think 90% of the leadership, have ever voted in elections. We don't know what elections are about, we know about our elections in Durban in terms of a secret ballot at the national conference, otherwise we have never really participated in any form of election, and I think that goes for most of us. And therefore, we have got now, in addition to the mass campaign we are having, to start unleashing a mass campaign to educate our people on the importance of voting, in terms of the elections and the policy of acquiring documents. But going back to the question you are raising, I think this regime has calculated that in order to defeat the ANC, let us not even give them time to think and discuss elections. Let us involve them in destabilisation. I think the regime has succeeded to push us away from even a space to discuss elections. We are so overstretched because there is a lot of violence in the country. Our movement is being destabilised, our members are being killed, the surrogates of the regime are waging a war against us. PAT You have already said for the delegation in the negotiations to accept the 70% is to get to election by the end of the year, what happens in the psychology of that, I mean there seems to be a contradiction here? CH Yes I agree, and I don't know, I don't want to pretend to have an answer. I rule out as a matter of the party and as part of the leadership any coalitions, any form of coalition with the NP. POM Even in an interim arrangement? CH Even in an interim arrangement. I don't think we should have a coalition with the NP. I know the programme says so, but I hold a very strong view as an individual that our movement is being drawn into a very dangerous trap. Co-option if you like. You know that interim situation, will lead to a position where we are going to be painted with the same brush with the NP. This NP has an accumulation of corruption, of scandals, of systematic withdrawal of social protection from the workers, of having neglected the area of housing for the poor people, of having neglected the building of schools for the African population. Now you share power with that group, whether it is for a year, and I am telling you in the eyes of the people, as they get poorer everyday, when they are retrenched, when they are dismissed by their bosses, they will say, "Mandela is there, he is part of this", and when elections come, people will say, "Why should I vote for an ANC government which in the last nine months has been part of the government but has done nothing for me?" POM You are saying that the level of compromise coalition ends up as being defining interests in terms of co-option, that this does not allow the radical changes that must be made at the start of a new government to give people confidence that a new beginning has been made. CH I don't oppose that part in our thinking, in looking at the problems of this country. The NP has got nothing in common with the SACP or the ANC in terms of say, for instance, we shall not allow the privatisation of public utilities, because the public utilities are supposed to deliver to the ordinary person by providing reasonable services, services which are in line with what the are paid, in line with the wages and the salaries of the people, I am referring to electricity, water and transport. Whereas this government is hell bent on privatising these as soon as possible. In that position the government is supported by Inkatha and other groups. We are going to press, let us say in that coalition, for a living wage and for the legalisation of trade unions in the public sectors, including the right of those workers striking. This government does not want even now to negotiate with NAHAWU ( NEHAWU)and other public sector unions. So you are going to have a dog fight within that Cabinet and there is not going to be any movement. But meanwhile the view from down below, will be that those folks are in government but things have not changed, the status quo remains. POM Did you see any element of that in the recent economic policy released by the ANC, the policy document that was in fact endorsed by Business Day? I have a quote here which says, "It is difficult to take serious exception to the economic policy the ANC has proposed, and that in itself is a measure of how the ANC leadership has shifted from its earlier unflinching support for socialism". CH Well, Business Day is definitely distorting the ANC policy. The ANC has never stood for socialism. It is true that in the Freedom Charter, if you were to consider nationalisation as indicating socialism, you must say that the Freedom Charter has got aspects of socialism. But in a bourgeois government that is socialised, I mean they have nationalised that, for example, in Western Europe. And they have nationalised in the interests of trying the problems of a country that has emerged from a situation of war, to bring about reparations in terms of damages, loss of property and loss of other things to the people, and also to make sure that government has got a voice in the economic restructuring. Therefore nationalisation must be seen as an attempt by a newly elected government. POM But the ANC document seemed to play down nationalisation to a considerable degree. CH It says it is one of the options, it does not say we shall nationalise this and that, but it says we shall consider nationalisation in order to bring about socio-economic restructuring. I think deep in the nature of the sort of organisation the ANC is, I think for me, this is reasonable. POM But if you were to contrast its policy document and economics, versus the economic policies of the SACP, where would they converge, where would they diverge? CH We are busy discussing the economic policies of the party and my view is that those economic policies of the party must be seen to be different from the ANC's. We as a party must come out in favour of nationalising some elements of the SA economy. But you see, we don't want to be state-ist in that nationalisation, as they did in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. We want nationalisation to benefit the working class, we want maximum worker participation in nationalising industry. We will have to discuss when we nationalise about our capacity to make nationalised industry cost effective, effective and accountable and democratic because we don't want to create a nationalised industry, a bureaucratic elite, which we saw in the former Socialist countries, and the party will also push for a situation where there should be legislation that will ensure social protection on the part of private industry, where we shall sympathetically support the struggles of the trade unions for worker's participation, not only in nationalised industry, but also in the private industry. Of course the form of that worker participation has got to be discussed between ourselves, the unions and the government of the future. We are going to be mobilising the people for these demands even in a future SA. Some people think that mass action will disappear when we get an ANC government. That is not going to be the case. We are going to make sure that an ANC government does not renege on the basic programme that revolves around the interests of the working people, the poor people, on the issues of democracy. Some elements might resent, the people in the townships for instance, pushing their demands, setting up their own civic organisation, their own democratic municipalities, because we have seen governments in other parts of Africa, Asia, newly elected governments after colonialism wanting to control the activities of the City Council, of the Mayor, and wanting to impose their own person as a Mayor because he is a good party man, and the people not electing that Mayor, and therefore that Mayor not being responsible, say, to that Local Council. We will want to prevent those things and that is why we feel that as a party we have got to be strong. We don't want to be seen as riding on the back of the ANC. That is why we are going out into the regions on our own steam as a party because we want to make sure that this country is not dominated by a clique of powerful people, a clique of very rich people, who will use their control of the economy to influence the people in government.
