Forty Years of the Kabwe Conference: Destroy the Old Order (Part 2)

Forty Years of the Kabwe Conference: Destroy the Old Order (Part 2)

(Excerpts from an Address by Oliver Tambo to the Nation on Radio Freedom, 22 July 1985)

Compatriots,

“Our task, to take the struggle into the very midst of the enemy, presents all revolutionaries of our country with the challenge of devising the correct tactics to realise this objective. It is a challenge that all of us, workers, women and youth, must meet. It however also places a special responsibility on all our white compatriots who are committed to bring about a democratic South Africa to act now to show the white population of our country that however much it might try to close its eyes to what is happening, the fact of the matter is that our country is in crisis.

“White South Africa must be made to realise that Botha cannot guarantee its security. The greater the repression that he resorts to in defence of white minority rule and in the name of the whites of our country, the greater becomes the level of insecurity facing these very same whites. To guarantee its own security, white South Africa has to come over to the side of the forces fighting for a democratic and non-racial society.

“The alternative that Botha offers them – that of pitting themselves against the overwhelming majority of the people of our country – is nothing but a death trap. Nothing will come of it except grief for the whole of white South Africa. We offer our white compatriots the only way out of the crisis which will surely engulf them, and that, in the near future – renounce Botha and his apartheid republic; join the anti-racist forces in the struggle for a democratic South Africa.

“The time has also come that those who serve in the apartheid tricameral parliament and claim to stand for a democratic South Africa should abandon the illusion that this parliament can do anything to solve the problems of our country. This institution is as much a part of the structure of apartheid rule as are the racist army, police and prison service. It is an instrument for the perpetuation of the white minority rule. To hold out the hope that it can do anything to bring about a just social is to attempt to hoax the people and to aid and abet the Pretoria regime in perpetuating its rule of terror.

“If there is any genuine anti-racist left wing within Botha’s parliament, now is the time for them to abandon this house of iniquity and join the masses of the people in struggle for a truly just society. Large parts of our country are under a publicly proclaimed state of emergency. Others are treated as though they are under such a state of emergency. This situation no longer allows for the playing of inconsequential games presented as an effort at reform. It demands that each one of us should choose sides: one is either on the side of genuine change or one is on the side of continued repression. There is no middle road.

“Those among the black people who have persisted in refusing to stop serving the army are now faced with the inevitable consequences of their mercenary stubbornness. They have now been turned into an army of occupation and administrators of martial law. If, in the past, they considered their duties as normal, they can no longer do so. There is nothing normal about an emergency. Neither will the actual tasks that they will carry out be normal. Their masters will demand on them the most heinous acts of brutality against their own people. On them will fall the greatest burdens in Pretoria’s campaign of extreme repression.

“Once more we call on these black people to leave the ranks of the enemy which is using them to terrorise their own mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters and children. We call on those whom the enemy has armed to turn their guns against those who have invaded our townships and not point them at the unarmed black masses of our country who are fighting to liberate themselves.

“There are some black people in our country who, claiming to be leaders and representatives of our people, have joined the clamour for the maintenance of apartheid law and order. The enemy is using these so-called law-abiding blacks to justify the intensified campaign of repression it has launched under the state of emergency that it has proclaimed. We call on these misguided individuals to direct their anger against those who have brought our country to the situation in which it is today.

“Only recently, Afrikaner intellectuals at the state-funded National Council for Social Research correctly laid the blame for the conflict in our country on the apartheid system. It is the height of servility for the black people who call themselves leaders, to refuse to acknowledge this truth and instead seek to secure a livelihood for themselves by blaming the victim of terror for the injury done to him.

“The apartheid system is in crisis. The state of emergency will not extricate the racists from this situation. All it will do is further to deepen that crisis and increase the cost in human lives of ending white minority domination in our country. We have advanced a great deal towards the realisation of our goal of a united, democratic and non-racial South Africa. There can be no stopping now. There can be no turning back.

“Let us therefore mobilise and march together in even greater unity towards freedom. At all times we must expect that the enemy will respond with even greater repression. We must withstand these campaigns of terror with the same determination that we have displayed over so many months. But more, we must defeat these campaigns and raise our struggle to even higher levels.

“Our watchword must be mobilisation, organisation, struggle. All our people must be mobilised into action. All our people must be organised for action. All our people must engage in struggle. That must be our reply to the enemy’s desperate counteroffensive.

“In that struggle we have to set up our armed offensive. In a situation of martial law, the need for the oppressed masses to resort to people’s war becomes plain for all to see. Therefore the order of the day to all units of Umkhonto we Sizwe is that they must strengthen their links with the people. They must act together with the people to inflict the greatest possible number of casualties on armed enemy personnel.

“They must take the battle to the enemy and, side by side with the heroic masses of our country, defeat the enemy’s efforts to rule in a new way, seize the initiative from the enemy and drive him into retreat. Thousands upon thousands of our people have been engaging the enemy in armed confrontation, using primitive means to deliver their blows. Now is the time for them to face the enemy using modern weapons of war.

“At this hour of a heightened enemy counteroffensive, progressive humanity has rallied behind us as never before. The whole world has denounced Botha’s state of emergency, and pledged its support for our struggle. The international community will adopt new measures to isolate the apartheid regime which has declared war against our people. Drawing strength from this international support, we must march with even greater confidence to victory. Botha’s state of emergency is an admission of defeat. Each desperate act he adopts is a sign that we are approaching our goal.

MAKE APARTHEID UNWORKABLE!
MAKE SOUTH AFRICA UNGOVERNABLE!
PREPARE THE CONDITIONS FOR THE SEIZURE OF POWER BY THE PEOPLE!
AMANDLA NGAWETHU!
MATLA KE A RONA!
IHLOMILE!

– Oliver Tambo (22 July 1985) –

Sources:
Oliver Tambo, “Address by Oliver Tambo to the Nation on Radio Freedom, 22 July 1985”, South African History Online (SAHO), 13 October 2011.
Adelaide Tambo, “Oliver Tambo Speaks: Speeches, Letters and Transcripts”, Kwela Books, 1987, pp. 308 – 316.

Castro Khwela
Good morning fellow Compatriots!