PRO-NAZIS IN SOUTH AFRICAN CABINET
By Ilizwi Lesizwe
Inaugurating a South African Air Force war memorial in Pretoria two months ago, State President G.R.Swart alleged that African peoples for whose safety South African pilots had died in World War II were now planning to attack the Republic of South Africa. ‘To appreciate to the full the cynicism of this remark it is worthwhile recalling that the South African Nationalists took Hitler's side in the last war and prayed for a Hitler victory, More than that, many Nationalist leaders openly espoused the Nazi philosophy, which they absorbed so thoroughly that it remains the basis of their Apartheid policy to the present day.
When Hitler's star was in the ascendant during the thirties, a rash of fascist organisations like the "Greyshirts," the "“Boerenasie” and the "New Order" broke out in South Africa and anti-Semitism flourished, ©
While still a professor at Stellenbosch University, Dr. Verwoerd, the present Prime Minister, went on a deputation with other Nationalist leaders to the government demanding a halt to the immigration of Jewish refugees . from Nazi Germany, At a public meeting in 1936, Dr.T.E.Dénges, the present
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Minister of Finance, declared: "The Jew is an insoluble element in every “national life." Biggest Jew-baiter of the lot was the present Foreign Minister, Eric Louw (resigning at the end of 1963), who introduced a Bill in Parliament to stop Jewish immigration, alleging on the one hand that they were dominating the world of business, and on the other that they predominated in the ranks of Communists.
When he became editor of Die Transvaler in 1937, Dr, Verwoerd wrote a long article on "the Jewish problem™ proposing the introduction of a quota system for Jews in all occupations and professions. In 1940 the Transvaal Nationalist party formally excluded Jews from membership.
Many of the smaller fascist organisations were later merged in the Nationalist party and their leaders like Von Moltke and Weichardt given seats in the South African parliament, where they sit today.
During the early days of the war the Nationalists thought their great» moment had arrived, and they prepared for the seizure of power. The Afrikaans organisation, "Ossewabrandwag," in which the present Minister of Justice, B.J.Vorster, was a general, went in for a massive campaign of © sabotage. In 1942 Vorster said: "We stand for Christian Nationalism which is an ally of National Socialism, . You can call this anti-democratic principle dictatorship if you wish, In Italy it is called Fascism, in GermanyNational Socialism and in South Africa’Christian Nationalism,”
For his pains Vorster was interned by the Smuts government during the war, and later placed under house arrest. Today he has taken revenge as the author of the Sabotage Act and the General Law Amendment Act of 1963 providing for house arrest and detention without trial for ninety days--~ this period can be repeated ad infinitum.
Verwoerd himself, as editor of Die Transvaler, poured out a steady stream of propaganda supporting the Nazi cause. Provoked by his efforts, the newspaper Star accused the Transvaler of falsifying news in support of Nazi propaganda and generally acting as a tool of the enemy. Verwoerd brought a libel action, but lost his case, the judge remarking: “He did - support Nagi. propaganda, he did make his paper a tool of the Nazis in South Africa, and he knew it.
The Nationalists pinned all their hopes on a Nazi victory. "The whole future of Afrikanderdom is dependent on a.German victory," said B,.J,Schoeman, the present Minister of Railways, at a Nationalist party congress in 1940. _
Eric Louw declared in Fraserburg in 1942: "If Germany wins, Dr. Malan will have the majority and Hitler will then have to negotiate with the one who has the majority, and the heaviest burden will be laid on those who pushed on the war,"
Hitler lost the war, and the Nationalists changed their tune, but not the real nature of their policies, They toned down on anti-Semitism and pretended. a new-found respect for democracy, but from the moment-they came to power in 1948 they went systematically to work to build the Nazified state of which they had dreamed.
Today, South Africa bears all the hallmarks of the police state == massive segregation of the races backed by a complete denial of civil rights, increasingly heavy penalties for political prisoners coupled with:indefinite detention without trial.
More and more, one nears of detainees being killed, like Solwandle and Slyanvala, or prisoners subjected to assaults and electric shocks, like Sobukwe and the Africans associated with the Bashee murder, or of people being shot while trying to escape, like Brutus; in fact, some freedom fighters, like Ganyile and Dr. Abrahams, were even kidnapped from the British ‘protectorates by South African agents. At present we have the Rivonia and Cape Town sabotage trials, where leaders like Sisulu, Mandela and Dr. Alexander, are on trial for their lives,
In the Sunday Times of October 20, 1963, the following appeared: "To solve the 'colour question! in South Africa, all Native women with more than one child should be sterilised and all Indians should be sent back to India, says Mr. Peter Willers, chairman of the South African Nazi Party. He calls Dr. Verwoerd and Mr. Vorster ‘softies! in their fight against subversive elements. . . . Mr, Willers said that his Nazi Party had an emblem similar to the swastika and that they used the theil! salute,"
| These evil realities are not the accidents of history but the fruits of deliberate planning by people steeped in the Nazi ideology. With such people there can be no compromise. They must be defeated and their evil handiwork cestroyed before South Africa can be made safe and free for all, In this radical transformation of the whole South African society, it must not be forgotten that Apartheid, as practised today, is the inevitable result of the specific capitalist socio-economic system in South Africa. As in the other African states -- where the colonial revolution is not yet complete -- where still 38,000,000 people suffer under the yoke of colonial~ ism, 155,000,000 under neo~colonialism and 51,000,000 (in Algeria, United Arab Republic, Ghana, Mali and Guinea) heading for complete national and economic dependence, also in South Africa (with a population of over 16,000,000) the economy plays the decisive role.
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