PW 101 for those who have forgotten

WHILE a politician recently hankered after the days of the PW presidency, it is time to step back and examine who former president PW Botha really was.

Having come into Parliament in 1948, and held the portfolio of defence, and later the presidency after the infamous Info Scandal, he ushered in the tricameral Parliament, pushed hard with the homelands and self-governing territories and instituted the states of emergency. Political repression was at its highest; media blackouts were the norm.

To those who think life was safer, the townships were in turmoil and every mall had airport-like security, with pictures of limpet mines, and you never knew if you were going to be caught up in an IRA-like explosion in the mall or CBD.

These were indiscriminate, and injured, maimed or killed, regardless of race. Perpetrators varied from the ANC and PAC to Azapo.

The political offices of the ANC in neighbouring coun- tries were repeatedly bombed in Israeli-style air attacks, often killing innocent civilians.

We had the death penalty, and crime was still the norm. Rapes, robberies and hijack- ings occurred, yet the statistics were lower as the homelands and self-governing territories (about eight) were not part of South Africa and South African crime statistics.

And, yes, we had Chief MG Buthelezi as chief minister and Minister of Police of KwaZulu, with his notorious ZP (Zulu Police, notoriously called Zulu Popeye south of Durban), and the military, who literally camped in the townships.

We also had the Group Areas Act, separate amenities and sanctions looming strong, which became the norm and, yes, the sports boycotts – no World Cup rugby for South Africa.

The pass laws and mixed marriages were scrapped under PW Botha’s tenure but apartheid, both petty and grand, was very much the norm.

As for his political initiatives, there was the disastrous Rubicon speech, which he delivered in Durban on August 15, 1985, after which the rand nosedived and inflation and interest rates skyrocketed.

His only positive was meeting his most famous political prisoner, Mr Nelson Mandela (for whom PW poured tea, and had a frank discussion with, but nothing came of it).

In the end, his very own National Party told him to quit and FW de Klerk took over, and that led to the Mandela presidency and FW and Mandela were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in 1993.

That was PW for any reader who has forgotten.

Apartheid, both petty and grand,

was the norm

Durban North

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