"EXPORTING APARTHEID" TO SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA
by
Michel Chossudovsky
Professor of Economics, University of Ottawa, author of The Globalization
of Poverty: Impacts of IMF and World Bank Reforms, Third World Network,
Penang and Zed Press, London, 1997. Copyright by Michel Chossudovsky,
Ottawa, 1996. Complete footnotes and sources available from author
Email:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
The right wing Afrikaner Freedom Front (FF) headed by General Constand
Viljoen plans to develop a "Food Corridor" extending across the Southern
part of the continent from Angola to Mozambique. Afrikaner agri-business is
to extend its grip into neighbouring countries with large scale investments
in commercial farming, food processing and eco-tourism. The Afrikaner
unions of the Orange Free State and Eastern Transvaal are partners; the
objective is to set up White-owned farms beyond South Africa's borders.
The "Food Corridor", however, does not mean "food for the local people". On
the contrary, under the scheme the peasants will loose their land;
small-holders will become farm labourers or tenants on large scale
plantations owned by the Boers. Moreover, the South African Chamber for
Agricultural Development (SACADA) which acts as an umbrella organization is
integrated by several right wing organisations including the Freedom Front
(FF) led by Viljoen and the secret Afrikaner Broederbond. As South African
Defence Force (SADF) Commander in Chief during the Apartheid regime,
General Viljoen had personally ordered the attacks on so-called "African
National Congress Targets" including the blow up of suspected
anti-apartheid activists and critics. As revealed by former spy Craig
Williamson from classified State Security Council documents, Viljoen was
also responsible for Stratcom (Strategic Communications), a covert
organization involved in frame-ups, political assassinations, bombings,
torture, covert propaganda and "dirty tricks campaigns"...(Stefaans
Brummer, "The Web of Stratcoms", Weekly Mail and Guardian. 24 February 1995).
The Freedom Front, although "moderate" in comparison to Eugene
Terre'Blanche's far-right Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB), is a racist
political movement committed to the Afrikaner Volksstaat. The
SACADA-Freedom Front initiative has nonetheless the political backing of
the African National Congress as well as the personal blessing of President
Nelson Mandela who has delegated Mpumalanga Premier Matthews Phosa to the
SACADA Board of Governors. All the other governors are members of the
Freedom Front.
Premier Phosa, a distinguished ANC politician and among the most prosperous
black businessmen in Mpumalanga province (East Transvaal), is the architect
of a proposed "regional economic block" between Eastern Transvaal,
Mozambique and Swaziland. Premier Phosa is not only firmly behind the
SACADA-Freedom Front initiative, he has also contributed to laying the
political ground work for the expansion of White Afrikaner business
interests into neighbouring countries. Phosa informed the provincial
legislature in 1995 that "he is communicating with Afrikaner leader General
Constand Viljoen to ensure that their separate initiatives are
complementary".
In discussions with President Mandela, General Viljoen had argued that:
"settling Afrikaner farmers would stimulate the economies of neighbouring
states, would provide food and employment for locals, and that this would
stem the flow of illegal immigrants into South Africa".(see EU Backs Boers
Trek to Mozambique", Weekly Mail and Guardian, 1 December 1995).
Viljoen has also held high level meetings on Afrikaner agricultural
investments with representatives of the European Union, the United Nations
and other donor agencies.
In turn, Pretoria is negotiating with several African governments on behalf
of SACADA and the Freedom Front. The ANC government is anxious to
facilitate the expansion of corporate agri-business into neighbouring
countries. "`Mandela has asked the Tanzanian government to accept Afrikaner
farmers to help develop the agricultural sector'. SACADA has approached
some 12 African countries `interested in White South African farmers'". In
a venture set up in 1994 under the South African Development Corporation
(SADEVCO), the government of the Congo had granted to the Boers 99 year
leases on agricultural land. President Mandela endorsed the scheme calling
on African nations "to accept the migrants as a kind of foreign aid".
An earlier trek of White farmers to Zambia and the Congo dating to the
early 1990s met with mixed results. Rather than tied to the interests of
corporate agribusiness (as in the case of SACADA), the impetus was based on
the resettlement of individual (often bankrupt) Afrikaner farmers without
political backing, financial support and the legitimacy of the New South
Africa.
The African host countries have on the whole welcomed the inflow of
Afrikaner investments. With regard to regulatory policies, however, the
Bretton Woods institutions and the World Trade Organization (WTO) (rather
than national governments) call the shots, invariably requiring (indebted)
countries to accept "a wide open door to foreign capital". In this context,
the liberalisation of trade and investment under donor supervision, tends
to support the extension of Afrikaner business interests throughout the
region. Moreover, in the sleazy environment shaped by transnational
corporations and international creditors, corrupt politicians and senior
bureaucrats are often co-opted or invited to become the "business partners"
of South African and other foreign investors.
The Expropriation of Peasant Lands
The "Food Corridor" will displace a pre-existing agricultural system, it
not only appropriates the land, its takes over the the host country's
economic and social infrastructure, it spells increased levels of poverty
in the countryside. It will most likely provide a fatal blow to subsistence
agriculture as well as to the peasant cash crop economy; it displaces local
level agricultural markets and aggravates the conditions of endemic famine
prevailing in the region. Jen Kelenga, a spokesperson for a pro-democracy
group in Zaire sees the Boers "in search of new territories to apply their
racist way of living".
The "Food Corridor" if carried through, could potentially alter the rural
landscape of the Southern African region, requiring the uprooting and
displacement of small farmers over an extensive territory. Under the
proposed scheme, millions of hectares of the best farmland are to be handed
over to South African agri-business. The Boers will manage large scale
commercial farms using the rural people both as "labour tenants" as well as
seasonal agricultural workers. While the project is meant to "bring
development", and "transfer much needed agricultural expertise", the
initiative is largely intent upon "exporting Apartheid" to neighbouring
countries. The latter objective is in turn supported by the gamut of
IMF-World Bank sponsored economic reforms.
Afrikaner investments in agriculture go hand in hand with the World Bank
sponsored Land Law. The expropriation of peasant lands is often demanded by
creditors as a condition for the rescheduling of Paris Club debts. Peasant
lands (which formally belonged to the State) are sold (at very low prices)
or leased out to international agri-business (eg. on a 50-99 years
concession). The meagre proceeds of the land sales will be used to service
the external debt.
The World Bank has put forth land legislation in Sub-Saharan Africa which
abrogates the right to land of millions of small-holders. Identical land
legislation is enforced throughout the region, the national level land laws
(drafted under technical advice from World Bank Legal Department) are with
some variations "exact carbon copies of each other":
"The constitution [in Mozambique] says that the land is the property of
the State and cannot be sold or mortgaged. There has been strong pressure
particularly from the United States and the World Bank for land to be
privatised and to allow mortgages..."(Joseph Hanlon, Supporting Peasants in
their Fight for Land, Christian Aid, London, November 1995
South African companies and banks are also participating in the
country-level privatisation programmes (under the structural adjustment
programme) acquiring at rock bottom prices the ownership of State assets in
mining, public utilities and agriculture. With regard to the latter,
experimental farms, government research stations, State-owned plantations,
seed producing facilities, etc. have been put on the auction block. With
the deregulation of agricultural markets under World Bank advice, the State
marketing system is either closed down or taken over by private investors.
Derogating Customary Land Rights
Under the proposed land legislation, both SACADA and the World Bank
nonetheless tout the protection of traditional land rights. The small
peasantry is to be "protected" through the establishment of "customary land
reserves" established in the immediate vicinity of the White commercial
farms. In practice, under the new land legislation, the majority of the
rural people will be caged into small territorial enclaves ("communal
lands") while the bulk of the best agricultural land will be sold or leased
to private investors.
This also means that peasant communities which practice shifting
cultivation over a large land area as well as pastoralists, will henceforth
be prosecuted for encroaching on lands earmarked for commercial farming,
often without their prior knowledge. Impoverished by the macro-economic
reforms, with no access to credit and modern farm inputs, these customary
enclaves will constitute "labour reserves" for large scale agri-business.
Afrikaner Farms in Mozambique
SACADA has plans to invest in Mozambique, Zaire, Zambia and Angola, "with
Mozambique being the test case". President Joaquim Chissano of Mozambique
and President Nelson Mandela signed an intergovernmental agreement in May
1996 which grants rights to Afrikaner agri-business to develop investments
in at least six provinces encompassing territorial concessions of some
eight million hectares. According to one South African official
(interviewed in Maputo, July 1996):
"Mozambique needs the technical expertise and the money, and we have the
people... We favour an area which is not heavily populated because it is an
Achilles heal if there are too many people on the land... For the Boers,
Land is next to God and the Bible."
In SACADA's concessionary areas in Mozambique, the "socialist" Frelimo
government will ensure that there is no encroachment; rural small-holders
and subsistence farmers (who invariably do not possess legal land titles)
will either be expulsed or transferred into marginal lands.(See the
documents of the Land Conference, Conferencia Nacional de terras, documento
de trabalho, Maputo, July 1996). In turn, according to Hanlon (op. cit.)
members of the Military and government ministers who seek to become
"business partners" of international agri-business have already been
granted concessions over millions of hectares of land which is already
occupied by the peasantry.
The World Bank together with bilateral donors has proposed on behalf of
potential foreign investors, a system of land registration including the
extensive mapping of land areas through aerial photography in view of
generating digitised maps (Hanlon, op cit.).
In Mozambique's Niassa province, the best agricultural land will be leased
in concession to the Afrikaners for fifty years. "There are just so many
beautiful, fertile places to choose from...", said Egbert Hiemstra "who
owns two farms in Lydenburg and wants a third in Mozambique". At the token
price of some $0.15 per hectare per annum, the land lease is a give-away.
Through the establishment of Mosagrius (a joint venture company), SACADA is
now firmly established in the fertile valley of the Lugenda river. But the
Boers also have their eyes on agricultural areas along the Zambezi and
Limpopo rivers as well as on the road and railway facilities linking
Lichinga, Niassa's capital to the deep see port of Nagala. The railway line
is being rehabilitated and modernised (by a French contractor) with
development aid provided by France.
In the initial stage of the agreement, concessionary areas in Niassa
province were handed over to SACADA in 1996 to be settled by some 500 White
Afrikaner farmers (Agreement on Basic Principles and Understanding,
concerning the Mosagrius Development Project, Maputo, May 1996). These
lands are earmarked for commercial farming in both temperate highveld and
sub-tropical lowfeld.
"Our intention is to develop the highveld areas in maize, wheat and beef
cattle linked up with agro-processing and the export market. In the
lowvelds we will plant a variety of tropical fruit trees as well as
establish modern juice factories. Our agricultural institutes will
establish research stations in the area with a view to supporting SACADA's
initiative...Eventually we would also like to get into the cotton areas of
Nampulo and Cabo Delgado provinces" (interview with Mosagrius project
liason officer, South African High Commission, Maputo)
The available infrastructure including several state buildings and
enterprises will be handed over; several State owned farms in Niassa will
be transferred to Mosagrius, the Technical College in Lichinga has been
transferred to the Boers. The agricultural Research Station is also to be
taken over: "They want out", they are seeking Afrikaner investment to keep
the Research Station afloat. Eventually Afrikaner agro-business is intent
on taking over the government's seed producing facilities (SEMOC) in Niassa.
In the Mosagrius project, "The main thrust will come from the successful
farmers in South Africa who are now seeking for new lands, and who are able
to mobilise considerable financial resources"(ibid). They will operate
their new farms as part of their business undertakings in South Africa,
dispatching White Afrikaner managers and supervisors to Mozambique. "Family
farms with a good track record but without funding capabilities are also
eligible. They will rely on SACADA for funding"(ibid). No provision is
made, however, to help Afrikaner farmers driven into bankruptcy as a result
of Pretoria's economic liberalisation programme. These farmers may,
nonetheless, be hired to work as managers in Mozambique.
In turn, the Boers will bring their Black right-hand men, their tractor
operators, their technicians. In the words of the Mosagrius liaison officer
at the South African High Commission in Maputo: "Each and every Afrikaner
farmer will bring his tame Kaffirs" (ibid) who will be used to supervise
the local workers. The number of White settlers in the concessionary areas
in Niassa is likely to be small.
SACADA has carefully mapped out the designated areas by helicopter, South
Africa's agricultural research institutes have surveyed the area, providing
an assessment of prevailing environmental, climatic and social conditions.
Agricultural scientists have not limited their focus to the analysis of
soil samples, human settlements in the area have been studied; South
African demographers have been called in as consultants to evaluate the
implications of displacing the rural people.
Creating "Rural Townships"
Under the SACADA scheme, the rural communities in Niassa which occupy the
Afrikaner concessionary areas are to be regrouped into "rural townships"
similar to those of the Apartheid regime:
"What you do is to develop villages along the roadside close to the
[White] farms. These villages have been planned very carefully [by SACADA]
in proximity to the fields so that farm-workers can go back and forth; you
give the villages some infrastructure and a plot of land for each household
so that the farm-labourers can set up their food gardens".(ibid).
Unless token customary land rights are entrenched within or in areas
contiguous to the concessions, the peasants will become landless farm
labourers or "labour tenants". Under the latter system applied by the Boers
in South Africa since the 19th Century, black peasant households perform
labour services (corvée) in exchange for the right to farm a small parcel
of land. Formally outlawed in South Africa in 1960 by the Nationalist
government, "labour tenancy" remains in existence in many parts of South
Africa including East Transvaal and Kwa-Zulu Natal. It has evolved towards
the payment of a (very low) nominal wage largely to disguise the (outlawed)
feudal relationship. Since 1995, it has been the target of the Land Reform
(Labour Tenants) Bill of Land Affairs Minister Derek Hanekom.
The rural townships established in the concessions will constitute
"reserves" of cheap labour for the White commercial farms. Wages are
substantially lower than in South Africa. For seasonal workers, the wage
has been set at the statutory minimum wage, a meagre $18 a month which the
IMF Representative Sergio Leite, considered in his statement to a donors'
meeting in 1995, to be "excessive" by international standards. He also
pointed to the inflationary pressures resulting from wage demands.
The derogation of workers rights as well as the deregulation of the labour
market under IMF advice, enables the Boers not only to pay their Mozambican
workers excessively low wages but also to escape the demands of Black
agricultural workers in South Africa. It also allows corporate
agri-business investing in neighbouring countries to more effectively lobby
the ANC government against Land Reform and "affirmative action" programmes
within South Africa.
Moreover, under the Mosagrius Agreement the Mozambican government will be
fully responsible in dealing with land disputes and ensuring the
expropriation of peasant lands "without prejudice or loss that may occur
from such claims to SDM [Mosagrius] and other Mosagrius
participants"(clause 42 of Mosagrius Agreement).
Foreign Aid Supports the Establishments of White Farms
South Africa's major commercial banks, the World Bank and the European
Union have firmly backed the project. "The Food Corridor" has become an
integral part of the IMF-World Bank sponsored structural adjustment
programme. In the words of SACADA Secretary Willie Jordaan: "SACADA had
endeavoured to bring its policies in line with the World Bank and the
International Monetary Fund, and claimed that it was set to become an
international development agency" with a mandate to contract with donor
institutions and carry out "foreign aid programmes" on their behalf.
While the West endorsed ANCs struggle against the Apartheid regime, in a
somewhat unusual twist it is now providing financial support to a racist
Afrikaner development organization. Under the disguise of "foreign aid",
Western donors are in fact contributing to the extension of the Apartheid
system into neighbouring countries. The European Union has provided money
to SACADA out of a development package explicitly earmarked by Brussels for
South Africa's Reconstruction and Development Programme. According to an EU
spokesman, the project "was the best noise out of Africa in 30 years". The
EU Ambassador to South Africa Mr. Erwan Fouéré met General Viljoen to
discuss the project. Fouéré confirmed that if all goes well, further EU
money could be made available to cover the costs of "settling Afrikaner
farmers in South Africa's neighbouring countries".(EU Backs Boers Trek to
Mozambique, Weekly mail and Guardian, 1 December 1996).
The initiative is categorised by the donor community as a bona fide
development project which will benefit the peasantry in the host country as
well as contribute to South Africa's Reconstruction. The fact that the
scheme derogates the land rights of small-holders and replicates the system
of "labour tenancy" prevalent in South Africa under Apartheid is not a
matter for discussion.
Moreover, national investment priorities set by the donors in the host
countries (under the World Bank sponsored Public Investment Programme), are
increasingly tuned to meeting the needs of South African business
interests. In Mozambique, for instance, so-called "targeted investments"
are undertaken with a view to rehabilitating port facilities, roads, water
resources, river and lake transportation, etc. largely to the benefit of
South African investors including SACADA.
Moreover, under the Mosagrius Agreement, Afrikaner investors "shall be
allowed a right of first refusal" in privatisation tenders in concessionary
areas under their jurisdiction (clause 15F section c of Mosagrius
Agreement). In turn the country's investment legislation (drafted with the
technical assistance of the World Bank) will provide for the free
remittance of corporate profits and the repatriation of capital back to
South Africa.
The SACADA scheme is also likely to suck up a portion of the State's meagre
health and education budget. In Mozambique, under the terms of the
Agreement the authorities are also to support the provision of
Western-style health services as well as create a "sanitary environment"
for the White Afrikaners settling in the territory (clauses 38 and 39 of
the Mosagrius Agreement). Part of the money provided by donors and
international organisations for social programmes will also be channelled
towards the concessionary areas.
Fostering Ecotourism
Most of Mozambique's coastline on lake Niassa --including a 160 km. stretch
in the Rif Valley from Meponda to Mapangula extending further North to Ilha
sobre o Lago close to the Tanzanian border-- has been designated "for
tourism and other complementary and subsidiary activities [which are]
ecologically sustainable" (clause 38 and 39 of Mosagrius Agreement). The
latter also include designated areas for South African investments in
fishing and aquaculture on lake Niassa displacing the local fishing
industry (see addendum 1, art. 1d of Mosagrius Agreement).
In turn, the Agreement hands over to Mosagrius, the development and
operation rights over the Niassa Game Reserve on the Tanzanian border. The
Reserve includes an extensive area of some 20,000 hectares earmarked for a
so-called "ecologically sustainable ecotourism". SACADA is to fence the
entire area and establish up-market tourist lodges on the periphery of the
Game Park; hunting of wild game is also envisaged for wealthy individuals
"in strictly controlled areas". According to the Mosagrius liason
officer,"fauna restocking of the Reserve may, however, be required to
ensure that tourists see the real thing". A specialist from South Africa's
Department of Nature Conservation is assisting SACADA in the planning the
venture as well as securing financial resources. International funding of
the lodges and the Game Reserve is in the process of being secured from a
number of wealthy private investors...
In a much larger undertaking, James Ulysses Blanchard III, the right-wing
Texan tycoon has been granted a concession over a vast territory which
includes the Maputo Elephant Reserve and the adjoining Machangula
peninsula. During the Mozambican civil war, Blanchard provided financial
backing to Renamo, the rebel organization directly supported by the the
Apartheid regime and trained by the South African Defence Force (SADF).
"But it now seems that the man who once bankrolled a rebel army to wage a
war of incredible destruction and brutality (the US State Department once
described Renamo atrocities as worse than those of the Pol Pot regime in
Cambodia) is likely to be rewarded with control over a huge chunk of
Mozambique's richest province".(Eddie Koch, "The Texan who Plans a Dream
Park Just Here", Weekly Mail and Guardian, 18 January 1996
Blanchard intends to create an Indian Ocean Dream Park with a floating
hotel, deluxe tourist lodges at $600-800 a night and a casino. Large
parcels of land in Manchangula have also been allocated to agricultural
investors from Eastern Transvaal. Local communities in Blanchard's
concessionary area will be expropriated; in the words of his general
manager, John Perrot:
"We gonna come here and say [to the local villagers] `Okay, now you're in
a national park. Your village can either get fenced or you can have them
wild animals walking right through your main street'"(Eddie Koch, op cit).
In this scramble for territory, the Mozambican government agreed to hand
over several million hectares of so-called "unused land" to a religious
organization, the Dutch based Maharashi Heaven on Earth Company. President
Chissano is a devotee of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, founder of the Natural Law
Party. Since the signing of the agreement in July 1993, however, the
government seems to have backtracked on the deal stating that the Maharashi
Church would "be treated like any other foreign investor, no more, no less".
Carving up the National Territory
An autonomous territory, "a State within a State" is being developed
initially in Niassa province; Mosagrius (overriding the national and
provincial governments) is the sole authority concerning the utilisation
rights of land in its concessionary areas (clause 34); similarly the
territory is defined as a free trade zone allowing for the unimpeded
movement of goods, capital and people (meaning White South Africans). All
investments in the concessionary areas "will be free from customs duties,
or other fiscal impositions" (Clause 35.2 of the Mosagrius Agreement, op.
cit).
In turn with concessions granted to foreign investors in various parts of
the country, the national territory is once again being carved up into a
number of separate "corridors" reminiscent of the colonial period. This
system of territorial concessions --with each of the corridors integrated
separately into the world market-- tends to favours the demise of the
national economy.
In turn, the donors have required (in the name of "governance"), the
down-sizing of the central State and the "decentralisation" of
decision-making to the provincial and district levels. Rather than
providing added powers and resources to regional and local communities,
State revenues will be channelled towards servicing Mozambique's external
debt. The "decentralisation" scheme is predicated on fiscal austerity under
the structural adjustment programme leading to a weakening of both the
central and regional governments.
The decline of the Mozambican State apparatus as well the fragmentation of
the national economy favours the transformation of entire regions of the
country (eg. Niassa province) into concessionary areas or "corridors" under
the political custody of donors, non-governmental organisations and foreign
investors. The latter constitute a de facto "parallel government" which
increasingly bypasses the State system. Moreover, in several areas in
Northern Mozambique, the former pro-Apartheid rebel group Renamo (which has
also established its links to the donors) is formally in command of local
government. In the war's aftermath, several Renamo leaders have become
"business partners" of South African companies investing in Mozambique,
including SACADA sponsored investments: "It would appear that there is a
secret understanding as part of the [1992] Peace Agreement that Renamo and
its backers will get land" (Hanlon, op cit0.
Land Reform in South Africa
The ANC has championed (without serious debate or discussion) the granting
of "Land to the Boers" in neighbouring countries as a means of relieving
land pressures within South Africa. The policy is said to facilitate the
ANC's land redistribution programme in favour of Black farmers led by the
controversial Minister of Land Affairs Derek Hanekom. Despite its merits,
the Land Reform Programme is unlikely to succeed. Its implementation has
been undermined from the outset by the post-Apartheid government's sweeping
macro-economic reforms under the neoliberal policy agenda.
The ANC government's proposed "economic medicine" is outlined in a Minstry
of Finance June 1996 document entitled: "Growth, Employment and
Redistribution: A Macro-Economic Framework". In addition to the standard
therapies (budget deficit reduction, devaluation of the Rand, privatisation
of State assets) the task force (integrated by two economists on loan from
the World Bank), called for:
"reduced minimum wage schedules for young trainees, reducing indirect wage
costs; and increasing the incentives for more job sharing and greater
employment flexibility; and a social agreement to facilitate wage and price
moderation..."
The policy document (which has been adopted by the ANC government) insists
upon a "regulated flexibility in managing the labour market" which
translates into "creating employment" by breaking down wage agreements and
collective bargaining... Despite the ANC's pledge to build the New South
Africa based on racial and social equality, the Macro-Economic Framework
largely serves to reinforce the structures of Apartheid.
In rural South Africa, the removal of agricultural subsidies, the
deregulation of credit and trade liberalisation (which is part of the
Macro-economic Framework) have not only contributed to the further
impoverishment of Black small-holders and tenant farmers, the measures have
also pushed numerous White Afrikaner family farms into bankruptcy.
Pretoria's structural adjustment programme thereby favours an even greater
concentration of farmland than during the Apartheid regime as well as the
consolidation of corporate agriculture both within and beyond South
Africa's borders.
Concluding Remarks
The Boers "Second Great Trek" to neighbouring countries does not contribute
to facilitating Land Reform within South Africa. In fact the policy
accomplishes exactly the opposite results: it maintains Black farmers in
marginal lands under the old system of segregation; it reinforces corporate
control over the best farmland while also providing a political avenue to
Afrikaner agri-business for "exporting Apartheid" to the entire Southern
African region.
Moreover, the transfer of nominal political power by the Apartheid regime
in 1994 rather than restraining the White dominated economic system, has in
fact created the pre-conditions for its advancement both within South
Africa and the region. In the New South Africa, the "export of Apartheid"
is now tagged as "foreign aid".
The ANC's political motivations in this regard are unclear. The dominant
ANC viewpoint, reflected by Nelson Mandela's statements, is that by
diverting the Boers from the domestic arena, the post-Apartheid government
will gain time and space for carrying out major social transformations
within South Africa.
In our opinion, this position is largely mistaken. The application of
"strong economic medicine" (ie. devaluation, job lay offs, market
deregulation, austerity measures, etc.) under the neoliberal agenda, has
gone hand in hand with de the facto reinforcement of Apartheid as an
economic system. In other words, the plight of the Black majority has
worsened largely as a result of the post-Apartheid economic reforms.
South Africa's dominant economic and financial interests allied with
international corporate capital are firmly behind these economic reforms.
Moreover, the latter could not have been carried out during the Apartheid
era with the same coherence, political legitimacy and international
support. While Apartheid is officially defunct, its economic structures
live on, now fused and blended into the structural adjustment programme.
The international community has supported this process; the IMF and the
World Bank which supported the government of Frederick de Klerck is now
directly involved in advising the ANC government on macro-economic reform:
"From exile, the ANC condemned the IMF for propping up apartheid. The IMF
then assisted the regime with its increasingly neoliberal economic policies
during the late 1980s, and designed South Africa's Value Added Tax during
the early 1990s, leading to mass popular protest. In 1993 the IMF granted a
large loan which included secret "conditionalities" that ensured that a
democratic South Africa would not waver from inherited undemocratic
economic policies, as well as informal conditions that the new government
retain the National Party Finance Minister and Reserve Bank
governor"(Statement by the Campaign Against Neoliberalism in South Africa
(CANSA), On the South African Visit by IMF Managing Director Michel
Camdessus", 16 October 1996.
"Democratisation" and "economic liberalisation" seem to go hand in hand.
Despite the ANC's commitment to social transformation, the government's
reforms under the neoliberal policy agenda, are serving the economic
interests of those who most actively supported the Apartheid regime as well
as members of the Afrikaner political establishment who were directly
involved in Apartheid's "dirty war".
Michel Chossudovsky
Department of Economics,
University of Ottawa,
Ottawa, K1N6N5
Fax: 1-613-7892050
E-Mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Alternative fax: 1-613-5625999
