[The following is an interview with Sipho Buthelezi, a leader of the Black Consciousness movement, the most influential Black nationalist current within South Africa. He was the first secretarygeneral of the Black People's Convention, which was banned along with most other Black Consciousness organizations in October 1977.
[Buthelezi now lives in exile. He has edited The Black Peoples' Convention (BPC)-South Africa: Historical Background and Basic Documents (New York: Black Liberation Press, n.d.). The interview was obtained in Britain in early 1979 by John Blair.]
Question. First, can you tell us something about your own political history?
Answer. I first became active in the SASO [South African Students Organisation] when it was formed in 1968. I was its main convenor at the University of Zululand. Later, in 1972, I became involved in the BPC [Black People's Convention]. First I was chairman of the Zululand Branch, and then at the [full] BPC convention in Hammanskraal in December 1972 I was appointed as the first secretary-general. After being imprisoned and banned I left the country in 1974 and became the BPC's first external representative, residing in Botswana. At the moment I am still in the leadership of the BPC externally.
Q. The Black Consciousness movement first appeared in the late 1960s after a long period in which political opposition seemed to have been thoroughly suppressed. What were the main reasons it emerged at that time?
A. It's necessary to appreciate the conse quences of the banning of the ANC [African National Congress] and PAC [Pan Africanist Congress] in 1960. Harsh re pression followed. Most of the leadership were banned, imprisoned, or exiled. That meant a political vacuum within the Black community.
Historically speaking there were other particular factors that led to the formation of SASO in December 1968. There had been Black student organizations before SASO, like the African Students Associa tion, the African Students Union of South Africa, and the Progressive Students Organisation. These collapsed, however, with the formation of segregated Black campuses. Then most students participated in the activities of the NUSAS [National Union of South African Students, a white led student federation]. But there was general dissatisfaction with the NUSAS because many people felt it had assumed a self-appointed role as spokesman for these campuses.
With the formation of the UCM [University Christian Movement] in 1967, a new channel of communication was estab lished. Students were able to come together during conferences sponsored by the UCM Eventually the idea arose of Black students thinking for themselves. While the UCM was still considered to have more radical politics than NUSAS, there was still a large degree of dissatisfaction amongst Blacks involved in it. We still felt that it was not possible to articulate the aspirations of Black students within a white-dominated organization. Thus SASO was ultimately formed to try to do this.
Q. Did SASO therefore emerge out of a split in the UCM?
A. Not really. What happened was that Black students had no real political platform. They had found this in NUSAS, but there were various frustrations confronting them there. The UCM appeared more radical but it was still essentially a white organization with a sprinkling of Blacks. Because of its more radical politics it did however attract a rather larger participation. Eventually however those who worked within it found that even the UCM did not provide adequately for their aspirations. It was only after this that SASO really became a mass movement of the Black students.
Q. What were SASO's main political positions?
A. When SASO was first formed it had no very clear political ideology. It was only later, in the early 1970s, that the idea of Black Consciousness as a mobilizing agent amongst the Black oppressed began to appear. At first SASO was limited to the Black campuses. But this was felt to be limiting since it was realized that a student group could not articulately express the aspirations of the mass of the op pressed.
Hence the formation of the Black People's Convention in December 1971 with the aim of filling the political vacuum that had prevailed during the 1960s. It is not however correct to say that the BPC was formed by SASO alone. It was a coalition of many social forces. At the first conference that was held, in Bloemfontein in April 1971, organizations involved included the Association for the Educational and Cultural Advancement of the African People of South Africa, the Independent Churches Association, the Interdenominational African Ministers' Association, the Young Mens' Christian Association, SASO, and many other smaller organizations. From this you can see that it was really a coalition of many social forces in the Black community.
Q. What sort of political program came out of this founding convention?
A. The first conference did not really talk about the BPC as such. There was simply a feeling that there was a vacuum in the community and that there needed to be a coalition movement that would coordinate all sorts of activities that were going on; political, cultural, and social. But this first conference decided that a further, larger one had to be called, involving more organizations, with the aim of forming an effective coordinating body. This was called in August 1971 at Pietermaritzburg but broke down in disagreement about what kind of body was needed.
Ultimately in December 1971 a fresh conference took place where the BPC was formed as a political organization. At first people had visualized a mere umbrella body which would be mainly cultural in function. The idea that eventually emerged however was the formation of a political movement, and the BPC was founded.
Its main aim was to solidify and unite all the oppressed people in the struggle for their "physical and psychological liberation," as it was put at the time. At this time great stress was laid on the need to supersede the multiracial liberal establishment that, with the suppression of the traditional organizations, appeared to have become the main spokesperson for the oppressed. There was also strong emphasis on the need to counter the Bantustan program which was then escalating rapidly.
Q. Was the BPC a completely new move ment in the sense that no one in it had links with organizations from the past?
A. There were individuals, but not very many, who were connected with past traditions. But it was a new movement in the sense that the general mass of the people who got involved in the movement had no real political links with the past. It was however of course a logical continuation of the process of national liberation. In fact if you look at how the ANC was formed in 1912 it involved the very same forces coming together.
Q. What were the main elements of the program finally thrashed out in December 1972?
A. The first important thing was to mobilize the oppressed masses. Amongst these the working class, which was seen as the vanguard force of the potential strug gle for national liberation, was prime. Hence various workers programs were developed.
For instance, the Black Workers Project employed experienced trade unionists to organize amongst the working class. This program was funded and assisted by both SASO and the Black Community Programmes. The methods that were used then were not of course always necessarily effective. But what is important politically is that it was being realized that it is only the working class that can lead the strug gle to its successful conclusion.
It's true that the program of BPC was not as explicitly socialist in content as that of the AN in its 1955 Freedom Charter. The most important thing, however, is to appreciate the different conditions under which the respective programs came about. Now there was brutal repression, and there had been this long period of vacuum. In addition, as I already indicated, the BPC was formed as a coalition of many varied organizations so that to come out with a clear program at that stage was not very possible. What was most important was to reestablish the main political principles that had been forgotten in the previous period.
Q. What are the main political currents now developing in the Black Conciousness movement?
A. Basically there are two strong currents. One stream of petty-bourgeois nationalism and another very strong section which is Marxist-Leninist in orientation. At this point there is no organized division between these two tendencies, especially inside the country where political debate is restrained by legislation and repression. But it is possible to see the clear emergence of such differences.
Q. What kinds of things are the two tendencies debating?
A. For Marxist-Leninists the most important thing is the formation of an inde pendent working-class organization. This is a vital issue for the general development of the struggle. It comes about from a realization that in the whole long history of the national liberation movements in South Africa, workers have always been left out in all the struggles that have been going on. When they have participated they have merely done so as spectators. They've not had a leadership of their own; they've not had a revolutionary ideology of their own. To Marxist-Leninists within the movement this is vital. Of course there
have been many problems, not only in the Black Consciousness movement but also in the ANC and the PAC, which have always been led by a petty-bourgeois leadership that follows opportunism, personalism, and, at times, even tribalism.
Q. Does this mean Marxist-Leninists inside the movement differ with those who see the Black population as a single group capable of uniting as one to overthrow apartheid?
A. We see an independent working-class organization as vital and as acting as the vanguard force in the struggle for national liberation. We appreciate that there should be a united front of all the "patriotic" forces in the country, but we recognize that
we need to ensure, if we're to establish a socialist society, that the Black working class is the leading force.
Q. Does the South African Communist Party (SACP) not say the same thing?
A. The main difference that we have with the SACP is that they maintain the two-stage theory of the struggle. That is to say that they state that the present fight is for a "national democratic" state and only after this has been achieved will the way be open for the struggle for socialism.
As far as we are concerned, South Africa being a highly industrialized society, there is no real reason why there should be two such stages in the struggle for socialism. Certain sections within the Unity Move ment for instance also agree with this sort of line. We believe that while the struggle is one for national liberation it also has to be raised at the level of class struggle. We don't think that we should first simply achieve national independence and then after that struggle for socialism. We believe we shall have the combination of the two stages into one.
Q. Do these differences within the move ment reflect class divisions within the Black community?
A. Yes, they really do. As I've indicated, we have a petty-bourgeois leadership that has always led the movement from 1912 until now. Recently there has developed a very strong feeling that the petty bourgeoisie has really led the movement into disar ray, into the present stalemate that we are all facing.
The Marxist-Leninists in the Black Consciousness movement have realized that this central problem can only be resolved through the formation of an independent working-class organization with its own structures and its own revolutionary the ory. In any case the present revolutionary theory" that has evolved over the last fifty years is quite unacceptable; it is regarded by most of us as pure formalism. It does not answer the aspirations of the op pressed people, that is the Black working class and other working people.
Q. Do you think that elements of all the existing movements will be involved in this new development of a working-class organization devoted to leading the socialist revolution in South Africa?
A. Our major aim within the BPC was to unite all patriotic forces within our country in the struggle for national liberation. In other words we recognized the existence of the ANC, the PAC, and the Unity Movement as contributory organizations in the struggle. But we feel that all these organizations, including the BPC, are really petty-bourgeois nationalist groups that do not actually express the aspirations of the working class, which is the majority of the South African population. In all the struggles they put themselves to the forefront.
A clear example is provided by the
BAWU [Black Allied Workers' Union], itself part of the Black Consciousness movement. It was formed as a political trade-union movement, but it was still largely dominated by the petty bourgeoisie. This has stifled the formation of an working-class leadership, independent which would in our opinion be an essential step.
We see the role of the ANC, the PAC, the Unity Movement, and the BPC as independent nationalist organizations within a national united front led specifically by a working-class leadership.
Q. How much influence do you think the ideas of the Black Consciousness move ment had during the two big waves of struggle in South Africa in the 1970s: the strike wave of 1972-3 and the Soweto and other uprisings in 1976?
A. The mass strikes were largely spontaneous, which is not to say they were not political in content. What happened first, to deal with Durban, is that a group of workers were sacked from the Durban Brick and Tile factory as a result of the economic demands that they put forward. The wave of strikes that followed could be seen as an act of solidarity with this. In some factories they were appeased by economic concessions to come back to work. But the main demand was for the reinstatement of those workers and the release of the strikers who had been arrested. It was thus essentially a political act.
In 1976 it was clearly the Black Consciousness movement that was instrumental in bringing about the events. As the upsurge spread throughout the country SASO became directly involved. It was in fact only in those universities where it was active that we find uprisings, for instance in Zululand, Turfloop, and Fort Hare.
Q. Is it true, as has sometimes been claimed on their behalf, that the AN and PAC had considerable influence during these uprisings?
A. No. It's not true. Completely incorrect. I know this because people I worked with at the time were directly involved. Of course there exists in South Africa a long tradition of struggle which is never entirely erased from memory. Thus leaders like Nelson Mandela and Robert Sobukwe lof the ANC and PAC, respectively] could remain a source of inspiration-clearly shown by the number of occasions on which demonstrators would chant their names, for instance. But this is different from there being an organized presence by ANC or PAC. That was certainly not the case in 1976.
Q. Are you optimistic that a genuine united front of all organizations of the oppressed can be built?
A. Here we need to distinguish between the situation in exile and that inside the country. It is true that sectarianism and even factionalism tends to be widespread in the former. Everybody is anxious to defend the name and the position of their own organization, especially because their own livelihood can sometimes depend on continued receipt of outside aid
Inside the country however people have no time for the old splits which they see as based around cliques rather than political principles. In my opinion, this pressure from the "home base" will mean that in the future leaderships will be forced to accept the united front or they will be pushed aside by their own supporters.
Q. How do you envisage the creation of an independent working-class leadership?
A. We think this has to be built step by step through involvement in the day-today activity of the Black working class. At this stage it would be quite wrong for a small group of us, without any serious base inside the class, to proclaim ourselves the leadership. It is only after serious work with the class in its struggles that we shall see the emergence of a genuine proletarian party. The party must be built in this way and not by simply announcing it.
Q. How optimistic are you about the future of the South African revolution?
A. We have to understand that the racial oppression of every Black in South Africa means that there is a massive potential unified bloc against the regime. Only a tiny, numerically insignificant, minority of Bantustan leaders, Indian big merchants, etc., have been bought off into collaboration by the government.
Secondly, I am certain that the 1973 strike wave marked a real leap forward in the consciousness of the Black working class, the leadership of the revolution. Although there have not been any such massive waves of action since then, the organization and consciousness of the class remains at the much higher level it then achieved.
Thirdly, I believe that the present eco nomic recession poses the ruling class with insurmountable problems that cannot be effectively solved within the framework of the present system. In particular there is the objective need for it to attack the extraordinarily privileged position of the white working class. Since this is however the National Party's base, it will be very difficult for them to tackle this problem.
For all these reasons I am very optimistic that we may enjoy much more rapid change in South Africa than might be envisaged if you only look at the obvious power of the state's repressive machinery. Even the CIA didn't predict what's hap pening in Iran. Hopefully we are involved in a similar situation.