Contents: What is going on? • Is this tribal rivalry? • What is Inkatha's Purpose? • What is the government's role in the violence? • What is DeKerk's strategy? • What are COSATU's demands? • Article reprinted from the New York Labor Committee Against Apartheid. A wave of violence swept over South Africa in August that could threaten negotiations to end apartheid. At the heart of the violence is Inkatha, an organization led by Gatsha Buthelezi, chief minister of the KwaZulu homeland. Inkatha functions as Buthelezi's political machine in tribal communities, complete with local warlords and armed vigilantes. Buthelezi also commands the resources of the KwaZulu police and patronage...
Contents: What is going on? • Is this tribal rivalry? • What is Inkatha's Purpose? • What is the government's role in the violence? • What is DeKerk's strategy? • What are COSATU's demands? • Article reprinted from the New York Labor Committee Against Apartheid. A wave of violence swept over South Africa in August that could threaten negotiations to end apartheid. At the heart of the violence is Inkatha, an organization led by Gatsha Buthelezi, chief minister of the KwaZulu homeland. Inkatha functions as Buthelezi's political machine in tribal communities, complete with local warlords and armed vigilantes. Buthelezi also commands the resources of the KwaZulu police and patronage apparatus. Since 1987, Inkatha operatives have attacked Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) and United Democratic Front (UDF) members, their families and communities in a violent campaign to prevent those organizations from winning support in Natal Province. Over 4,000 have been killed and 60,000 made homeless in the three-year conflict. In August, the killings escalated, as Inkatha extended its brutal recruiting drive to the migrant worker hostels near Pretoria and Johannesburg. Inkatha would lose everything if the African National Congress (ANC) succeeds in its demand for dismantling the homeland system and establishing a unitary, non -racial, non-tribal and democratic state. A Market Research Africa poll found that less than 2% of black South Africans supported Buthelezi, while 58% supported Nelson Mandela. COSATU has called on the government to arrest all Inkatha warlords responsible for the violence and appoint an independent board of inquiry to investigate police collusion with Inkatha. COSATU demanded an end to the country's migrant labor policy and single-sex hostels, which have been the focus of much of the recent fighting. The article mentions the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), F.W. de Klerk, and Zulu nationalism.
