South Africa the Debate Over Sanctions

Every time a paroxysm of black unrest grips South Africa, followed by a crackdown by the white government of State President P.W. Botha, statesmen and politicians in Western capitals begin asking, Is there a way, any way short of military action for the world to force Pretoria to change its racial policies? Last week, as South Africa's current state of emergency entered its third week, the debate flared once more. Its focus: whether recent events require a major step-up in economic sanctions against South Africa, and whether such pressure would really contribute to banishing apartheid.

The week's discussions centered in the Hague, where leaders of the twelve members of the European Community met to ponder the subject. In the end, they settled for weaker recommendations than many observers had expected. They called on South Africa to release Black Leader Nelson Mandela, who has been in prison for 24 years, and to lift its ban on the African National Congress, the country's oldest black political organization, which today conducts a limited and largely ineffectual guerrilla campaign against the Pretoria regime from nearby Zambia.

The E.C. decided that after Britain takes over the presidency of the organization for six months beginning July 1, British Foreign Secretary Sir Geoffrey Howe will visit South Africa in the hope of establishing a dialogue between the country's government officials and black leaders. The Europeans also declared that in three months they will decide on "further measures" that might be needed, including a ban on new investments in South Africa and a curb on the import of South African coal, iron and steel, and gold coins.

The West European leaders might have felt more urgency had South Africa been sputtering out of control. But the country appeared to be relatively quiet--at least insofar as could be determined by the press, which under the de facto censorship was more or less obliged to take the Botha government's word for it. A series of minor terrorist explosions took place in Durban, Johannesburg and the Eastern Cape, and at week's end police killed four black guerrillas near the Botswana border. Wildcat strikes and worker "stayaways" continued in about 100 supermarkets and other retail stores, underscoring reports that around 180 union officials remained in detention, along with perhaps 1,600 other blacks. Out of an estimated 3,000 arrested since the emergency was declared on June 12, about 1,200 were thought to have been released. In a separate development, treason charges against four black trade unionists were dropped after the judge ruled that taped evidence appeared to have been tampered with.

In addition to a CBS cameraman who had already left the country, two more journalists were expelled: Richard Manning, the Newsweek bureau chief in Johannesburg, and Dan Sagir, an Israeli who represented the newspaper Ha'aretz. From Amnesty International, the London-based human rights organization, came reports of three more raids on black churches and the detention of entire congregations. Amnesty International also reported that Zwelakhe Sisulu, a black South African editor and member of a prominent activist family, had been arrested.

Helen Suzman, the best-known opposition figure in the South African Parliament, read from a list of several hundred individuals believed to be in detention, demanding to know how many South Africans were actually in custody and how many of those were under 21. Declared Suzman: "South Africa has become like El Salvador and Argentina, where thousands of people go missing and the governments won't acknowledge where they are or whether they are dead or alive." At week's end Parliament adjourned until Aug. 18, depriving journalists for the next seven weeks of information elicited by the parliamentary questions of opposition legislators like Suzman.

The Pretoria government is trying to keep news of its repression away from world attention precisely because it knows that such accounts can inflame international opinion and increase pressures for more sanctions. Many countries already have a wide range of restrictions on contacts with South Africa, ranging from sporting events to the sale of oil. It was in an atmosphere of protest that the House of Representatives two weeks ago passed a bill calling for a ban on all U.S. trade with South Africa, except for strategic minerals necessary for national defense. In the Senate, a milder bill is expected to pass later in the summer.

Though the U.S. maintains very tough trade sanctions against such countries as Cuba, Viet Nam, Kampuchea, Libya, North Korea and Nicaragua, the Reagan Administration opposes any similar action toward South Africa. So far, Washington has banned the sale of arms, oil and certain police equipment to South Africa, withdrawn from sports and cultural exchanges, curtailed government loans and stopped the sale of Krugerrand gold coins in the U.S., but Reagan opposes the adoption of additional measures. Moreover, the Administration argues that America's ability to influence the Botha government's policies is marginal, even though the U.S. is South Africa's largest trading partner. Still, Washington is clearly miffed at Pretoria's new crackdown, coming as it did at a time when the U.S. had hoped that Botha was becoming more moderate. Said Chester Crocker, the Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs: "We think that what the South African government has done is to shoot itself in both feet."

If anything, the British government's opposition to sanctions is even stronger than the Reagan Administration's. Despite rising public outrage at South Africa, as evidenced by a large demonstration in London last Saturday, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher contends that such measures would be as ineffectual as those taken in the 1960s and '70s against the white rebel government in Rhodesia. She believes that they would hurt black South Africans, not to mention the independent black states to the north (see box), long before they would have any real impact on apartheid. Thatcher is also obviously concerned about Britain's estimated $8 billion direct investment in South Africa, the largest of any nation, and the possible loss of 120,000 British jobs at home if total economic sanctions were adopted.

Nonetheless, the Thatcher government faces a meeting of the Commonwealth on Aug. 2, at which Britain is likely to find itself a minority of one on the subject of sanctions. Last month, after a visit to South Africa, some members of the Commonwealth's Eminent Persons Group declared that the worsening situation made sanctions a necessity. At least one Commonwealth leader, President Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia, has threatened to pull his country out of the organization unless Britain adopts a firmer policy on the South African issue. So last week the British government took the symbolic step of inviting Oliver Tambo, leader of the African National Congress, to meet with Lynda Chalker, a minister of state in the Foreign Office.

At the Hague, Britain found a willing ally in West Germany, another of South Africa's leading commercial partners. Bonn consistently opposes trade sanctions as counterproductive and, in any event, considers them pointless in this case without the cooperation of the U.S. and Japan. Several of the smaller powers, including the Netherlands, Denmark and Ireland, called in vain for the E.C. to take stronger action.

Most of the argument against sanctions is based on South Africa's relative strength. The country produces much of what it needs, including armaments, nuclear power and more than 50% of its oil through a coal-liquefaction process. Three of its leading exports--gold, platinum and diamonds--are rare and easy to sell. Others, such as chromium and manganese, are in high demand for strategic reasons. Yet it would be wrong to conclude that South Africans are unconcerned by the debate: a recently published opinion survey of the country's whites showed that 71% believe the South African economy is not strong enough to prevent sanctions from hurting.

One area of proven vulnerability is finance. Last year, after several American and European banks demanded immediate payment on short-term loans to South Africa because of the deteriorating situation, the country virtually panicked. The level of the national currency, the rand, plummeted, and in September the government declared a moratorium on repaying its $14 billion in short-term bank loans. Says Jamaican Prime Minister Edward Seaga: "If Pretoria will not listen to arguments based on rights, it will listen to arguments based on rands." But no one expects measures against South African trade to be nearly as effective as the banking action. Some businessmen somewhere will always find ways to beat the boycott and make a profit.

Many American and European officials have begun to argue, however, that the effectiveness of economic sanctions is not as important as the political statement they represent. As such, the measures are aimed as much at South Africa's standing in the world community as at its pocketbook. Said Pennsylvania Congressman William Gray III, a strong advocate of House action: "Sanctions are a statement of where we stand as a nation, not an attempt to bring a government down."

Though sanctions would almost certainly hurt the blacks that they are designed to free from oppression, practically all black political leaders in South Africa have called for them. As Archbishop-elect Desmond Tutu put it, "Blacks are saying, 'We are suffering already. To end it, we will support sanctions, even if we have to take on additional suffering.' " Moreover, some proponents of sanctions insist that the arguments against such action, while still valid, are increasingly irrelevant. As they see it, the world has exhausted, without effect, every moral and social pressure that can be exerted on the Pretoria government. If South Africa is to avoid the disaster that many feel is over the horizon, every measure, even if imperfect, should be seriously considered as a way to deflect it from its course. The debate over sanctions raises tempers as well as issues. Even Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi, the head of the Zulus, the largest black tribe, and as certified an antiapartheid liberal as Helen Suzman are against them. But pressure for sanctions can only intensify as long as South Africa wields its police might to enforce repressive policies.

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