POLITICS & SECURITY
As with my other topics, this is a record of my personal contact with the politics of the country and does not attempt to analyse it too much.
My parents never talked of politics, but growing up I was aware of it in some ways. I have mentioned elsewhere seeing the house maid of the house behind us in Baysville being arrested for theft and hearing her saying it was right to steal as she had nothing and they had everything. I have mentioned the bush dwellers near where we played when very young and seeing a body being removed. I have mentioned how most whites called most blacks “boy” or “girl” no matter their age. Not necessarily through any sense of dominance or hatred; often simply a paternalistic superiority. And black folk had a quiet acceptance of the status quo and their roles in life – well that is the perception we were presented with.
The degree of a sense of prejudicial superiority whites felt was the more evident between English and Afrikaans speakers. The latter so much more tied into the ruling government of the day and therefore supporting the doctrine of apartheid. The country was declared an independent sovereign state in 1934, but it remained in effect a self-ruling colony of the United Kingdom.
My maternal grandmother, Nana, had not seen her country of birth, Ireland (Belfast), for decades, but retained her strong Irish identity. However it was my paternal grandmother, Maud, who had been born in SA and had only briefly seen England, that perhaps epitomises white colonial thought. She had lived in East London (SA) and for some time with her farming sons in Southern and Northern Rhodesia. But while living with us years later had what appeared to me the quirky insistence that we stand up for the God-Save-The-Queen music that came out of the SABC radio service as it closed down each evening at about 10pm. There was, and to a much lesser extent now, a feeling of belonging to a much greater entity – mainly by English speakers with the UK or perhaps other European connections.
In 1961 SA declared itself a republic completely independent of the UK. I was midway through primary school. I remember the build up to the referendum and the mood building up to it. At this young age I was beginning to be more aware of South African politics. I was beginning to hear talk, mainly by the parents of friends, of apartheid, of Sharpville....... I can remember that even at the age of 10, I had discussions with my young friends at school of emigrating in case life here became intolerable. I chose Canada. My parents still hardly spoke of it all. I was picking this all up from school and from families of friends. Then the day of Independence arrived. At school we got little versions of the new flag and a celebratory coin and cool drinks and sweets. A happy day for us young people. I lost the momentos.
Life was much the same. At Sea Scouts we still did Baden-Powell stuff. We still found reference to God and the Queen in our handbook and events. As reprints came in that slowly faded. I lingered in scouts a bit longer than was probably good for me although being rather reserved, I didn't have alternatives to get me out and about. I got my chief scout award. My father became involved in the troop and as a district scouter. We came across non-white scout troops at our regional camps, but they did not camp alongside us as, I was to understand much later, law prevented that. My father was somewhat conservative, but with a paternalistic outlook. He brought home a coloured scout master one day for lunch. As we dropped him back at the station he walked through the “whites only” door. I was very agitated. I had not yet developed a clear head and resistance to such things.
I attended a jamboree in Pretoria coinciding with Republic Day. The Voortrekkers camped nearby. We found them rather militaristic. We watched as Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd (the "architect of apartheid") drove by when we attended the public events in Pretoria Heights.
I had hoped for a career in the navy and managed to do basic training at Gordons Bay on False Bay where officer training also took place. See NAVAL CAREER, English and Afrikaans together. Mild “Boer War” jokes and rivalry. With me was a guy who was descended from Messerschmitt, the German WWII fighter plane manufacturer. I did not get onto the officer course. I was too timid and could not name all of the government ministers. As the officer candidates from other centres arrived and before many of us left for other courses elsewhere I met some of them. One was Paul Vorster, son of the then prime minister. I was still very naïve about politics. After a spell on a ship where I got asthma I was moved to Youngsfield – a combined army/navy/airforce base. It had a very basic airstrip and was used for accommodation and some flight training. The navy used it as Maritime Headwquarters (Silvermine state of the art HQ being still built). We plotted the shipping around the coast based on surveilance aircraft reports including the many Russian cargo ships carrying military trucks and tanks destined for other countries. The location suited me as it was in easy contact with my Rondebosch Watson cousins, and fairly easy contact with Cape Town. Once, to save bus and train fares, I walked from Cape Town back to the base. I passed through the fascinating area of District 6. People of all races and faiths living in bustling proximity. Flats above businesses. Happy, Moaning. Cajoling. Bidding. Calling “hey sailor” from balconies. I was in full uniform. I loved it.
It was years later that I got to understand District 6's predicament; how it had already been shrunk under apartheid. It is gone. Similar fates met mixed communities around the country including in Port Elizabeth and East London - all in the name of "improvement", but all politically motivated.
With the navy out of the way, I was off to varsity. The University of Port Elizabeth. Bilingual. Created to offset the liberal presence of Rhodes in the city (although centred in Grahamstown). Created by the secretive Broederbond. Dominated at Board level by Nats and Dutch Reformed Church members which were completely entwined. But it did have a new architecture school and it was relatively close to East London. My academic record left a lot to be desired for, but the whole experience did influence me in other ways. I remember a dominee student going amongst the participants at a dance and forcing couples from his congregation apart. I remember that a dance between students from Rhodes and UPE after a major sports event being cancelled because Rhodes had Chinese !!! students. It was that which startled me into joining the Progressive Party. I was certainly not political material, being reserved and shy, but I did get to be youth chairman (with very few members). I canvas for elections for Andy Savage and Paddy Ball. I did meet Colin Eglin and van Zyl Slabbert and Helen Suzman and they made quite an impression on me. The party changed name as the Union party disbanded with some members joining us. It lost a bit of its righteous and idealistic oomph, but remained much the same.
On leaving varsity and starting work I joined the East London branch of the party. I canvassed there for John Malcomess (who owned the Mercedes francise in the city. I was still coming across women at the door who had not yet been told by their husbands what to vote! I met some of the old stalwarts again and a new politician, Marius Barnard, brother of Chris Barnard. They had both pioneered heart transplants (and had operated on my wife's aunt - not a transplant).
By the early '80s I had tired of politics as such and sought something more practical and pragmatic. I joined the South African Institute for Race Relations. Its local director was Val Viljoen, a lovely and forthright women who could confidently handle the occasional radio interviews by visiting reporters from the Netherlands, Denmark etc. (She was to become an MP in free South Africa). The chairman then was Harold Winearls; a lawyer. He had his post box blown up with a stolen army thunderflash. A prank? Or a complaint against his liberal politics? Next was a church minister, Steve Fourie. (We had Steve officiate at our wedding at the Clarendon Road house). I became active on the committee.
The SAIRR had a shop with books and local crafts and a catch-up school upstairs in premises next to the City Hall. The security police would occasionally pounce and take away things such as calculators (then quite expensive) and subversive children's books such as Molo Songololo (Hello Millipede). Working for the Institute was Eileen who was concurrently doing postgrad research, much of which was oral histories on tapes. The committee met in the shop window in full sight of passers-by. Her car with all her research was out of sight just slightly down from us. Once when we came out the car had been broken into and almost all her research material had been taken; not loose cash. It could only have been the security police. I drove her in the dark around Duncan Village to look for anything that may have been jettisoned. It could have been absolutely anywhere, but the through road was a possibility and we simply had to do something. It was never found and she had to a great deal to do over again.
As his term came to an end at an AGM, the small committee stood around afterwards to select the new chairman. It was me. The very next morning I had a phone call inviting me to a restaurant (owned by the Daily Dispatch) for lunch by a security policeman, Dirk Prytt ###.. I agreed to go, but refused to have anything to eat and sat there watching him eat while answering mundane questions. He was evidently simply making sure I understood that they already knew everything. He said he knew me from school. I didn't remember him.
It turned out that we had a telltale within our small committee. Pam. I was the only one who had not already known. She worked for the Daily Dispatch. Her husband was a policeman and in turn in contact with the Security Police. We grew suspicious of phone calls after that and suspected tapping. I was later to meet a government building inspector on one of my jobs who acknowledged that the Security Police would sometimes use his department as a front for phone tapping.
Duncan Village was a suburb within East London that had been created as a residential area for other races, mainly black. Buffalo Flats beyond it was newer and for coloureds. The sprawling Mdantsane had then been created beyond the city boundaries for blacks as part of the apartheid doctrine. So that meant blacks would be enticed to leave Duncan Village or as housing was made available in Mdantsane, forced to go there. Coloured and black folk had lived amicably in Duncan Village for generations. But accommodation was very limited. I have even visited shanty houses built over graves. With the prospect of being allocated housing vacated by black folk, coloured people's hopes were raised and tensions arose. The Institute lent their support to a group resisting this segregated reallocation on apartheid lines. I arranged for a sympathetic academic town planner Prof Wally van Zyl from Bloemfontein to come down and address a public meeting. This was well supported. We had the amazing Bishop Tutu as key speaker. I, though, reserved, still nervous about the security police and with a new family to care for, would not chair the meeting and instead got the preceding Institute chairman, Harold Winnearls to do so. He was after all a lawyer. I never got to actually meet Tutu although I did take photos.
Desmond Tutu in full flow.
A group at the Duncan Village community meeting with Desmond Tutu.
But I did vaguely get to know his wife Leah. As regional chairman I also served on the national board. Family faces such as van Zyl Slabbert were there and I met some amazing people, mainly academics from around the country. Both van Zyl Slabbert and a Natal academic had their libraries torched. It was at this time that moves were started to create Operation Hunger. I was on the subcommittee with Leah Tutu. My initial expectations were in hindsight very naïve. It was to get a full time director and the efforts grew dramatically. But even her perceptions were shown to be too reticent and she was replaced. The main drive was to meet the terrible hunger and malnutrition created by the conditions that apartheid left in many regions. The demise of apartheid did not resolve that at all, but it did affect the means and efficacy of the charity and it was to fade from prominence.
While Wally van Zyl was in East London I suggested that he join me at the Independence Celebrations for the Republic of Ciskei. I had been invited as I had been doing architectural work there. We sat in the stadium close just up from the new President Lennox Sebe. There was the usual speeches and military pomp – on a modest scale for a new country. And then the South African flag was lowered with drums and bugles. At this moment the Ciskein soldier tugged the flag of the new Ciskei republic. It wouldn't unfurl. He tried again. And again. Surely a hard yank would do the trick. The whole flagpole collapsed and broke in half. Some SA soldiers came across and tied it together using the flag rope and with a now much shorter flagpole but with at least a flag flying, the ceremony continued. Now if I was superstitious......... It was by now well after midnight which was the alotted the time of the changeover. Wally and I crept out – to be met by many other vehicles leaving early. We were hit quite hard by a Ciskei Department of Health bakkie. Fortunately for me it caught the turned left tyre and only scratched the mirror. Unfortunately for Wally, he didn't have the benefit of a steering wheel to grab and he had whiplash for a long time afterwards. Well the history of the Republic of Ciskei was short but calamitous; sometimes simply inept; sometimes violent.
I was to meet the President of the Ciskei, Lennox Sebe, once at an East London library function when he launched his book - a lot of boring past speeches. Other than saying hello, we didn't really talk to each other and I remember him standing there alone and lonely afterwards, ignored by everyone. Perhaps I should have chatted to him. He was afterall part of our history.
When doing work in Mdantsane which was becoming part of the independent homeland of the Republic of Ciskei I first needed to get a permit from the SA run office on the approach road. I didn't always bother.
We did a number of Government Workshops in Ciskei deputised while still initiated through Pertoria. But although the funding was from SA, it was handled through Ciskei offices at first in Zwelitsha and subsequently in the capital Bisho. As the postal service could not be trusted I had to go to fetch our fee cheques. The Zwelitsha office was a rabbit warren of prefab and similar old buildings congealed together. Sometimes it had not bothered to open. On one occasion when they, the Department of Works, had become behind in its electricity payments, it had been cut off. What natural light was minimal and limited to the outer offices. Fortunately the official found it in a filing cabinet with a torch. The Bisho offices were much better. The official by now getting the hang it. I needed to witness tender openings for instance, that of the Mdantsane Post Office discussed below, there. I have a strong memory of Kentucky Fried Chicken everywhere. Finger Licken lunch all over the desks. It was said you got things done quicker if you gave some to the official concerned.
The Apartheid regime still had hold and asserted it forcibly, sometimes violently during the '80s. It is not the aim of this to get into the now historical details of it nor of the debacles parallel to it in places such as Ciskei, but a few comments are fitting. We scanned the more liberal English newspaper for factual news. It was not always obvious. The Daily Dispatch at the peak of apartheid would publish newspapers with large gaps to emphasise how gagged it was. Its editor, Donald Woods had fled. Years later a film had been produced based on his efforts to expose the reality behind the black activist Steve Biko's death in the hands of the police. “Cry Freedom' was directed and produced by Richard Attenborough. As we stood in the queue at the cinema in East London to get tickets, police arrived and seized the film reel. Coincidently we were soon to take a holiday in Scotland. We saw it in Clydebank. A very emotional experience. This was home grown politics and violence. And we even knew some of the characters depicted. Donald Woods's secretary had grown up down the road. A key policeman was Donald Card, whose wife had sold my mother home knitted jerseys for us when we were young. I had got to know Donald in later years as an efficient councillor and even mayor. But at the time depicted in the film he is cop caught up supporting the apartheid regime. He subsequently helped in the untangling of it. While I got on well with Donald when I met him at events or even popped in to his mayoral office about things, I never qutie worked out what his involvement had been as a policeman or of his later seemingly mellowed approach.
The government of Lennox Sebe fell in a blood-less coup to Brigadier Oupa Gqoza. While the coup itself may have been bloodless, the build up to it wasn't. I never really understood the politics and rivalries so will not get into that here suffice to remember the Bisho Massacre of 1992 in attempt to oust Gqozo. See link below. Burnt on the outside and raw inside. I do not like my meat rare, let alone still walking moments beforehand.
Apartheid did eventually crumble. But as it did so efforts were made on a number of fronts to speed it on its way and to set up the ground work for a new society. This was an unsettling period. Groups such as IDASA were making diplomatic forays into neighbouring countries to meet leaders in exile, And they would set up events locally to report back. On one occasion we met several very cautious local activitists. One was a women, Marion Sparg, white, who had set a bomb in the Cambridge Police Station toilets.
I remember seeing the bomb damage of three bombs in and near East London. All very small, but having a rebellious punch. One was outside the Golden Egg in Oxford Street. Another at the building used by Rhodes University in the lower city centre. The third at Mdantsane Post Office.
Remember that while great progress was made at some levels in dismantling apartheid, leaders of “independent homelands” had their own issues and could resort to violence to assert dominance. My father had been the architect while working for the council for the Mdantsane Post Office, now within the republic of Ciskei. One day we heard that a bomb had gone off within it. I went to look. Minor damage. Fallen ceilings and a brick wall had shifted.
But then rebellion broke out against the Ciskei regime. ALL public buildings were set on fire plus a number of private businesses and some industries outside of the Ciskei boundaries in nearby Fort Jackson (roughly where our Miller ancestors had lived). I had been intending to go to the regional capital of Bisho to see the tenders for the bomb damage work, but hesitated for a few days. When I did get there, the whole of the commercial – administrative part of Mdantsane looked like something out of a Beirut war documentary. (Lebanon was the violent Middle East hotspot at the time). The concrete strong room had had its heavy iron door prized open – the concrete spalling in the heat. Small safes sat looted and with bullet holes. We were told they were shot at by the police. Anyway we got a greatly increased project out of it.
The pictures that follow are from the late 1980's and show Mdantsane's town centre. Nearby the Post Office were shops and a shebeen (drinking hall). I include these to show the context as to what followed. It is impossible to try to analyse this in political terms and I will not try, but at least they record the setting in time.
Mdantsane Post Office prior to the troubles. The "forecourt" is bustling with activity. Street stalls of vegetables and other necessities.
A large colourful mosaic by Elaine Savage depicts local life.
It is worth considering the context of life here. The bus company was run by the Ciskei government and carried residents between jobs in East London and other surrounding areas and Mdantsane. A massive mini-bus industry flourished here as well and those who did not catch them trekked accross to the railway station some distance away.
Look to the side and you see an array of other stalls waiting to tempt customers coming off the busses. Here we see blanket, even mattresses and a be frame. This is commerce at its rawest. Such markets also existed within East London, such as in Buffalo Street, but that was more curtailed by officialdom. Those with jobs coming into contact with those hoping for a sale of some kind. Goods and food bought wholesale or second hand or from the "black market" and resold with minimal profit.
At this time Mdantsane had a population of about 500 000, about the same as East London (including other races) and it stretched off across the hills, rows and rows of almost identical small houses.
Between the town centre and Post Office was some open space and someone has taken the opportunity to grow mielies (maize).
Initiative takes many forms. House plans drawn. Barney's clothing very cheap. M & R Signs (including car number plates).
Life was tough. The independence of Ciskei brought no real benefits to the average resident and in some ways entrenched apartheid under another regime.
Bisho on the other hand had some impressive developments. We did not manage to get some of that architectural work, but did go there for work related meetings. It had a stadium, new hotels, an airport...
But it was also a different world to the life of the common man and woman and one night every single government related building in Mdantsane was torched as well as factories in nearby Fort Jackson industrial area and some properties of envied Mdantsane better off residents. It looked like a war zone.
The following picture are of the Mdantsane Post Office, the very one that we had been asked to renovate due to minor bomb damage. Now it was almost, not quite, destroyed.
My father doing a preliminary site assessment accompanied by a government representative.
This side appeared almost unscarred - except for a burnt out car.
Besides doing government workshops we did some private houses for professional black people. They still needed to live apart within allocated areas in Mdantsane. One of our clients was a doctor. We visited that of a family who owned a chemist chain (amongst others) This was in fact very impressive and we even held a fund raising event there for our childrens Montesorri pre-school. (Apartheid was at that time showing signs of fading).
Later architectural projects include the East London City hall restorations and work on the '70s magistrates court building.
The City Council had begun to modernise the city hall using in house architects. A councillor had recognised the follow of the methods and contacted us – my father because of his National Monuments involvement and me because of my conservation knowledge. We advised a specialist architect and full proper restoration with minimal change to suit changing needs and sustainability. I was then employed as site architect under that specialist, John Rennie. This subject arises here in its political context. The building had been erected in 1896 to inspire colonial pride. Now we were entering an era of socio-political change. I sat on a gable and witnessed vast marches down Oxford Street led by the likes of Bishop Tutu. Marshals in fake army gear and some carrying fake weapons; a few made from plumbing. The project had been funded by central government. One of the last to be so funded as it already saw the change of regime coming. What would a new society think of this expense on such a building?
I made sure that my eldest daughter watched Mandela walk to freedom on tv. She was just old enough to remember it. Apartheid fell and Mandela took power. We watched the long queues at elections and then his inauguration on TV. Then the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was set up. It met in the City Hall when it was held locally. It appears that it took on a new aura amongst the previously excluded. It was to host many an event of other races or without the context of race at all. But if the project had stalled or been planned too late, this may never have happened. The two cannon used to quell the Basutoland Uprising and had stood outside for generations quietly never replaced. The mounted soldier of the war memorial still stands proudly in front. A statue of Steve Biko since added to below the clock tower. I waited in the crowd to see Mandela arrive to address them (although business called and I missed the actual event, I did get a fleeting view of him).
The magistrates courts had been designed in the '70s at the height of apartheid by George Albert. Now as apartheid ended much need to be undone. We were commissioned. Each of the courts of white magistrates (no jury) was symmetrical. The public came in at different sides from different corridors depending on race. The accused were usually held in cells in the basement segregated by gender and race. An underground tunnel led through to the police station. Main entrances from the street were also separate. Other public facilities such as pensions were not quite as vehemently separate, but still so signed. I was project architect. An interesting experience. Roof flashing, a judge's wallet and other items stolen during the works. We programmed the works so that most activities continued to operate so this all happened with public, adminsitrative officials and even magistrates and judges were in the building. (Judges were on a travelling circuit system and only used this court on this basis). I was to use the courts only twice myself. Once to try to reclaim unpaid architects fees. And to be a witness when we had been robbed at home and the culprit caught.
When I wrote my book, The Urban Trail, I was very conscious of its white orientation in terms of architects, property owners, examples of authority, industry and anecdotes. When I rewrote it I aimed to rectify that. Unfortunately it remains in rough draft on stiffy disks as we then emigrated. I kept that old pc that could read stiffies for some years, but it is difficult to set it up here in the UK and I dumped it. A full print out of the draft is amongst my books although it does not have illustrations. That draft though is recognition of the many craftsmen of other colours and of the sheer muscle-power of labour that went into creating the architecture and form of East London. And it covers all of greater East London too. While it does not aim to be a history book nor one about politics as such it does include key events including those of arson and violence. It was very startling to record all such events in just the East London and surrounding areas during my lifetime. [The Urban Trail - a walk through East London's Central business District and older suburbs. 1989. Still available on 2nd hand book websites].
It is now well over 20 years since we emigrated to Scotland (1999). So many of our friends have done likewise. Between us we have personally known 20 people who have been murdered over many years. We less in touch these days so These are not apartheid related, well not directly. My parents maid by a woman jealous of her liaison with her man. The man who played the keyboard at our parents wedding. The man who took our photos at ours. A university friend shot on the doorstep of his Wild Coast holiday cottage one New Year. Politics may be the cause in some ways. Or the solution. But the causes are social and economic. How do you resolve all that?
Just in those 18 years of marriage, building a house and having two daughters, we got robbed on average about once a year. Car radios. Hose pipes. Clothes from the washline. My car was taken from the garage one night (it still didn't have garage doors yet). They managed to hot-wire it, but could not release the steering column and didn't get far. A neighbour was woken by his dog and went after them with a revolver. We were woken with loud knocking on the door by the police. And break-ins. Although I had fixed down the windows with restrictors, they managed to break the glass and twist the wooden frames. Each time I added more. One Sunday morning after some great time on the beach we returned to find the kitchen door open. A great deal had been taken down to the river, close to the bottom of the garden. Bedding, tv etc. While we awaited the police, a young guy wandered in, apparently not realising that we were back. He fled into the bush and I gave chase in my flip-flop sandals but was soon asthmatic. The police arrived and looked around. But the dog squad had arrived from a different direction and scoured to bush. He saw them and kept quiet. He, then thinking they had gone off raised his head. And they had him. A very young meek looking guy and very likely working with others who had disappeared. While he was interrogated in the garden I fetched the hoard from the river bank. My paddle ski had been taken as a means of getting it across the shallow water. I then joined the police and the family talking to the thief. We noticed that he was wearing my wife's watch. Some jewellery and my watch given to me by her were never recovered. I attended the trial accompanied by a daughter in one of the courtrooms I had recently helped renovate and remove all signs of apartheid from.
The Code Blue security sign on our garage. (The bars over the outdoor light were to protect it against netballs being played by the kids. The ring was just above it).
One morning I had just started work in our office in Devereux Avenue, when I got an urgent call from Ines. Please come immediately. I rushed back. We had recently extended the house. She had been lying in bed reading the Daily Dispatch which would have been flung down the front path. Someone had walked into the room. Fortunately he was greatly surprised to find someone still there at that time of day and he fled. But he returned to “negotiate” with her. But as the room was new the keys were still in the locks. She jumped up and just in time was able to lock the door from the inside. By this time our maid, Sylvia had arrived for her day's work. And as he rushed past her she screamed at him. We were indebted to her arriving just then. We never caught that intruder.
What we did do was to immediately get panic alarms installed around the house. 5 in all with press buttons in easily accessible, but not obvious places such as behind curtains. All this was transferred by wireless signal to CODE BLUE armed security who had a presence in the suburb and claimed a 10 minute response. Not sure how effective that timing would be, but way better than a police response. And with fewer scruples about using their arms. We felt a bit better although constantly nervous about setting it off accidentality.
This whole episode scared us. For years my wife had asked to take the family to move to Scotland, her country of origin. I though with the business, love of wildlife, the beach, paddle skiing etc resisted. But now it was me that insisted on emigrating. And we are all now completely settled and integrated here. At this point our parents moved into this house and my brother moved into the Selborne house.
WIKIPEDIA - BISHO MASSACRE : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bisho_massacre
