In an attempt to retain some power the National Party will probably reject the winner-takes-all form of democracy, argues Anton Harber
NATIONAL PARTY leader FW de Klerk is likely to make proposals next week for partial, watered-down powersharing after the 1999 general election.
Party insiders say that De Klerk will use the NP’s federal congress at the World Trade Centre to float ideas being developed by the party leadership to counter the ANC proposal to revert to a traditional winner-takes-all democracy at the end of the term of office of the current government of national unity.
One idea being floated is that the party that wins the next national election will form the cabinet and govern the country on a day-to-day basis, but a new multi-party council, called a staatsraad, will deliberate on selected major issues, such as the budget.
NP congresses have seldom been real forums for debate. Rather, they have provided platforms for party leaders to give guidance to members. But it is expected that a number of the
1 200 delegates will voice dissatisfaction with the closeness of NP and ANC leadership in the GNU.
This gets to the heart of the NP’s dilemma as both a part of the GNU and the leading opposition party. “There is a feeling,” one key party official said this week, “that we are losing our identity. The lines between us and the ANC are blurred. The ANC has shifted, so we have to come up with an alternative viewpoint. People say we are becoming meek and mild and sounding too much like the ANC.”
But there is no suggestion that the NP should leave the GNU. “The criticism is not about whether we participate, but on how we do it and how we communicate our role in the GNU,” the party official said.
This is a dilemma reflected in resolutions before the congress. The Northern Transvaal region has proposed that the party “reaffirms its dedicated opposition to the ANC/SACP alliance and its policies”; while the PWV region urges that the NP “ensures effective involvement in the reconstruction and development programme so that it can be propagated as a programme of the GNU and not as an ANC political policy document.”
Since the RDP is an ANC policy document, this is a case of an opposition party trying to adopt the policy of the majority party — hardly the way to define a strong new identity in the build-up to the crucial local government elections later this year.
To deal with this, De Klerk is expected to lead a wave of “ANC-bashing”. One can expect some harsh criticism of ANC policy by party leaders, though they are in an awkward position: tough criticism of government policy can also be turned against them for going along with it in the cabinet.
Congress will also debate some policy issues that will separate the party from the ANC. The most heated are expected to be about abortion and the death penalty.
There are significant minorities in the party who want abortion under wider circumstances than currently allowed and to get rid of the death penalty. But these are two issues on which the party can clearly differentiate itself from the ANC, which supports abortion-on-demand and an abolition of the extreme penalty. A number of party sources have confirmed that they expect tough debate on these issues.
Other issues that the party will home in on are language, education and crime — all the subject of multiple resolutions from regions.
The other major strategic issue is how to become a truly non-racial party. The NP has faced a lot of criticism — both internal and external — for the whiteness of its list of MPs, senators and ministers. The party has to balance its desire to develop a black constituency — the only area in which it can really grow — with the need to hold on to its traditionally white, conservative voters. In the 1994 election, it is estimated the NP won 65 percent of white votes, 60 to 70 percent of coloured and Indian votes, but only three to four percent of the African vote.
“There are two schools of thought,” one NP leader said. “One is that we should consolidate our present power base, do nothing to put it in danger, and after we have done this, we can move into the black community. The other school suggests we start afresh — we must position ourselves as a party which puts its main focus on the black community.
“Everyone agrees we should become a non-racial party. And everyone agrees that our leadership must reflect our black support. It’s a question of strategy.”
It is a tough dilemma for the NP. Choosing to focus on its current constituency would doom it to being forever a minority party, since whites, coloureds and Indians make up only about 27 percent of the electorate. But an African constituency will have different demands on policies such as affirmative action and the RDP.
Although party elections take place at the next meeting of the NP federal council, attention will focus on two emerging black members tipped for leadership posts, MP David Chuenyane and Senator David Malatsi.
Chuenyane said he was working on an affirmative action proposal because he thought this, and the abortion issue, would be the toughest facing the congress.
Most resolutions before the congress point to discomfort with — but not rejection of — affirmative action. Regions are calling for affirmative action to be fair and just and “not reverse discrimination”.
Malatsi said this week that he believed the party needs to “articulate its positions as both a party in the GNU and an opposition”.
“The silence of the NP since the GNU came into being may lead people to think the party has gone underground. But we can’t be a submarine party, we should always be there for the people.
“We have to ask how we can keep stability in the GNU — in the interests of all South Africans — and be an effective opposition.”