WITH less than two years to go before South Africa’s second democratic elections, the murder of five African National Congress members including two elected councillors in Richmond is a threat to more than just peace in the Natal Midlands.
It is proof that sinister forces bent on subverting democracy are still active in South Africa, whether in the form of thugs masquerading as politicians or third force conspirators seeking to fan the flames of conflagration.
It is an ominous indication that the emergence of Bantu Holomisa’s National Consultative Forum as a rival to the ANC could bring with it a murderous turf war just as the Inkatha Freedom Party-ANC hatchet is at last being buried. It would be tempting to conclude that, as these killings happened in the wake of the ANC’s trashing of the Sifiso Nkabinde faction in local government by-elections, our country is too fragile to accommodate party-political rivalry and that the depths of political intolerance are vast. That would be a mistake because it is exactly what the conspiratorial forces would want us to believe by inciting communities to war.
There is only one way to answer the critics and prevent a potential rerun of the war that erupted in KwaZulu/Natal in the mid- Eighties. The survival of our democracy requires that the culprits be brought to book as soon as possible and be put in jail for a long time.
Given the casual attitude that some people seem to adopt to capital offences, the wisdom of a “special amnesty” for KwaZulu- Natal appears more questionable than ever. Nkabinde, who has been repeatedly implicated in violence in the Midlands, is one who has benefitted from this unprecedented write-off of the bloody debts of the past.
Perhaps we will live to regret not putting the warlords behind bars where they belong.
The failure to make people account for heinous crimes spawned the war of the Eighties. Killers identified by witnesses and victims were free to walk the streets and burn and murder with impunity. Now, as never before, the forces of law and order must act to prevent a new erosion of public trust in the system of justice. We need to prove that democracy works.
Political parties need to discipline their followers to prevent an escalation into a no-win cycle of retaliation and counter- retaliation. The attacks on Holomisa’s supporters returning from a rally on the East Rand two weeks ago should have been vociferously condemned by the ANC.
It is time again for leaders to plea for tolerance and for the right of people to freely associate and support the organisations of their choice. Political leaders who indulge in bloodletting and intimidation as an alternative to reasoned argument and building support from constituencies should be made to pay for what they have done.