Analysts and political parties agreed on Monday that right-wing elements who had ”declared war” on the government and were plotting to overthrow it by armed force posed little real danger.
Although they could wage a limited terror campaign, blow up a few buildings and murder some prominent people, no one Sapa spoke to believed they could either overthrow the South African government or stay in power if they succeeded.
Former Freedom Front leader General Constand Viljoen said he did not rate the threat as serious.
”I don’t believe they pose much of a threat. The government is somewhat overreacting,” he told Sapa.
However, Viljoen, who retired from politics in 1999 and is now tending his farm, said the Afrikaner was dissatisfied under the current dispensation.
Stopping to say that the Afrikaner community was too riven to speak with one voice, Viljoen said Afrikaners were being ignored.
”They are being ignored as a minority and enjoy few collective rights. The rights are enshrined in the constitution but have not been given to the Afrikaner. Therefore they have reason to be dissatisfied, but I must hasten to add not reason to overthrow the government by armed force.”
He said reasons for discontent included perceptions that some crime was anti-Afrikaner — particularly farm attacks — fears of Zimbabwe-style land reform and affirmative action.
Centre for Policy Studies political analyst Dumisani Hlophe said the rightwingers involved in the plot were politically naive.
”I don’t want to describe them as a bunch of lunatics, but they lack any political understanding if they think they can launch a coup d’etat and hope to sustain it.”
Hlophe said democracy in South Africa was too far advanced for anyone, black or white, to take and hold power by armed force. South Africa’s transition had also been so broad-based that the current regime enjoyed all-round legitimacy and had the loyalty of the police and armed forces. This was borne out by reports that many police officers and soldiers approached by the plotters reported on them instead.
Ten of the plotters have already been charged with high treason and offences under the Internal Security Act and an eleventh was arrested on Sunday after a truck containing explosive ingredients and ammunition was impounded at Lichtenburg in the North West.
In terms of documents sent to some political parties, the dissidents intended to re-establish the Boer republics that disappeared into history at the signing of a general surrender at Vereeniging a hundred years ago in May.
Far rightwingers have never stopped dreaming of undoing the peace treaty that ended the devastating Anglo South African War.
Several attempts have been made to resurrect them in some form, notably the 1914 rebellion, and Robey Leibrandt’s campaign — with Nazi support — during World War Two.
Although both enjoyed limited support from within the regular security forces, all were swiftly put down by loyal police and the military’s reserve component.
University of Stellenbosch political scientist Hennie Kotze said the timing of the plot related to the larger number of disaffected Afrikaners with little to lose in comparison to the late 1980s when there was also a right-wing threat to constitutional order. Then, many had mortgages to service and hire-purchases to pay. Now many had lost their jobs or farms; and hope, he said.
Even so, only a small element would be able to drop out of society and start an armed campaign. Their effect would be determined by what weapons and how many explosives they could lay their hands on.
Kotze feared that their indirect effect could be more damaging than the physical damage the dissidents could inflict.
He said any sabotage and murder campaign could be detrimental to internal and external investment, would drive down the rand, chase up food prices and increase general discontent.
”This is the medium- to long term danger,” he said.
”My research shows there has been a disconcerting decline in confidence in the state among whites in general, and Afrikaners in particular, since 1990. This is one reason the economy is not growing. Instead of investing, the wealthy are taking billions out of the country. They are creating problems for themselves.”
An even greater danger lay on the left of the political spectrum, where still-amorphous leftwing groupings were emerging and were beginning to organise disaffected black communities around issues such as land, privatisation and poverty.
Kotze said Mbeki’s handling of Zimbabwe, and debates around land ownership were also problematic.
The leaders of the two rightwing parties represented in Parliament urged the government not to overreact.
Freedom Front leader Dr Pieter Mulder said, while it would be stupid to ignore the threat, the government’s response should be wise and considered, as the plotters only had limited support.
Afrikaner Eenheidsbeweging leader Cassie Aucamp said his party rejected attempts by radicals to overthrow the government by violence or armed resistance. South Africa’s problems had to be solved by constitutional and political means.
However, the AEB considered the incidence of a so-called ”right-wing violent resistance” to be an isolated phenomenon within a limited circle, without any significant power base. – Sapa