The reparations bandwagon is leaving South African shores, gearing itself up to take on international companies for their role in prolonging the former apartheid regime.
The ground-breaking class action against Swiss and United States Banks for bankrolling and benefiting from the apartheid regime comes after years of digging into the role played by these institutions.
Championing the cause is maverick US lawyer Edward Fagan, representing 80 South African plaintiffs, one of whom is Dorothy Molefi, the mother of Hector Petersen, the 13-year-old boy shot by police during the Soweto uprising in June 1976. Fagan made himself unpopular in Switzerland when he took on Swiss banks for Nazi victims, winning a class action suit worth $1,25-billion.
Fagan plans a full-scale attack on a number of international companies linked to the apartheid regime. This is the first class action suit aimed at two giant Swiss Banks, Credit Suisse and UBS, as well as US-based Citicorp.
”The second round will be aimed at German Banks and then American computer companies,” says Fagan. They then plan to look at companies in the oil and vehicle industry. Fagan says the computer companies are being targeted because they provided the technology to the former apartheid government to implement the dompas system.
Recent media reports quote Fagan as saying: ”Every person who suffered under apartheid in South Africa is entitled to a cheque.” But this week Daniel Heeb, assistant for Gloria International Multiconsulting, said they do not want to raise false hopes. There are no cheques in the mail just yet. ”People should not be hopeful that if we file the action in two years’ time they will receive $2 000. We cannot say what amount they will receive.”
Heeb says South Africans should call the telephone hotline set up to take their contact details. A questionnaire will then be sent to them and, based on their answers, a decision will be made if they qualify to be added to the suit.
He says there is no guarantee that the reparations will be paid on an individual level because it may come in the form of funds for society.
The class action comes as a final resort after repeated demands for companies to account for their crimes and activities in support of the apartheid regime.
”None of these companies have made or paid reparations, compensation or restitution to the South African population, whose victimisation and damages were made possible by them,” says Heeb. ”None of these companies went before the Truth and Reconciliation Committee to account for their wrongful acts and to have proper damages assessed against them.”
The Swiss government has dismissed the suit saying it was not part of the United Nations and was therefore free of embargo obligations. It also scoffed at the suit, saying it was a Fagan plan to argue that the Swiss companies acted immorally at the time.
Fagan received a shocking reaction from Swiss protestors last Monday who sabotaged his press conference in Switzerland by jeering that this was another attempt to tarnish Switzerland’s good name and image.
Fagan in his complaint links the apartheid regime to Nazi ideology at the time. ”In 1948, in the wake of the Nazi Holocaust… a racially exclusive government led by supporters of a Nazi victory in World War II, took power in South Africa.”
The complaint makes it clear that the companies cannot be excluded from calls for reparation. Colonel Craig Williamson, letter-bomb killer, at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission gave evidence that confirmed the relationship. ”Our weapons, ammunition, uniforms, vehicles, radios and other equipment were all developed and provided by industry. Our finances and banking were done by bankers who even gave us credit cards for covert operations.”
Fagan maintains in his complaint that were it not for the conspiracy of these financial institutions and companies, apartheid would not have been possible. ”For justice to be done, the financial institutions and companies that fuelled and made possible the apartheid regime’s reign of terror must account for their sins, crimes and profiteering, just as did the companies that fuelled and made possible the Nazi reign of terror.”