Tutu Asks U.S. Firms to Set S. Africa Deadline

South African Bishop Desmond Tutu met privately here Thursday with the chairmen of two of America’s biggest corporations with ties to South Africa, and later publicly called on American businesses to set a deadline for pulling out of that country if their demands for improved race relations are not met by its government.

Tutu, winner of the 1984 Nobel Peace Prize, met for about an hour Thursday morning with Roger B. Smith, chairman of General Motors, and W. Michael Blumenthal, chairman of Burroughs Corp., to explain his views on the need for American businesses to exert more pressure on the South African government to end apartheid, its system of racial segregation and white minority rule.

GM operates an auto assembly complex in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, and employs 4,400 workers there, while Burroughs has 575 employees in its South African sales and service operations.

Head U.S. Group

Smith and Blumenthal are co-chairmen of a newly formed American business group, the U.S. Corporate Council on South Africa, which has already issued specific demands to the South African government aimed at breaking down some of the worst aspects of apartheid.

The council, which is trying to get South Africa-based corporations to lobby the government on its behalf, is demanding the abolition of rules limiting the freedom of movement of blacks in the country, guarantees of the rights of citizenship and political participation for blacks and an end of restrictions on the property rights of blacks.

But the corporate group, which now has more than 100 U.S. member companies, has not said that its members will pull out of the country if its demands are not met, according to Irving Geller, a spokesman for Burroughs.

“Our general feeling is if you pull out, you lose whatever leverage you had after that point,” Geller said.

But Tutu, who is touring the United States seeking support for the anti-apartheid movement in his country, told the Detroit Economic Club, a major business group, that American firms must set a firm deadline for getting out of South Africa if the white regime fails to agree to a list of demands, similar to those issued by the corporate council, which he feels the corporations must make of the government.

Urges Business Demands

In a luncheon address to the club after his private meeting with Smith and Blumenthal, he said American businesses should call for lifting the present partial state of emergency, withdrawal of South African troops from black townships, release of all political prisoners and detainees, freedom for black workers to have their families live with them in urban areas and the right of black workers to sell their labor freely.

“American corporations should set a deadline for the implementation of the demands . . . and be able to say that if the demands aren’t met, they will pull out,” Tutu said.

“I believe this is our last chance at a reasonably peaceful resolution” of the South African crisis, he added.

Geller said that Tutu made similar points in his private meeting with Smith and Blumenthal, while the two executives briefed Tutu on the activities of the corporate council, which was formed last fall. It was Tutu’s first meeting with the business leaders, Geller said.

Criticizes Sullivan Code

Tutu also criticized the Sullivan Principles, a code of conduct that calls upon American corporations with operations in South Africa to integrate their facilities and improve the status and working conditions of their black employees. (All of the members of the new corporate council have signed the Sullivan Principles, according to GM spokesman Clifford Merriott.)

Tutu said the Sullivan Principles don’t go far enough. “The companies adhering to the Sullivan Principles do good things for the workers in their plants,” he said. “But we don’t want apartheid improved. We want apartheid dismantled.”

Tutu plans to visit Southern California next week.