Cheering Crowds Greet Mbeki in Johannesburg : But Celebration for Freed ANC Chairman Nearly Turns to Riot

Govan Mbeki, chairman of the outlawed African National Congress, received a tumultuous welcome from hundreds of blacks when he arrived here on Friday after his release from 24 years in prison for attempting to overthrow South Africa’s minority white government.

Cheering, chanting youths mobbed Mbeki, 77, and his wife, Epainette, 71, when they arrived from the coastal city of Port Elizabeth, where he was freed Thursday by the South African authorities in a move apparently intended to promote negotiations on the country’s future.

“Viva Mbeki! Viva ANC! Viva South African Communist Party!” the exuberant youths chanted as Mbeki, a top party as well as ANC leader, emerged from Johannesburg’s Jan Smuts International Airport. Women ululated with joy to celebrate Mbeki’s release, and he was surrounded by a forest of upraised arms and clenched fists as he moved through the busy airport.

Riot Averted at Airport

Among those greeting Mbeki were Winnie Mandela, the wife of Nelson Mandela, and Albertina Sisulu, the wife of Walter Sisulu, two other top ANC leaders with whom Mbeki was convicted of sabotage and sentenced to life imprisonment and who are still jailed.

They were joined by community leaders, clergymen, anti-apartheid activists and labor union officials--a testimony to Mbeki’s considerable stature as a 50-year veteran of the ANC.

But the welcome nearly turned into a riot as police, caught up in the tightly pressed crowd surrounding Mbeki’s car and struggling to restore order, called for reinforcements and prepared to charge the crowd with batons and dogs.

“Why should your men be running all over, chasing these people because they have come to meet Mr. Mbeki?” Winnie Mandela, dressed in the ANC’s green, black and gold colors, demanded of a senior police officer. “You are provoking people who have done absolutely nothing and in front of a man who has been in prison for over 23 years.”

Crowds Kept Calm

After further conversation with Priscilla Jana, Mbeki’s lawyer, the police commander ordered his men to pull back, and the Mbeki car left the airport through columns of cheering blacks, followed by police and preceded by Winnie Mandela, who kept the crowds calm and disciplined. Although witnesses reported scattered clashes later, serious trouble was averted.

Both the government and anti-apartheid organizations seem determined to avoid any incidents resulting from Mbeki’s release that would make more difficult the release of Mandela, Sisulu and other imprisoned black nationalists, whose participation is widely seen as essential for the success of any negotiations to resolve the country’s prolonged crisis.

This resolve will probably be tested by the still-tentative plans of anti-apartheid groups for a weekend rally in Soweto, the sprawling black township outside Johannesburg, to greet Mbeki, like Mandela a legendary figure among black youths born long after his 1963 arrest.

Still regarded by the ANC as its national chairman, Mbeki may be asked to play a role in uniting and strengthening the anti-apartheid movement. He declined to discuss his political plans Friday.

Reunited With Wife

“I am not deciding anything--the committee is deciding,” he told newsmen on the plane from Port Elizabeth, referring to anti-apartheid activists making arrangements for him. “There is a state of emergency in this country, so how can you do these things alone? One person can’t--it must be organized.”

Mbeki said he conferred by telephone Friday with his son Thabo Mbeki, the ANC information director at the organization’s headquarters in Lusaka, Zambia, making clear his intention to coordinate all his activities with the ANC leadership in exile.

In Port Elizabeth, he was reunited with his wife, whom he had not seen for several years, and then formally welcomed with a short prayer service at his seaside hotel. During the service, he was urged to “continue the struggle, to continue fighting against apartheid and for a free and democratic South Africa.”

But a planned visit to New Brighton, the black township outside the city where he will live, was postponed until next week. “People from New Brighton said they thought the dust must settle first,” Mbeki explained. “There was still too much excitement in the township from my release.”

Times researcher Michael Cadman, in Port Elizabeth, contributed to this article.