Mandela Urges Talks to Plan for ‘a New Era’ : South Africa: The jailed black leader still backs armed struggle. But he stresses negotiations with the government.

Jailed black nationalist Nelson R. Mandela, in his first major policy statement since his trial 26 years ago, has reiterated his commitment to the armed liberation struggle “as a legitimate form of self-defense,” but he says he wants to bring the African National Congress and the white minority-led government to the negotiating table.

The lengthy document, published Thursday by the left-wing Cape Town weekly South, offers rare insight into the thinking of Mandela, the 71-year-old leader of the ANC.

Sources close to Mandela say the document was written last year, presented to Pieter W. Botha, who was then the president of South Africa, at their meeting in July and later read to anti-apartheid leaders who visited Mandela in prison.

“The overwhelming majority of South Africans, black and white, hope to see the ANC and the government working closely together to lay the foundations for a new era in our country, in which racial discrimination and prejudice, coercion and confrontation, death and destruction, will be forgotten,” Mandela says, according to the text published in South. He urges the government to seize the opportunity without delay.

Mandela has since written another, secret peace proposal for his colleagues in the outlawed ANC. This proposal, described as a 10-point peace plan, is under consideration by the ANC’s national executive at its exile headquarters in Lusaka, Zambia.

Mandela is expected to be released within weeks from Victor Verster Prison, where he is serving a life sentence for sabotage. Justice Minister Kobie Coetsee, in an interview this week, said the government intends to free Mandela and that the only question is “when and under what circumstances.”

In a separate development Thursday, anti-apartheid leaders made public a letter from Mandela in which he said the ANC remains committed to nationalizing banks, mines and monopoly industries. Any change in that policy is inconceivable, Mandela said.

The letter was published by leaders of the United Democratic Front, an anti-apartheid coalition with close ties to the ANC. Front spokesman Patrick Lekota said Mandela wanted to clarify his position on economic issues because of suggestions that he and the external ANC leadership are in conflict.

“Black economic empowerment is a goal we fully support and encourage, but in our situation state control of certain sectors of the economy is unavoidable,” Mandela said in the letter.

In the policy statement published by South, Mandela said he was “acting on my own initiative, in the hope that the (ANC) will, in due course, endorse my action.”

He stressed that his decision to urge the government to negotiate with the ANC was not an attempt at negotiation, and said, “Negotiation on political matters is literally a matter of life and death which (must) be handled by the (ANC) itself through its appointed representatives.”

He added: “My task is a very limited one, and that is to bring the country’s two major political bodies to the negotiating table. No prisoner, irrespective of his status or influence, can conduct negotiations of this nature from prison.”

No one knows for sure what role the country’s most-respected political prisoner will play in the liberation movement once he is released. Mandela has described himself as “a loyal and disciplined member of the ANC,” and he has been meeting with government leaders since 1986. Sources in the anti-apartheid movement say Mandela will probably form part of its negotiating team.

President Frederik W. de Klerk has promised to create a climate for negotiations, and a detailed plan is expected when Parliament convenes next week.

De Klerk and his Cabinet are seeking ways to lift the 30-year ban on the ANC.