8 Die as S. Africa Police Fire on Protest; Hundreds Hurt

In an upsurge of violent racial clashes, South African police opened fire Monday on tens of thousands of black protesters in the township of Sebokeng, killing eight and injuring hundreds.

The trouble, reflecting growing black-white tensions in South Africa over the pace of reform, occurred after about 30,000 demonstrators gathered outside township municipal offices to protest high rents and poor living conditions.

A judge earlier had denied permission for the protest marches in Sebokeng and the neighboring Sharpeville township. The Sebokeng demonstrators presented a petition to a police commander Monday morning and--less than half an hour later--the authorities opened fire with birdshot, which can be fatal at close range, rubber bullets and tear gas, witnesses said.

Hospital officials in Sebokeng, about 25 miles south of Johannesburg, said eight people were killed and more than 350 others were injured. Police said they received reports of four deaths but were unable to confirm any.

Sporadic clashes with police continued throughout the day in Sebokeng and Sharpeville, where police used tear gas to disperse thousands of protesters who threw rocks at the municipal offices and police station.

At dusk, police reported their patrols “coming under constant attack, mainly by stone-throwing mobs” in Sebokeng. Residents erected barricades of burning tires to keep authorities out of the township, and witnesses said whites in unmarked cars were cruising the township, firing randomly. Municipal offices and a service station owned by a council member in Sebokeng were gutted by fire.

The clashes came amid one of the bloodiest periods since the upheaval of 1984-86 in South Africa. Police have reported more than 220 deaths and 2,000 incidents of unrest throughout the country since President Frederik W. de Klerk legalized the African National Congress, his government’s chief opponent, Feb. 2 and freed black nationalist Nelson R. Mandela from prison nine days later.

Over the weekend, as townships buried two dozen blacks killed last week in factional fights and confrontations with police, 15 more people were killed in continuing strife between rival black groups in Natal province. Police said eight of those deaths came during one fight between supporters of the ANC and those of the rival Inkatha movement.

Anti-apartheid leaders blame the wave of unrest on the frustrations of people who until recently have been denied the right to publicly protest their dismal living conditions and corruption in their township councils. Leaders of the ANC-aligned Mass Democratic Movement (MDM) and United Democratic Front (UDF) have called for peaceful demonstrations to keep pressure on the government, but so far they have been powerless to halt the escalating violence.

“What is taking place now is more or less outside and beyond what was anticipated by the movement,” Patrick Lekota, the front’s publicity secretary, was quoted as saying last week.

The trouble seems certain to further delay the lifting of the 45-month-old state of emergency, which the ANC has demanded as a precondition for negotiations with the government to draw up a new constitution that will end white minority-led rule and give blacks a vote. Preliminary talks with the government about the ANC’s preconditions are scheduled for April 11 in Cape Town.

The emergency decree gives police broad powers to quell unrest and detain activists, with little or no judicial review, and more than 150 people have been detained in recent weeks.

The Mass Democratic Movement called for calm and discipline among its supporters Monday, but it blamed the Sebokeng violence on police officers whose “presence excited the situation.”

Some of the movement’s leaders contend that right-wing factions in the police force, unhappy with De Klerk’s recent reform initiatives, are attempting to sabotage the government’s peace efforts.

Law and Order Minister Adriaan Vlok urged whites Monday to refrain from taking the law into their own hands, and he promised to reinforce police patrols in Sebokeng and other area townships. Right-wing whites living near the troubled townships have launched several indiscriminate attacks on blacks since a white motorist was killed by a black mob near Sharpeville two weeks ago.

“We do not need hot heads, but cool heads,” Vlok told white community leaders and senior police officers in the industrial town of Vanderbijlpark. “I would really urge people seriously to desist from forming themselves into vigilante groups.”

The area including Sebokeng, known as the Vaal triangle, has been the scene of some of the most violent clashes in South African history. The region was a flash point for bloody riots in 1984-86 and--30 years ago last week--police in Sharpeville killed 67 black demonstrators.

Police also said Monday that council offices in Soweto, South Africa’s largest black township, were attacked late Sunday night by rocket-propelled grenades, causing some damage but no injuries. Three limpet mines were later detonated at a Johannesburg power station.

The authorities said they suspected that ANC guerrillas were responsible for the attacks.