De Klerk Visits U.S.; a Reward for Reforms

President Frederik W. de Klerk on Sunday reaped one of the rewards for spearheading social and political reform in his homeland, becoming the first South African head of state welcomed in an official visit to Washington since 1945.

It was only a few days ago that he toured this huge black township, looking in on a migrant workers’ hostel reeking of human waste, a primary school and a new shopping center where he stopped to buy a pack of Camel Lights.

When he appeared at the door of a neat yellow stucco home, he surprised Henrietta Mafokosho by asking if she’d give him and his wife a house tour.

“I was shivering,” Mafokosho, 21, recalled. “I couldn’t believe such a great man was here in my house, shaking my hand. He’s a nice guy.”

There haven’t been many white South African leaders in this troubled country’s history whom Sowetans would call great men--or even, for that matter, nice guys. But De Klerk is like none before him.

Since he was sworn into office a year ago last week, the 54-year-old head of state has shaken up South Africa and the world with his stunning reform program.

Upon his arrival at Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington on Sunday, he quoted civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. and declared that his nation is on “a great journey” toward full democracy.

A smiling De Klerk, recalling the words of King, said: “Peace and freedom are the goals of all men. South Africa has embarked on a great journey. It is a journey for full democracy at home, and abroad full participation in the family of nations.”

He added that “the new South Africa is at hand” and promised that the “walls of apartheid are coming down.”

De Klerk, who meets President Bush today, has said his mission is to persuade Americans that he is serious about reform.

“Many people (in America) are still looking at South Africa through glasses they should have discarded by now,” De Klerk said before embarking on his trip. He added that it would be “a great challenge to change the image burned into their minds by years and years” of violent scenes from South Africa on their television screens.

But the trip comes as De Klerk’s program to dismantle apartheid and begin negotiations, warmly welcomed both here and abroad, runs into its most serious difficulties since the government opened talks with the African National Congress in May.

A month of factional violence in Johannesburg-area townships has left more than 760 dead and put new obstacles on the road to peace. De Klerk has sent extra police into the townships in Operation Iron Fist, which seemed to halt the trouble, at least temporarily.

The president also ordered razor wire put up around flash points of trouble, prepared to impose curfews beginning Tuesday and declared a 10-day amnesty for the surrender of dangerous weapons.

The ANC has criticized the crackdown, saying it amounts to a reimposition of the state of emergency and is designed to repress legitimate political activity. The ANC blames the current violence on right-wing white agitators who are stoking black fighting to undermine the peace process.

De Klerk says the fighting stems primarily from ethnic and political differences among blacks, although he says it is possible other, unknown, forces are behind some of the attacks.

Incidents of unrest have increased sharply since De Klerk normalized black political activity by legalizing the ANC and other black organizations in a landmark speech Feb. 2.

The rising expectations of blacks living in ghettos has touched off hundreds of demonstrations. Some have been peaceful but others have been broken up with police tear gas and bullets.

A recent judicial inquiry recommended that charges be brought against three dozen black and white police officers who killed five demonstrators without provocation in Sebokeng during a March protest.

The scenes of unrest have been replayed nightly for nervous whites on state-run television, driving many into the lap of the government’s right-wing political opponents.

Adding to De Klerk’s woes is the almost daily criticism from militant white groups who complain that whites suspected in right-wing attacks and bombings have been detained without cause and tortured while in custody. Police officials express private fears for De Klerk’s life.

The growing power of the right wing has put pressure on the president to prove that his reforms will be good for the country’s whites in the long run.

“De Klerk tries to project an image of sweet reasonableness, and he’s done it successfully,” said Sampie Terreblanche, a political analyst at Stellenbosch University. “But in the next six months, he’ll have to deliver some of that sweetness.”

Most analysts agree that the lifting of economic and other sanctions against South Africa would go a long way toward easing the anxieties of whites, who have been financially and emotionally hurt by the campaign to isolate them from the West’s markets, culture and sports fields.

ANC Deputy President Nelson Mandela, during a U.S. tour in June, won assurances from many congressional leaders that sanctions will remain in place until apartheid reform is irreversible. The ANC says that point has not yet been reached.

So far, De Klerk has said he’s disappointed that foreign governments have refused “to acknowledge that the process in South Africa has become irreversible. We sincerely say . . . there will be a new constitution. And that constitution will be fair and just.

“The time is right for the international community to re-evaluate the situation and to put their money where their mouths are,” De Klerk added.

The president said, though, that he did not come to the United States “with hat in hand” to plead for an end to sanctions. “That will take care of itself as South Africans prove that we mean business,” he said.

Sanctions against South Africa, passed over President Reagan’s veto in 1986, are among the most severe Pretoria faces. The American law outlines specific steps that must be taken by the South African government before the Administration can consider removing those sanctions.

The Bush Administration believes De Klerk has met most of those conditions. One obstacle will be removed when the government releases about 2,500 political prisoners. The government and the ANC have agreed on a plan to identify and release those activists, beginning in a matter of weeks.

A more formidable obstacle is the lifting of the state of emergency in Natal province. Three years of black faction fighting in Natal between supporters of Mandela’s ANC and Mangosuthu Gatsha Buthelezi’s Inkatha Freedom Party has killed nearly 4,000 people.

Even if De Klerk receives no promises from Washington, the trip still will be heralded back home as a major diplomatic breakthrough. The last South African leader to visit the United States was Gen. Jan Smuts, in 1945, three years before the National Party came to power.

Many white South Africans have chafed under the diplomatic and economic isolation engendered by their country’s system of apartheid, which segregates neighborhoods, schools and hospitals and denies the black majority a vote in national affairs.

Since 1983, the number of American firms doing business in South Africa has dropped from 386 to 129. Nevertheless, many South Africans still admire Americans and delight in American entertainment and products.

Two of the most popular programs on state-run television are “LA Law” and “thirtysomething.” Theaters here show many American movies. And South Africans snap up everything from American canned goods to computers--despite mark-ups that average 400% of the U.S. sales price.

De Klerk’s promises to negotiate a new constitution that will end apartheid and extend voting rights to black people has greatly improved Pretoria’s relations with the United States, Europe and Africa. But that has yet to translate into trade agreements to aid South Africa’s sagging economy. Many foreign governments are looking for more concrete signs of change.

The president already has promised that the next session of Parliament, which opens in February, 1991, will scrap the Group Areas Act, a pillar of apartheid that carves the country into separate neighborhoods for blacks, mixed-race Coloreds, Indians and whites.

He has moved less quickly on opening schools. White public schools will be allowed to open their doors to blacks next year if 72% of a school’s parents agree. But the government still maintains veto power and, even in integrated schools, whites still will get first choice for openings.

De Klerk has been heartened, though, by the warm reception many blacks in South Africa have given to his reform program. The graffiti artists in South Africa’s townships have splattered his first initials--”Viva F. W.”--next to their anti-apartheid slogans.

And recent opinion polls suggest that if a multiracial election were held today, the white Afrikaner president would get one in five black votes. (Mandela would get three of the other four.)

De Klerk was cheered by hundreds of Sowetans during his recent tour here. Many were surprised to hear him admit that the conditions of many township residents, especially those living in the hostels that have been the flash points of recent violence, “were absolutely unacceptable.”

“My impression is that so much needs to be done,” he said.

He had told Soweto primary school pupils that he and “other leaders, the black leaders, all of us, are trying to work out a new South Africa in which you will be able to live happily.”

And at least some Sowetans were impressed by his sincerity.

“A lot of people in the township really like F. W. They believe in him,” Henrietta Mafokosho said. “And they believe that in a few years, everything will be OK.”

Times staff writer Jim Mann, in Washington, contributed to this story.