S. Africa Softens Harsh Security Act : Reform: Parliament amends law that allowed police to detain anti-apartheid activists indefinitely without trial. But critics say the changes do not go far enough.

Concluding one of the most remarkable sittings in its history, the South African Parliament voted Friday to sharply amend security laws under which tens of thousands of people--including a few of the lawmakers themselves--have been detained without trial.

The changes in the Internal Security Act did not go far enough for many mixed-race legislators or anti-apartheid organizations, such as the African National Congress. But they agreed that the revised act is a significant step in the right direction.

The security law amendments came on the final day of the 1991 session of Parliament, which handled a record 150 bills, including the repeal of the legal pillars of apartheid and hundreds of other discriminatory laws.

Vestiges of apartheid remain, however. The government still may segregate schools, call a white election, conscript only whites into the army and pay lower retirement pensions to blacks than to whites.

“It’s worrying for me that people all over the world think we have removed all discrimination,” said Jannie Momberg, a member of Parliament from the liberal white Democratic Party.

“The government has made a clear commitment to scrap apartheid, but the principal of a school can still turn a black kid away,” Momberg added. “And until there’s a new constitution, apartheid will remain.”

The Internal Security Act, the last in a long line of security statutes dating to 1950, was among the most notorious laws in South Africa. It gave the white-minority government and its police force the power to detain indefinitely anti-apartheid political activists in solitary confinement, without judicial recourse.

On Friday, Parliament drastically amended Section 29 of the act, which allowed police to detain activists indefinitely for interrogation “until all questions are satisfactorily answered.” The new measures reduce the period of detention from 90 days, renewable indefinitely by the police, to 10 days, renewable only on the order of a judge.

Of the more than 24,000 activists detained under Section 29 over the years, fewer than a quarter were ever charged with a crime, and only 3% were convicted, according to human rights groups. Ruth First, the late wife of Communist Party chief Joe Slovo and subject of the film “A World Apart,” was among activists held in detention for months under the act.

In the worst cases, it was used to torture confessions out of activists. More than 60 people died in detention, including such anti-apartheid luminaries as black-consciousness leader Steve Biko, who was beaten to death in police custody in 1977. Two teen-age activists died in detention last year.

The amendment passed Friday also removed other key parts of the act, including provisions that allowed police to detain a person indefinitely if they needed him as a witness or believed that he was likely to commit a security offense.

It also removed the “consolidated list,” which was used extensively to restrict activists from being quoted, holding parliamentary office or practicing law. And it eliminated a law that made support for communism an offense.

Parliament also excised a provision that allowed the government to “banish” political activists. Among those subjected to that law over the years was Winnie Mandela, wife of ANC leader Nelson Mandela, who was banished to a township, 300 miles from her home in Soweto, for five years during the early 1980s.

The government also erased a statute that empowered it to ban publications and require radical newspapers and magazines to register with the government and pay a $16,000 deposit.

Several other important parts of the security laws were retained, however. Police still are empowered to ban--and forcibly disperse--any political gathering deemed a threat to public safety.

Although all members of Parliament except the right-wing white Conservative Party voted for the security act amendments, some liberal whites and mixed-race lawmakers did so with reservations.

During debate on the measure, mixed-race members of Parliament called for a moment of silence to honor those who had died in detention. Members of President Frederik W. de Klerk’s ruling National Party and the Conservative Party did not stand.

“You sit there and say, ‘We will not ask for forgiveness,’ and you expect us to forget,” said the Rev. Allan Hendrickse, leader of the mixed-race, or Colored, chamber of Parliament. In 1977, Hendrickse reminded Parliament, he had been detained for 60 days in solitary confinement, with only a grass mat and two blankets.

Although the purpose of the detention was to question him, Hendrickse said he was never interrogated. “And what happened to me was light in comparison to other people,” he said. “That’s why I can never accept detention without trial.”

Kobie Coetsee, the minister of justice, told Parliament that he recalled being shocked to learn in 1982 that a white detainee had committed suicide. (Many of those killed in custody were said by the police to have committed suicide.)

“I wondered: had the right things been done, had the proper procedures been followed?” Coetsee said. “Such questions gnaw at you, and you have to have nerves,” he added. “But you also have to have insight, the power to listen, to hear that we need reform of our security legislation.”

The six-month session of Parliament, which ended Friday, erased much of the apartheid legislation passed in the 1950s when the National Party first came to power. Among the statutes to go were acts that segregated residential neighborhoods, prohibited blacks from buying land in 87% of the country and forced all South Africans to be registered by race.

But the ANC and other anti-apartheid organizations contend that Parliament stopped far short of removing discrimination.

“The big debate is not whether you scrap legislation,” said Jan van Eck, a member of the Democratic Party, the liberal opposition to De Klerk in Parliament. “The big debate should be whether people at grass roots experience reform. All we’re doing now is scrapping legislation.”

Residential segregation was removed, for example, but it was replaced with laws allowing neighborhoods to draw up their own “norms and standards,” which the ANC says is apartheid in disguise. Property owners also may refuse to sell to black buyers.

Although the land acts were scrapped, allowing blacks to purchase property anywhere in the country, the government did not restore land to any of the 3.5 million blacks forcibly removed from their homes. Instead, the government set up a land commission, which will hear disputes over land ownership and make non-binding recommendations to De Klerk.

And the law classifying South Africans by race was eliminated, but it applies only to newborns and immigrants. Race listings will remain on the current registration rolls, which have been used to deny blacks the vote and to segregate schools, until the government negotiates a new constitution with the black majority.

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What S. Africa Did--and Didn’t--Do

Main actions taken during 1991 session of South Africa’s Parliament: LAND ACTS: Repealed

Allows blacks to purchase land anywhere in the country for the first time in nearly 80 years.

But does not return land to any of the estimated 3.5 million blacks forcibly removed from their property. GROUP AREAS ACT: Repealed

Allows people of all races to live wherever they want.

But allows neighborhoods to draw up their own “norms and standards” and does not prevent property owners from discriminating against black buyers. POPULATION REGISTRATION ACT: Repealed

Ends practice of classifying all newborn South Africans by race.

But does not do away with the race classification rolls, which now allow government to keep schools segregated, among other things. INTERNAL SECURITY ACT: Amended

Removes laws that let government: bar opponents from public speaking; banish people to distant areas of the country, and force newspapers to register and place $16,000 deposits with government.

But does not eliminate detention without trial. (Period of detention was changed from 90 days, renewable indefinitely by the police, to 10 days, renewable only by court order.)