Ciskei Leader Seeks to Keep Some Power : S. Africa: The future of black homelands has become a major issue in deadlocked talks on a new constitution.

The ruler of Ciskei, Brig. Gen. Oupa Gqozo, accepts that his small patch on the southeast coast will rejoin South Africa, but he wants to retain some power.

Gqozo (pronounced COR-sa) is one of several leaders of South Africa’s black homelands who have increasingly aligned themselves with the white government as insurance for when apartheid ends.

The future of the 10 homelands has become a major issue in South Africa’s deadlocked talks on a new constitution. No matter the outcome, millions of impoverished blacks living in the mostly rural territories face a bleak future.

Black opposition groups such as the African National Congress oppose the homelands as vestiges of apartheid. The ANC wants the homelands stripped of any rights or powers separating them from South Africa.

Gqozo, Bophuthatswana President Lucas Mangope and Kwazulu chief minister Mangosuthu Gatsha Buthelezi--who leads the ANC’s main rival, the Inkatha Freedom Party--seek strong regional or federal powers in a new political system.

Mangope, whose homeland is the most prosperous because of rich platinum deposits and a gambling resort, says he’ll wait to see what happens in South Africa before deciding whether to rejoin.

“We have experienced the fruits of independence,” said Rowan Cronje, a white who is one of Mangope’s top ministers. “To give that up, there must be very good reasons.”

President Frederik W. de Klerk’s government, fearful that an ANC-dominated government would trample the white minority, has promoted a possible federal system that would give ethnic groups in each region more power.

When Ciskeian troops opened fire on ANC marchers Monday, killing 28 and wounding almost 200, De Klerk was meeting with leaders of Kwazulu, Ciskei, Bophuthatswana and other territories to discuss federalism.

Four of the homelands--Bophuthatswana, Ciskei, Transkei and Venda--are considered independent by South Africa.

Their combined 8 million residents lost their South African citizenship but remain dependent on South Africa, which provides most of their income.

Options for the four homelands, which have histories of corruption and coup attempts, in a post-apartheid government range from retaining independence to rejoining a unified South Africa.

The Failed Homeland System

* How it began--In 1960s, the government began stripping millions of blacks of South African citizenship and forcing them to homelands or special regions. The effort was intended to bolster apartheid by providing separate nations for 15 million blacks.

* The future--Both sides agree that homelands should be integrated into South Africa under a new constitution.

Source: Associated Press