ANC Planning Protest After Burial of Hani

The African National Congress announced plans Friday for a campaign of civil disobedience to white authority as South Africa prepared for a fresh outpouring of grief over assassinated black leader Chris Hani.

But President Frederik W. de Klerk said his government will not give in to “blackmail” and warned that his government will take the necessary steps to maintain order.

Nelson Mandela’s ANC and its labor union allies said they will embark on a mass campaign starting Tuesday, the day after Hani’s funeral, unless multi-party negotiators meet demands to set an early date for the first non-racial elections. Hani, head of the Communist Party and a top ANC official, was assassinated last Saturday by a white gunman.

A similar campaign last May led to the deaths of scores of people in clashes with police and between rival black groups.

Asked whether the mass action call amounts to a civil disobedience campaign, ANC Secretary General Cyril Ramaphosa said, “Yes.”

De Klerk said his government remains committed to democracy negotiations. “It (the government) will not, however, be blackmailed,” he added in a statement.

His ruling National Party said the call is a recipe for disaster and a dangerous strategy and said there are signs that attitudes are hardening on all sides of the political spectrum.

Mass marches are planned in Johannesburg and Pretoria today and memorials are set for Sunday in sprawling Soweto township before Hani’s burial Monday near his home in the Johannesburg satellite town of Germiston.

Police will be given powers to arrest without a warrant, detain without trial and impose curfews.

Tens of thousands of people are expected to flood into Johannesburg in fleets of buses, taxis and special trains for what is likely to be the biggest funeral in South African history.