Bop Is No More, as South Africa Takes Control of ‘Independent’ Black Homeland

The land of Bop is no more.

The so-called Republic of Bophuthatswana, a fictional country that was granted independence by South Africa’s apartheid-era rulers in 1977 and recognized by no one else, has been effectively reclaimed by Pretoria after last week’s violent mass protests and an abortive invasion by a ragtag army of white vigilantes.

Until South Africa’s first elections with universal suffrage are held next month, Tjaart van der Walt, South Africa’s resident ambassador in Mmabatho, will serve as interim administrator of Bop, as the Tswana tribal homeland was usually called.

“The sad fact was that, humanely speaking, the loss of life and property in the homeland could have been prevented,” Van Der Walt told a meeting with civil servants Monday in Mmabatho, the capital. “But we are here to pick up the pieces.”

As a sign of the change, the Independent Electoral Commission, which is in charge of the elections, launched “Operation Access” on Mmabatho’s streets to issue voter identification cards, start voter education programs and designate polling sites for the newly enfranchised population.

Lucas Mangope, Bop’s unpopular former president, was deposed by the multi-party Transitional Executive Council on Sunday after he reneged on an agreement to allow free campaigning by opposition parties.

But Mangope made his first public appearance Monday in Kimberley, safely outside Bop’s former borders, to proclaim he is still “legally and constitutionally” president. He said he is considering suing the South African government.

“They had no right whatsoever to oust me,” he complained at a meeting with white right-wing leaders and Inkatha Freedom Party leader Mangosuthu Gatsha Buthelezi, who still plans to boycott the election.

The group, the remains of the now badly fractured Freedom Alliance, expressed outrage at the “un-Christian, double-crossing betrayal of Mangope by the South African government.” Buthelezi added that his supporters will “fight to the last man” to resist a government dominated by Nelson Mandela’s African National Congress.

ANC officials, officially banned and routinely jailed or harassed in Bop during Mangope’s despotic rule, quickly flooded in to campaign. Mandela, the ANC’s president, will hold his first rally in Mmabatho today, after visits by his former wife, Winnie, and other ANC leaders.

In Bop, at least 24 people were killed and more than 140 wounded before South African troops moved in Saturday to stop street battles, looting and arson by both civilians and Bop security forces as part of an uprising by anti-Mangope protesters. Damages are estimated in the tens of millions of dollars.

In a separate development, Hernus Kriel, the government minister of law and order, revoked a sweeping order he announced Saturday that named 52 cities and towns as “unrest areas” subject to extrajudicial restrictions, including the banning of rallies.

At a supposedly prohibited campaign rally in Wesselton, Mandela complained that Kriel had not consulted him, President Frederik W. de Klerk or the head of the country’s Independent Electoral Commission before issuing the order.

“The amount of confusion and lack of consultation among members of the government is frightening,” Mandela said.