African National Congress Meets in Cradle of Apartheid

Not so long ago, this oak-shaded university town in the heart of South Africa’s wine country was the intellectual cradle of the Afrikaner white nationalist movement.

Among the many national leaders who graduated from the Afrikaans-speaking University of Stellenbosch was Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd, who in the 1960s forced black people to live in reservation-style “homelands.” A bust of Stellenbosch graduate and former Prime Minister Daniel Francois Malan -- who coined the term “apartheid” -- is on display in the university’s D.F. Malan Memorial Center.

This is where the ruling African National Congress will meet today to elect its party leadership and outline its national strategy for the next five years. Poverty, economic restructuring and political consolidation will top the list of priorities for the five-day conference.

But the ANC’s choice of venue is proof of the sweeping transformation of this society in the last eight years.

South Africa is a majority-rule nation now, with an emergent black middle class and several wide-ranging affirmative action programs aimed at diversifying industry’s ranks.

The country that worked to disrupt the stability of post-colonial governments throughout sub-Saharan Africa under Verwoerd and other leaders is now the region’s No. 1 peace broker. Although it has been criticized for its support of Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe, South Africa is playing an important role as a mediator in several countries, including Rwanda, Congo and the Ivory Coast.

Perhaps most impressive is the nation’s relatively stable economy. After a long period of divestment and negative growth under the apartheid regime, capital is coming back. The country now has a smaller proportion of debt than many European nations. Its gross national product increased an average of 2.7% annually over the last decade and is expected to hit 3.3% this year. The currency, the rand, is depressed -- but in the last two months it has surged against the dollar.

In a recent speech before business leaders, President Thabo Mbeki recalled the fears of investors and citizens who worried that the transition from apartheid to majority rule that began a decade ago might result in “the country collapsing as a result of a terrible racial conflagration.”

“We are proud to say that, contrary to what some expected, South Africa is today one of the most stable countries in the world, with an entrenched and properly functioning democratic system,” Mbeki said.

Still, daunting and chronic problems plague this nation of 43 million:

* One out of 10 South Africans has the human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS, and Mbeki -- who once rejected HIV’s lethality, though he later moderated his views -- has yet to offer a comprehensive plan to deal with the crisis.

* The nation’s violent crime rate is among the world’s worst and is routinely cited as an obstacle to foreign investment.

* More than a third of South Africans have no jobs. One-fifth don’t have access to clean water, and half don’t have adequate housing. Statistics South Africa, the government’s information clearinghouse, recently released a study showing that the gap between rich and poor has widened since 1994.

“The fact is, there’s a large number of people who are just falling off the edges,” said Paul Graham, executive director of the Institute for Democracy in South Africa. “According to polls, only 9% of South Africans think the government is doing a good job -- that’s not very good.”

However, if South Africans are less than happy with their government, that dissatisfaction hasn’t yet shown up at the ballot box. The ANC routinely sweeps elections at every level.

The ANC elite is even cracking down on allies and factions within the party. Last month, the leadership foiled an alleged attempt by liberal ANC operatives in Eastern Cape province to sideline more conservative members. Mbeki disbanded the province’s troublesome leadership council and scaled back the number of delegates it would be able to send to Stellenbosch.

Many here say that the ANC, which began as a liberation movement and rose to power under former President Nelson Mandela, has lost its populist roots. In recent months, Mbeki’s administration has moved to consolidate the party’s power by squelching debate on issues such as privatization of the telecommunications and energy industries, which were nationalized under apartheid.

Iraj Abedian, a senior economist for Standard Bank in Johannesburg, said the ANC has a hard decision to make between frugality and investment in infrastructure. Abedian praised the government’s conservative spending policies but said he is concerned that it is not doing enough to re-integrate the victims of apartheid into society.

“Everybody notices unemployment, but that’s just the symptom,” he said. “The challenge for this government is to train the millions of 25- to 40-year-olds who have no skills because they were fighting apartheid when they should have been in schools and colleges.”