Indeed, the unfortunate incident brought home another pleasing realisation: it was no longer possible for an individual to scupper the peace process unilaterally. South Africans’ search for peace was well under way; there was no turning back.
There was still enough goodwill in the air for the nineteen parties present to sign a solemn statement, the Declaration of Intent, on the day before the adjournment for the Christmas season.5 By doing so, the parties committed themselves to all the basic elements of the future South African democratic state.
This solemn undertaking about the broad framework of our democracy had not been difficult to reach. However, for many, its details were destined to cause many troubled days and nights.
At Codesa 1, it was agreed to form five working groups with representation from all participating parties to tackle the core issues of the peace process in an open, participatory and equitable manner. Naturally, the working groups did not find all the answers and solutions. Nevertheless, they were an indispensable public stage where politicians, under the watchful eyes of their supporters and the media, could argue and debate to their hearts’ content, providing an inestimable contribution to make every South African feel as if they were part of the peace – and, indeed, the future.
In the modern world, agreements that are reached secretly in smoke-filled rooms, without making the citizenry feel part of the process, never succeed in their final implementation.
The working groups focused on the following themes: i) the creation of a level political playing field; ii) constitutional principles and a new constitution; iii) a transitional dispensation until such time as the new constitution came into operation; iv) the TBVC states and their democratic rights; and v) the time frames for implementing the Codesa agreements.
With the exception of Working Group 2, the contributions of the working groups provided, at best, a lean harvest. Soapbox orators spouted thousands of embellished words. Intellectual witticisms were uttered. Bile was spewed and aspirant politicians checked surreptitiously to see if the media had taken note of their supposedly clever utterances.
Many of the contributions, especially from the NP politicians, were pitiful. They were unprepared, sought advice from junior officials, and received little guidance from either De Klerk or Meyer. They were simply not equipped for the task.
In Working Group 2, the sparks flew. Tertius Delport and Cyril Ramaphosa clashed head-on about the majority percentage required for amending the Interim Constitution. Delport insisted upon a majority of 75 per cent, seemingly with De Klerk’s backing. Ramaphosa began with two-thirds, but later increased this to 70 per cent.
Later, he added the stipulation that, if the constitutional assembly did not accept a constitution within six months with the required majority (75 or 70 per cent), a referendum should be held in which a simple majority would be sufficient. With the ANC’s by now familiar and well-practised tactic of slowing down progress, it would be child’s play to enforce a referendum.
However, this proved unnecessary. By mid-1993, De Klerk had conceded to Mandela’s insistence on a majority of only 60 per cent. This is what happens when leaders lack strategic sense. De Klerk’s inertia, his reluctance to make a decision when necessary, caught up with him.
In terms of making a historical contribution, the Codesa working groups were rank outsiders. The chief negotiators fought out the core issues of the negotiation process behind closed doors. These were armed conflict, populist mass violence, the future of the civil service, affirmative action, amnesty, the official languages and cultural matters, the provinces and their respective borders, levels of constitutional government and the devolution of power.
In the confidential discussions as well as the bargaining in the working groups, the government’s views often prevailed; in the ‘public negotiations’, this was seldom the case.
During 1991, it became obvious to the Department of Constitutional Development that it urgently needed overall management; planning and co-ordination with the broader public service were required. At the time, I was the state’s most senior director general by a number of years.
Roelf Meyer, minister of constitutional development, sounded me out, asking whether I would be prepared to help with the management of the settlement process. We had known each other since our student days at the University of the Free State and were inducted, coincidentally, on the same evening as members of the Ruiterwag, an Afrikaner cultural organisation.
With Meyer’s offer came a difficult decision, something over which I tossed and turned at night. NI would be in safe hands and I felt sure that the settlement process would determine the fate of South Africans for generations to come. And yet it was with heavy hearts that Engela and I severed our ties with NI.
On 1 February 1992 I became director general (DG) of Constitutional Development, a key department that needed full commitment and careful management. In civil service terms, it was a young department that had already fallen under various ministers, of whom the seasoned Chris Heunis was the most competent. Earlier, he had asked me earnestly whether I would take on the position of DG of the department, but I decided against it; at one stage, there was media speculation that I was to become minister of this department, which led to unpleasant gossip and backbiting.
As for the department’s officialdom, it was a struggle to create and maintain an efficient staff complement. Accomplished officials are not always keen to join a new department of their own accord and it was no easy task to fill the posts, particularly the senior positions. It was a challenge for a new department to open its own berth of responsibilities in the bureaucracy.
Fortunately, we managed to acquire the services of a few former NI members such as Maritz Spaarwater, Daan Opperman, AP Botha, Herman du Toit, Gustav von Bratt and Nel Marais. The department was also able to rely on other stalwarts, among others Andrew Gray, Ando Donkers, Chris du Plessis, Koos van der Merwe, Chris Maritz, Renate Williams, François Beukman and a specialist adviser, Johan Symington. Symington’s wisdom often proved indispensable.
The deputy head, Henk Fourie, and the administrative head, Deon du Plooy, were stalwarts from the proud tradition of the old civil service, and were the backbone of the department.
Nevertheless, the department was but a small group of people who, for the most part, busied themselves with lengthy academic discussions and failed to implement the constitutional settlement process successfully.
1 Willie Esterhuyse, Endgame: Secret Talks and the End of Apartheid, pp. 290–292; Hermann Giliomee, Die laaste Afrikanerleiers (Cape Town: Tafelberg, 2012), p. 355.
2 FW de Klerk, Die laaste trek – ’n nuwe begin (Cape Town: Human & Rousseau, 1999), p. 239. Also available in English: FW de Klerk, The Last Trek – A New Beginning: An Autobiography (London: St Martin’s Press, 1999).
3 Patti Waldmeir, Anatomy of a Miracle (London: Viking, 1997), pp. 191–192.
4 FW de Klerk, Die laaste trek – ’n nuwe begin, pp. 240–242.
5 The two parties who refused to sign were Bophuthatswana, because it was against incorporation into South Africa, and the IFP, whose delegates felt that federalism did not feature strongly enough in the declaration.
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