Crying for Freedom
NED and the Transition to Democracy in South Africa – Part 5:
Civil Society, Women, Business, and the 1994 Elections
In a research paper entitled “Funding Freedom?” published by CPS in 2001, Maxine Reitzes and Steven Friedman assessed the impact of foreign political aid to civil society organizations (CSOs) in South Africa, including five that had been direct or indirect recipients of NED support. In addition to IDASA and COSATU, their study examined the South African National Civics Organisation (SANCO), the Federation of African Business and Consumer Societies (FABCOS), and the Women’s National Coalition (WNC). The study examined the extent to which CSOs fostered political pluralism, engendered democratic values, and enhanced participation in public life. It also focused on how foreign funding enhanced or hindered this role. The study found that for many CSOs the relationship to the government changed after the fall of apartheid, some being absorbed by it, others disappearing, and yet others maintaining their autonomy whether in partnership or opposition to the government. Donors could be helpful to CSOs, thus strengthening democracy, but their support could also be problematic, for example if the donor’s agenda did not adequately coincide with that of the CSO. In conclusion, though, they agreed “extending donor support to grassroots CSOs is an essential element in any democratisation strategy. The risks of acting are great – those of failing to act far greater.”1 The NED program sought to avoid many of the donor pitfalls described in the CPS study, but NED’s experience also suggested the rich rewards of support to civil society.
The Soweto Civic Association received a NED grant of $200,000 in 1992 to strengthen its capacity to engage in negotiations concerning the restructuring of local government. SCA received another grant of $100,000 in 1993 to continue its work on organizational capacity building, community development, and local government restructuring. Although the SCA played an historic role in leading the emergence of the civic movement in South Africa in the wake of the Soweto Uprising, and was banned along with the UDF in 1988, civics eventually disappeared as the new local government structures were set up in the aftermath of the 1994 elections, but they provided much of the early leadership and ethos of South Africa’s emerging democracy. The SCA was the most prominent of the scores of civics across South Africa that united to form SANCO in 1992. Pat Lephunya, the general secretary of the SCA when it received NED support, was proud of its effectiveness in transitioning from the apartheid local authorities to the new local government, which enjoyed much greater legitimacy in securing electricity payments, for example. Other issues addressed by the SCA included restructuring taxes, revamping housing policy, and improving health services. Augmenting the capacity of what would become South Africa’s new civil service was an enormous undertaking, and the NED support to the SCA was just a small contribution to a complex problem that remains challenging, but it demonstrates how, if democracy is to deliver, there must be a focus on the seemingly mundane, but critical details that affect daily lives.
The Umtapo Centre received a grant of $100,000 in 1992 to support its information center in Durban and conduct youth leadership training workshops and seminars. In 1993, Umtapo received an additional $100,000 for its information center and youth leadership training, as well as a quarterly magazine, newsletter, annual review, booklet of essays, and proceedings of conferences and seminars. One of the challenges of working in South Africa during those years, with undercurrents that persist to this day, was navigating not just the racial tensions, but the ethnic, social, and ultimately ideological divisions. As has been already apparent in this discussion of the NED program, the opposition to apartheid was far from homogeneous, and NED made a deliberate effort to span the spectrum of tendencies, from White liberals such as the Institute of Race Relations, and White progressives, such as IDASA, to the “Charterist” groups that dominated the UDF and ANC, and the more conservative African tendencies, such as Inkatha. Another important, if increasingly diminished, tendency was the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM), originally led by Steve Biko, with roots in the Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC), both of which emphasized Black leadership and competed for support with the ANC, which subscribed to nonracialism. The Azanian People’s Organization (AZAPO) became a leading exponent of BC philosophy, often drawing on its leadership from the so-called “Asian” community. NACTU was undoubtedly the strongest of the BC institutions, led by Phiroshaw Camay, but many other civil society groups adhered to the BC philosophy, including the Umtapo Centre. Tackling the violence in Kwa Zulu/Natal, Strini Moodley, the director of Umtapo who died in 2006, reflected on its approach as “not just interested in the absence of war, but the quality of life of every human being in the world.”23 Such ideological idealism was characteristic of AZAPO, but its appeal was limited. Umtapo increased its international engagement, becoming a core founder of CIVICUS, which continues to be a leading advocate for civil society around the world. Another leading BC intellectual and charismatic activist was Saths Cooper, who became director of the Institute for Multi-Party Democracy.
Women played important roles in South Africa’s freedom movement, including such PSA advisers as Sheena Duncan of the Black Sash and Sally Motlana of the Black Housewives’ League. Yet as the South African transition proceeded, women struggled to get their voice heard. The Women’s National Coalition received a NED grant of $80,000 in 1993 for a national campaign of consultation, research, information dissemination and advocacy to ensure the fullest participation of women in formulating South Africa’s new constitution. Frene Ginwala, who later became speaker of the parliament, was president, and Pregs Govender was the director. The project culminated in a national conference to draft a Women’s Charter, which I attended. In a definitive paper by Shireen Hassim, she concludes:
The remarkable aspect of the WNC experience was the success of the organization in creating a visible political constituency of women during the transitional process. Whereas feminists in the North were despairing of the possibilities of political praxis as a result of the increasing dominance of disaggregated identity-based politics, the WNC showed how those disaggregated interests could be creatively woven into an effective strategy. Although it succeeded for a limited period, its effects were long-term, both in entrenching vital gains in the constitution and the institutions of state, and in providing a tantalizing glimpse into what a strong women’s movement could be in South Africa. The WNC managed to position itself strategically as the voice of organized women. The WNC’s leadership included women with high political profile and with long experience of how parties and liberation movements worked internally. The uniqueness of the WNC’s ability to lobby political organizations and demand a place at the negotiation table while at the same time retaining its political independence, gave women a powerful voice at a crucial moment in South Africa’s political history. There is little doubt that without the WNC, the constitutional arrangements would have looked bleaker for women. 24
The Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE), a core NED institute associated with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, supported a variety of projects that reflect a strategy of experimentation in early years. Its first grant in South Africa was in 1987 for $41,600 to the Durban office of the Get Ahead Foundation, which provided small loans to black South African businesses. In 1988, CIPE provided $32,000 to the Southern Africa Black Taxi Association for its communications infrastructure; in 1991, $34,000 for Matchmaker Services to connect established businesses with aspiring black entrepreneurs; in 1992, $54,000 for the African Council of Hawkers and Informal Business to train 2,000 hawkers in the townships; and in 1993, $64,555 to enable the Media Business Training Trust to train journalists and journalistic managers in business principles and related subjects, as well as $58,064 to enable the Foundation for African Business and Consumer Service (FABCOS) to establish an Entrepreneurial Education and Advice Service for emerging black entrepreneurs. In 1995 CIPE provided $183,375 to enable the Sunnyside Group to undertake a Small Business Alert program analyzing its laws and regulations and their effect on small business development and the economy, and $62,201 to enable the Free Market Foundation of South Africa to conduct outreach activities designed to advocate its position on constitutional and economic reforms to lawmakers and the National Assembly.
NED’s two core political party institutes also contributed to South Africa’s transition, culminating in an election support project funded by USAID. The International Republican Institute (IRI) received its first NED funding for projects in South Africa in 1993. A grant of $30,000 continued NED support to the South African Institute of Race Relations “in its effort to ensure that post-apartheid South Africa becomes a stable multiparty democracy based on liberal economic and political principles by monitoring and investigating adherence to basic human rights of the major political parties and identifying and giving early public warning of civil liberty violations following the April 1994 elections.”20 In addition, a grant of $62,035 to IRI enabled the Wilgespruit Fellowship Center to conduct cross-cultural communication and conflict resolution workshops in Venda and Pietermaritzburg.
IRI received NED support for four projects in 1994. With a grant of $19,660, IRI supported a conference of the Institute for International Education on revamping and rebuilding the security forces in South Africa and encouraging dialogue and cooperation among those responsible for South African security policies. A $79,740 grant enabled the Helen Suzman Foundation to conduct a series of regional workshops in the Cape Province, KwaZulu/Natal Province and Transvaal Province on the South African constitution, citizens’ rights, and civil society for local leaders. IRI received $61,836 to support the preparation of academic papers exploring the historic and potential future roles of traditional leaders in South Africa in order to promote understanding and communication between political parties, traditional leaders and their respective constituencies in KwaZulu/Natal. IRI again supported the Institute of Race Relations with a grant of $56,707 for its Free Society Project to monitor the Government of National Unity concerning the creation and preservation of a democratic society, limited government, and the rule of law. IRI would continue to provide similar support to the Institute at varying levels for 20 years, totaling more than $1 million, and making it NED’s single longest partner in South Africa.
The National Democratic Institute (NDI). On the occasion of NDI’s 40th anniversary in 2023, NDI’s strategic advisor, Pat Merloe, and NDI’s Southern Africa advisor from 1986 – 2000, Patricia Keefer, whose contribution to the entire NED effort in South Africa was pivotal, reflected on the Institute’s work in South Africa. In 1991, NDI received a NED grant of $125,630 to conduct seminars on election processes and laws and to enable South African political organizations to participate in relevant NDI programs in other countries. NDI received $114,720 in NED funds in 1992 for a civic education project that continued work with the Center for Development Studies at the University of Western Cape (UWC) on the electoral process. NDI and CDS conducted civic education “teach-ins” at 12 regional centers across the country with election experts and political leaders from 12 countries, which included mock polling stations and election role-playing. This evolved into Project Vote, which according to Pat, reached millions of previously disenfranchised South Africans. Project Vote conducted training workshops for thousands of community-based volunteers who then led voter education activities in churches, schools, bus terminals, sports arenas, pension centers, hospitals, prisons, and community centers, mostly in rural communities, and with messages in 10 languages. The sample ballot designed by Project Vote was used by the electoral authorities to design the official ballot for the 1994 elections, and less than 1 per cent of the nearly 20 million ballots cast in 1994 were invalidated due to voter error, “an exceptional accomplishment where the vast majority of people had not voted before, which was a testament to the impact of Project Vote and other efforts.”21
In 1993, NDI received $117,620 to support the participation of six teams of South African representatives with election responsibilities in their own organizations on NDI-sponsored observer delegations in countries such as Congo-Brazzaville, Cambodia, Mexico, Paraguay and Yemen, with the goal of enabling them to incorporate their experiences into their work in South Africa. These exchanges would reinforce the importance of peaceful, credible transitions.
With an $885,000 CAAA grant from USAID in 1993, NDI, in partnership with IRI and the JCPES, co-sponsored the South African Election Support Project, which provided technical support to nearly all South African political parties. The assistance included conducting and analyzing opinion polls, communications strategies for peaceful electoral competition, rights and responsibilities under South Africa’s electoral framework, codes of conduct, and how to make use of party liaison, complaints and arbitration mechanisms established by the election commission. Princeton Lyman, the US Ambassador to South Africa at the time, who would later join the NED board, recalls how the Pan Africanist Congress complained that it had not been included in the training because it had been unwilling to renounce the armed struggle, but eventually modified its position and was later able to receive assistance.27 Lyman thought “the most controversial form of American assistance in the election, but also perhaps among the most valuable, was our assistance to political parties.” By this time, Congress had authorized $10 million, mainly to the ANC and Inkatha, as well as additional funding later to 13 other parties. Lyman was keen that NDI, IRI, and JCPES work together to avoid perceptions of partisanship, an arrangement which “worked extremely well.”22 In 1995, NDI received a grant of $61,149 to support the participation of legislators in parliamentary assistance programs throughout Africa and in other parts of the world.
The Project Vote curriculum would provide a format for later programs throughout the region, and in South Africa, NDI followed up with post-election work in the national and provincial parliaments and with local elections. Amy Biehl, who was well known and respected for her work at NDI in South Africa from 1990 – 1992 on the election program, made the ultimate sacrifice on behalf of the transition when she was killed in Gugulethu, a township outside of Cape Town, by a group of angry youth. Her killers were convicted, but released in 1998 as part of the Truth and Reconciliation Process, and later worked for a foundation established by Amy’s parents in her memory.23
NED’s program in South Africa wound down after the 1994 elections. NED’s core institutes maintained some presence, and South Africa was always acknowledged as an important democratic success story, whatever disappointments arose. NED revisited South Africa most recently for the 12th biannual Global Assembly of the World Movement for Democracy, held in Johannesburg November 20 – 22, 2024. The WMD Assemblies bring together hundreds of democracy activists in a different country every two years. The first was held in Delhi in 1999, and others have been held in cities across the globe, but this was the second time for South Africa, which hosted a previous one in Durban in 2004. Having attended many of these assemblies, although biased, I would contend that this was the best of them all. It was well attended with some of the world’s most eminent democratic heroes, featuring brilliant presentations and workshops, intensive networking, and a great deal of education. South Africa was showcased as both an inspiration and a cautionary tale. The assembly conveyed a message of international solidarity and determination while celebrating the 30th anniversary of South Africa’s first fully democratic elections. But it also addressed the reversals that have befallen the democratic movement, which have intensified enormously in the year since.
The assembly contended with some controversy, especially around the question of Gaza, but the conversation was remarkably civil. Moreover, the assembly succeeded in embracing a broad political spectrum of South Africa, including the ANC and the DP, which had just entered a governing alliance, as well as Inkatha, the PAC, the Afrikaner Freedom Front, and other political groupings. It displayed South Africa’s diversity, as well as its many democratic achievements, such as a vibrant independent press and civil society, a strong democratic constitution and independent judiciary, and a continuing tradition of democratic elections. South Africa has its challenges, including corruption, violent crime, economic stagnation, and the ongoing legacy of apartheid. But for many years now, Freedom House and other barometers of democracy have rated South Africa as the freest country in Africa, outperforming the United States in some categories. With some humility, South Africa has finally emerged as a leader of the free world, even in fora such as the BRICS. In today’s international context, this role will require great courage, but South Africa has proved its mettle.
Concluding Observations
This summary of NED’s program in South Africa during the country’s democratic transition is intended to recount the significant, if modest, contribution that was made. Overlapping the pre-transitional struggle against apartheid and the breakthrough and transitional phases of South Africa’s democratization, the program coincided with a rapid expansion of democracy assistance worldwide. NED’s funding was a relatively small component of the overall CAAA/AID effort, and many private donors and bilateral donors complemented NED’s assistance. Yet the legacy of NED support remains 30 years after most of the program came to an end, and not only did South Africa benefit, but lessons learned by NED and others in those early years of democracy support continue to resonate.