Steve Biko was murdered in September 1977, 27 years ago this month, and now our Heritage Month. Quite correctly various activities were therefore undertaken this month to honour this great hero of our people. During this same fateful month, we bade farewell to another great patriot, Ds Beyers Naude, who passed away after a long period of ill health.
Steve Biko and Beyers Naude had been comrades in arms. They occupied the same trench of struggle for the defeat of the apartheid system. Both stubbornly refused to be terrorised by the apartheid regime to abandon the cause of the oppressed masses of our country.
At first the apartheid regime punished them by subjecting them to all manner of banning orders. In October 1977, this regime then banned the organisations they led, as well as various publications. It also proceeded to detain a large number of leaders and activists of the broad movement for the liberation our people.
But before these arrests were made and the banning orders imposed, agents of the apartheid regime murdered Steve Biko. Earlier in the year, they had already murdered another of his comrades, Mapetla Mohapi.
The apartheid regime acted as it did, to silence the voice of dissent and crush the dream of freedom that inspired Mapetla Mohapi, Steve Biko, Beyers Naude and the millions of our people. Most fortunately, Oom Bey was able to survive all the dangers posed by an angry oppressive system, and experienced the first decade of the freedom for which he had sacrificed so much.
Unfortunately, the ruthless agents of the apartheid regime had ensured that others such as Ongopotse Tiro, Mapetla Mohapi, Steve Biko and others could not be with us as we celebrated and enjoyed the freedom for which they had fought. Nevertheless, the very fact that freedom was won, despite the campaign of terror conducted by the apartheid regime, made the unequivocal point that their sacrifices were not in vain.
Because of those sacrifices, today all our people enjoy all the freedoms that the apartheid system denied them. Today, and for the last ten years, there is not a single person whose voice has been silenced. No political or any other organisation, and no publication has been banned. Nobody has been arrested and detained because of their political beliefs.
In tribute to the heroes and heroines who died and sacrificed in other ways for our liberation, we have made certain and will make certain that we defend the fundamental rights of all our people to the freedoms of thought, speech, assembly, and other freedoms that combine to constitute the body of fundamental human rights provided for by our Constitution.
The two-week period allowing local government councillors to "cross the floor" to other parties or form new political organisations also fell within this same month of September. Many councillors therefore took this opportunity to change their various affiliations, joining or forming other parties or political organisations.
Our Constitution, adopted in 1996, provided for the adoption of legislation that would regulate such floor crossing. Those who negotiated our constitution, the Constitutional Assembly itself, as well as the Constitutional Court not only found nothing wrong with the phenomenon of "crossing the floor", but also thought it might be necessary.
Not too long after the Constitution was adopted, some of the opposition parties started agitating for the passage of the floor crossing legislation allowed by the Constitution. Recently our Deputy President, Jacob Zuma, told the story of how the then Democratic Party (DP) had approached and shown him draft legislation it had prepared, to speed up the adoption of the floor crossing legislation.
The ANC engaged in a protracted internal debate about this matter, seeking to arrive at what it would consider to be the best outcome for our democracy and country.
Then, as now, our electoral system governing the election of the members of the national and provincial legislatures is characterised by the two features of party lists and proportional representation. Because of this, the number of representatives each party has in these legislatures reflects the level of support each of the parties enjoys among the people.
As the ANC debated the desirability or otherwise of the adoption of the floor crossing legislation, the point was made very strongly that such floor crossing would undermine the will of the people. It was argued, correctly, that our movement had to adhere to the vision contained in the Freedom Charter, that "The People Shall Govern".
Accordingly the point was made that at all times, the number of party representatives in the legislatures should reflect the strength of the party as indicated in democratic elections. Inevitably the floor crossing would therefore breach the principle and practice that the people shall govern, resulting in some parties having a disproportionately larger representation, or vice versa.
Contrary to this, the point was equally strongly made that ours was a very young democracy. Inevitably there would be a fair degree of volatility and dynamism in terms of the social and political consciousness of many of our people. The point was made, for instance, that it would take some people time before they outgrew the negative and false perceptions of the ANC they had been fed by the apartheid regime.
Those perceptions had been part of the body of "white fears" which our movement deliberately and consciously addressed in the period before and after 1994. It was therefore argued that it would take time for these fears to disappear, as essentially white South Africa came to understand that it had nothing to fear from democracy, non-racism and our liberation movement.
Nevertheless, it was clear that these attitudes would necessarily change, as those who had fears in the past experienced the security provided by a democratic and non-racial South Africa. As a consequence of that experience, they might, naturally, change their political affiliation even between the set election years.
These arguments were advanced to make the point that our political system should show sufficient flexibility, taking into account the reality of the volatility and dynamism of the evolving situation in our country. It was said that it would be incorrect to seek to freeze people's views for whole periods of five years, allowing for no political evolution except at five-year intervals.
In itself, such insistence on a relatively static system might result in a system of representation that would not be congruent with evolving popular opinion. In this regard, the point was also made that even supporters of the ANC, who had come into the movement because of their opposition to apartheid, might now want to move to other parties on the basis that these provided them with a different ideological home of their choice.
Thus ANC members could very well find themselves attracted to Liberal, Christian Democratic or other parties, reflecting similar sentiment among sections of the masses that had been happy to follow the leadership of the ANC during the struggle against apartheid. The argument was presented that it would be incorrect to frustrate such natural evolution, on the basis of a proposition that the evolving political consciousness should only be allowed to manifest itself and make an impact on society once every five years.
Nevertheless, despite this argument, it was also felt that the legislation we should propose, that would enable such new consciousness to be reflected in our legislatures, should be "restrictive" rather than "permissive". Thus, while enabling people to "cross the floor", it would set various conditions that would make such crossing somewhat difficult rather than easy.
This, it was argued, would restrict, limit and contain the possibility to ignore the will of the people, and discourage floor crossing that might be occasioned more by selfish interests rather than genuine political evolution on the part of the representatives.
Of course, inherent in all this, was the argument in favour of the exercise of the freedoms of thought, expression and association by the representatives themselves. Despite the fact of their election on the basis of their party political platform, we considered it wrong that these representatives should be denied such freedom, such that they would not have the possibility to adopt different political positions.
In this regard, it was thought important that people should not be obliged to stay as members of parties long after they had outgrown the understanding that had made them to join these parties. Therefore the fact that they might lose their seats in the legislatures would have to be dealt with, so that it does not become an obstacle to our country's political evolution.
On this basis we decided that such representatives should be allowed to cross the floor with their seats. This would free them from having to stay in organisations they felt they had outgrown, simply to preserve the membership of the legislatures.
Perhaps the biggest and most dramatic evidence of the evolution of political thought in our country has been demonstrated by the fortunes of the former Democratic Party and New National Party (NNP). In the first instance this led to them deciding to merge and form the Democratic Alliance (DA). This, in reality, is what caused the DP to approach the Deputy President as Leader of Government Business, arguing for the floor crossing legislation that would enable the DP and the NNP to form the DA.
Of course the DA did not last for very long because yet another political shift was taking place or was making itself felt. The New National Party, the former party of apartheid, found that it could not successfully merge with the Democratic Party, because it had come to believe unequivocally in a non-racial democracy. On the other hand, the DP, the party of liberal democracy, had become the home of the forces and ideas that sought to resist the entrenchment of a truly democratic and non-racial society, for whom the NP had originally provided a home.
The DP was correct to have approached the Deputy President with regard to the floor crossing legislation. It would have been incorrect to allow the absence of such legislation to distort the natural political evolution in our country, which prompted the formation of the DA, by blocking the emerging sentiments about party affiliation from finding their organisational expression. All this is also fundamental to the exercise of the freedoms we have already mentioned.
The late Stanley Chetty, then Speaker of the Estcourt Municipal Council in KwaZulu Natal exercised this right when during the floor crossing period this month, he crossed over to the ANC. But now he is dead, having been shot by some as yet unknown murderers. The Estcourt Municipal Manager is also reported to have sought protection, after people described as "bodyguards" assaulted him.
The ANC Provincial Chairperson in KwaZulu Natal and Premier of the Province, Sbu Ndebele, has already said he is convinced that Stanley Chetty's was a political assassination. He has pointed to the fact that other councillors who crossed over to the ANC have been threatened with death.
Murder under any circumstances is totally unacceptable. With regard to this as any other murder case, we are certain that the Police Service will do everything it can to apprehend those responsible for Stanley Chetty's death and bring them before our courts. However, we also cannot ignore the possibility that this might have been a political assassination.
As we have said, Steve Biko who was murdered 27 years ago this month, and Oom Bey who passed away this month, and many others, sacrificed everything so that all our people could enjoy full democratic rights. Nobody in our country has either the right or the power to deny any of our people the possibility to use and enjoy those rights. We will not allow that anybody restores to our country even one element of the repressive practices that characterised 1977 and other years.
When he "crossed the floor", Stanley Chetty was expressing the freedom Steve Biko and others made possible for him to form and express his opinion and join any organisation of his choice, without fear of harassment, arrest, imprisonment or death. He was using the rights that have therefore been expressed in both our Constitution and legislation. Accordingly, to block anybody from exercising those rights would itself be a criminal act.
All the state law enforcement agencies have an urgent responsibility to look for and find those who killed Stanley Chetty. The net must catch all those who might have been involved in the incitement, conceptualisation, planning and execution of the murderous deed.
If, indeed this was a political assassination, we must all communicate a clear message to the assassins and those who might want to emulate them - that democratic South Africa will give no quarter in the struggle to defeat those who want to continue the practices of the apartheid regime!
We extend our heartfelt condolences to the Chetty family. We will not allow that anybody confers upon himself or herself powers to decide which democratic rights our people should enjoy and exercise and which, not. Stanley Chetty's killers murdered a man, but they also sought to drown in his blood our liberty and the rights we have won through struggle.
Stanley Chetty's murderers must be found and subjected to the full might of the law. Councillor Chetty's death must, like Steve Biko's death, serve to spur us to engage in further action to realise the goals of the national democratic revolution.
