International Neus South Africa

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The response of the racist Vorster dictatorship in South Africa to the massive political upheavals which have shaken the country since last June has been to unleash an increasingly savage campaign of repression against the black population and its white supporters.

Every basic democratic right is ground under the heel of Vorster's repressive apparatus.

During the last month this camagin has reached unprecedented levels.

At least ten blacks have been shot dead and dozens wounded by police in the Cape Town suburbs of Guguletu and Nyanga after they had attacked the homes of police informers.

Several hundred people have been arrested and detained in the same period under the vicious Terrorism Act and Internal Security Act.

UNLIMITED ARREST

These two laws allow the authorities to arrest anyone without charge for an unlimited period without reference to the courts and without being obliged to reveal the nature of the charges or even that the arrests have taken place.

As a result hundreds of black workers and students have 'disappeared' into custody over the last few weeks. Minister of 'Justice' James Kruger has admitted to holding about 150 under the Internal Security Act; but black and civil rights organisations estimate that the number is many hundreds more than this.

No accurate estimate is possible since many hundreds of black militants from all the major cities have been escaping arrest by JAPAN When the newly elected members of the Japanese Diet (Parliament) meet in Tokyo on Christmas Day to select a new government it will be the first time for twenty-one years that the main capitalist party, the Liberal Democrats, have not held an absolute majority of seats.

Yet the main electoral gains have not gone to the parties based on the working class (the predominantly pro-Moscow Communist Party, and the divided Socialist Party) but to the 'centre' groups (the break-away *New Liberal Club' , the right-wing Social Democrats - formed after a split in the Socialist Party in 1960 - and the demagogic 'Clean Government Party' — Koweito - which campaigned against the involvement of Liberal Democrat chiefs like former Prime Minister Tanaka in the Lockheed bribes scandal.

And, paradoxically, ballot-box support for both Tanaka himself, who got six times as many votes as were necessary to be elected, and for former Justice Minister Inaba, in charge of pursuing the corruption enquiries, remained strong.

This reflects the power of the political arrangements built up by the ruling class in the LDP factions since the war, relying on the conserratism of the countryside and the party machines of the cities.

The recent elections also formed a crucial test of the new 'reformist' policies of the Stalinists in the leadership of the Japanese Comsaris Party. fleeing to neighbouring countries such as Swaziland and Bo tswana.

It is now estimated that over 2,000 have escaped the indiscriminate arrests in this way.

Among the principal victims of the present onslaught are the leaders of the unrecognised black trade unions.

Twenty seven black union leaders and members of the Universities wages commissions which do research for these unions, have in the last month been subjected to 'banning' orders.

NO RIGHTS To be banned means to lose the rights to belong to any organisation, to be quoted in the press or to move to another area.

Particularly badly hit by the banning orders is the Metal and Allied Workers Union which has been campaigning for recognition by the South African subsidiary of British Leyland.

Leyland has refused, like Pikingtons and other British firms in south Africa, to give any recognition to the black unions and have collaborated fully in the racist and anti-union policies of the Vorster aictatorship..

Various liberal church organisations have come under increasing repression. So has the white National Union of South African Students (NUSAS).

ACQUITTED

Five NUSAS members, however, were acquitted by the courts last week of such charges as 'advocating an egalitarian society' The fact that not even Vorster's own courts are always reliable instruments of his repression is one reason why his regime is increasingly using the provisons of the repressive laws which allow it to Far front bringing the gains which Secretary General Fuwa was promising the membership,, the shift to the right - including (as in France) the formal abandonment of the goal of 'the dictatorship of the proletariat, and open-ended suggestions , for a coalition - had the effect of slashing the Party's parliamentary strength from 39 to 17 seats.

The Party, however, remains central to the grip of the Labour bureaucracy over the organised working class, with considerable strength in the trade unions, over a third of a million members, and electoral support (abour 12% of the votes cast) proportionately much larger than its strength in Parliament.

And from both Stalinist spokesmen and leaders of the right and centre in the Socialist Party have come statements since the election that indicate manoeuvres for 'Popular Front' agreements with the capitalist parties.

They made it clear that neither nationalisations, nor the repudiation of the Japanese-American military pact, were conditions of political collaboration.

This treaty is one of the central elements in • US military plans directed against the USSR and Opposition to the pact has been one of the central planks of the Japanese Communist Party in the whole post-war period.

Their abandonment of it points the way to Popular Front agreements of the type now being openly prepared in Italy and France to de the workers movement to capitalist policies in face of the operate in complete secrecy.

The growing fear and desperation of the racists which has lead to the current wave of intensified repression is to be seen not only in South Africa itself but also Namibia where Vorster hopes shortly to set up a fake 'independent' government.

Such a puppet regime has no hope of defending itself against the independence movement now waging a guerilla war in Namibia.

This explains why the South African defence minister last week SWAPO guerilla fighters gave a broad hint that South Africa was about to launch a new invasion of Southern Angola in order to wipe out the guerilla camps of the South West African Peoples Organisation (SWAPO).

The growing repression in Southern Africa requires the strongest possible response from the British labour movement - action against the British firms which refuse to recognise black trade unions; and action to force the Labour government to end its collaboration with Vorster's racist tyranny.