From Malan to Mbeki: The memoirs of an Afrikaner with a conscience

FROM MALAN TO MBEKI

THE MEMOIRS OF AN AFRIKANER WITH A CONSCIENCE

By

Jannie Momberg

Foreword by

Ahmed Kathrada

Copyright: Benedic Books 2012

Published by Benedic Books at Smashwords

Published by Benedic Books

Address: PO Box 5646, Helderview, 7135, South Africa

Email:info@benedic.net

Website: www.benedic.net

All rights reserved. 2011

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying and recording, or by any other information storage or retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher.

All photographs are from the private collection of the Momberg-family, unless otherwise stated.

First print 2011

eBook ISBN: 978-0-9870154-7-1

Cover design by Xavier Nagel Agencies.

Editing by Maggie Follett.

Index, design and typesetting by Benedic Books.

I dedicate this book to Trienie, my loyal wife and soul mate for more than 46 years. Without her love, loyalty and help, I could never have walked this road.

Foreword by Ahmed Kathrada

Chapters

1. EARLY YEARS

2. ZOLA BUDD AND MY INVOLVEMENT WITH SPORT ADMINISTRATION

3. HELDERBERG

4. THE INDEPENDENT PARTY AND THE FORMING OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY

5. MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT

6. TRIGEMINAL NEURALGIA

7. JOINING THE ANC

8. MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT IN A DEMOCRATIC NON-RACIAL SOUTH AFRICA

9. AMBASSADOR

10. IN CONCLUSION.

Addenda

Speeches in Parliament

I am sorry...

I crossed my Rubicon...

Letters

I can still call Jan Hendrik Momberg my friend. What a privilege!

In solemn memory of this great son of our people

Foreword

Dear Comrade Kathy began the email I received last December from Jannie Momberg. These three words symbolised how far this man had travelled in his 72 years. From having been raised in a staunch National Party family, to joining this Apartheid Party, to his involvement in liberal White politics, to finally becoming an African National Congress Member of Parliament, Jannie had come full circle.

The email was short - just five lines - and being Jannie, he got straight to the point. He explained that he was in the final stages of writing a book on his political years, and attached a few chapters to the email. He wanted me to write the Foreword. Again in typical Jannie style, he said: You can write whatever you think is best. The length is entirely up to you, as long as it’s not too short.

This was vintage Jannie - warm, enthusiastic, direct and witty. I agreed to meet him to discuss it, and we arranged an appointment to coincide with my visit to Cape Town. Just days before the meeting, he telephoned me and pleaded to be allowed to reschedule our engagement, saying: I have just got to see the cricket match! We agreed to postpone the meeting; however this was not to be. A few days later a phone call came. I assumed it was a confirmation of our appointment, or another reschedule ... but it was much worse; our dear Jannie had died! It took some time to get over the shock. At the Memorial Service, Jannie briefly lived again, through the heartfelt words of the Dominee, Trevor Manuel, and Jannie’s sons.

The Foreword stayed in my mind. Although I felt that it would have been presumptuous of me to conclude that Jannie’s request would still hold, I strongly believed that it would be a huge loss if the story of this outstanding son of South Africa remained unpublished. I was subsequently to discover that my doubts were unfounded, when some months later, Jannie’s widow Trienie came all the way from False Bay to my place in Cape Town, to inform me that the book was due to be published soon, and my Foreword was required.

As tempting as it is, I will not steal Jannie’s thunder and reveal any of the fascinating or amusing anecdotes that appear in the pages of this frank account of his remarkable story. His was a life which spanned political eras - from Apartheid to Democracy, and his story (as the son of an elite Afrikaner family) only serves to highlight his extraordinary personal transition in later life.

Jannie was born in 1938, in the same year that I - at the age of eight - had to be wrenched away from my mother and father to attend school in Johannesburg, as Apartheid had decreed that an Indian boy could not be admitted to the White or Black schools in Schweizer-Reneke. My first traumatic awakening to the evils of racism took place at a very tender age. In later years, I vowed to use my life to oppose it however I could - a journey which led me into the Young Communist League, the South African Communist Party, the ANC, and ultimately to 26 years in prison - but that is another story.

As I was learning about Anti-Apartheid activism, on the other side of the country, Jannie was growing up as the son of a Hitler supporter. He was ten years old in 1948, when the National Party won the General election, and came to power in South Africa. Its leaders, such as the Architect of Apartheid (D.F. Malan) and John Vorster were counted amongst his family's close friends. Jannie’s account of sharing tea with a wheelchair-bound Malan - and the political advice he dispensed to the young student - makes for interesting reading.

While Jannie campaigned for South Africa to become a Republic, we in the ANC were campaigning against the All-White Republic - in fact, one of the charges on which Madiba was sentenced to jail for five years (in 1962) was for inciting a strike against the proclamation of the Republic. In 1963, Jannie had his first confrontation with the National Party because a group of Coloured people had been turned away from a symphony concert in Cape Town. During the same year, we were charged with sabotage at the Rivonia Trial, and in June 1964, sentenced to life imprisonment.

We first got to hear about Jannie Momberg at Pollsmoor Prison in the mid-1980s, when he was Zola Budd’s manager. We had been in prison for 16 years when we were first allowed to have newspapers, and in 1985 we had television. Like the rest of the world, we got to hear about this barefoot runner who was good enough to race in the Olympic Games. We were probably more interested in the fact that here was another South African breaking our sporting boycott than the fact that she ran without shoes, or was managed by an Afrikaner wine farmer - but for Jannie, the job of managing Zola Budd meant that he often travelled overseas, where he saw media accounts of what was really happening in South Africa. He could also read about the point of view of the ANC - whereas any information about this organisation was banned at home.

We had observed through the media that this committed National Party supporter had broken with the Party after a membership of 30 years. He writes in his memoirs that this act was akin to losing a limb. His slow awakening, from 1963 onwards, had led him to a turning point in 1985. At what was to be his last NP Congress, he used this opportunity to call for the abolition of certain Apartheid laws.

He finally resigned from the National Party in 1987. In 1988 he involved himself in the formation of a new Party - the Independent Party. A year later, he was one of the founders of the Democratic Party, which was formed out of a merger between the Independent Party and the Progressive Federal Party. Later, in 1989, he was part of the group of (mainly) Afrikaners who travelled to Lusaka to meet the leadership of the ANC in exile. He was enriched by his encounters with Thabo Mbeki and Chris Hani. The visit was lauded by the Anti-Apartheid Movement and lambasted by the Regime back home.

In 1990, President F.W. de Klerk unbanned the ANC and released Madiba from prison. This move was another turning-point in the life of Jannie Momberg. In 1992, he and four other Democratic Party MPs: Jan van Eck, Pierre Cronje, Rob Haswell and Dave Dalling resigned from the Democratic Party, and joined the ANC - making them the first ANC Members of Parliament in the All-White House of Assembly.

My partner, Ms Barbara Hogan (also a former political prisoner) and I had our first personal encounter with Jannie in 1993, when he and his colleagues invited us to lunch in the Parliamentary Restaurant. This was the very first time we had crossed the portals of the Legislature. Jannie showed us around the building. He took us into the House of Delegates, formed in 1983 as part of the Tri-Cameral Parliament, ostensibly to represent the Indian community. This was a toothless body - a dummy institution with no powers. It was with a feeling of revulsion that I witnessed adults pretending to be equal partners amongst the rulers of the country. In reality they were 2nd class citizens, talking (as has been described elsewhere) through a toy telephone to deaf people at the other end.

My mind went back to Pollsmoor Prison, when a Member of this body applied to visit me, and I informed our jailers that I refused to see him. It was not an easy decision on my part; the man in question was someone with whom I had served a month’s imprisonment in Durban Central Prison during the Passive Resistance movement launched by the South African Indian Congress in 1946. Forty years later he had allied himself with individuals who were regarded as collaborators with the Apartheid Regime.

I next met Jannie in 1994, while we were campaigning for the first non-racial, Democratic elections in the Indian Group Area of Roshnee, near Vereeniging. His powerful, down-to-earth speech made a significant impact upon the people.

After the ANC victory, I was elected as a Member of Parliament. Apart from what we had gathered in the media, we had absolutely no idea about running Parliament. We lacked experience - even in the running of a little Town Council! Having had years of experience, Jannie was appointed as one of the ANC Whips. In this capacity, Jannie was especially instrumental in making us comfortable.

One of his numerous tasks was to allocate seating in the House to Parliamentarians, which sometimes proved to be a challenge, as this book reveals. Taking us around that day, however, he insisted on giving me a seat with the Cabinet Ministers. He was relying on media reports that I had been appointed Minister of Prisons, which was true - but he was not yet aware of the change in the situation, that had taken place virtually overnight. I was an ordinary MP. Jannie was a very energetic and valuable Member of Parliament who did his job thoroughly. Whether directly or indirectly, he also trained many others who knew nothing about the Whippery, let alone about being Members of Parliament.

He was a very direct person, never shy to make clear what he wanted - and he was sometimes even criticised for his directness. This was the first time he had come into a situation where he was dealing with people as equals. He had only heard the names of some of the people he was going to work with, but he got widespread support from Madiba downwards.

We should never underestimate the sacrifices he made by moving from a racially exclusive set-up, to becoming a pioneer of non-racialism in the ANC. He was one of those people who turned their backs on the racist Parties to join our movement in the early 90s. Moving into what was the beginning of the first Democratic non-racial ANC was a very bold thing for them to do, considering where they had come from! The response of his own community caused him to suffer immensely. He was isolated and branded a traitor.

Jannie served us well in Parliament, finally resigning in 2000 - but this was not to be the end of his contribution. He was appointed South Africa’s Ambassador to Greece; a position he served with distinction until 2006. (On a personal level, I have always regretted that we were never able to take up any of his kind invitations to visit the country.)

No mention of Jannie and his life would be complete without paying tribute to his family. His wife Trienie stood by his side from the time they first met in 1963. They married in 1964, and she became his partner and most ardent supporter during some of the most turbulent years of his life. Together they had four sons - Niels, Steyn, Jannie and Altus - and Jannie was blessed with very happy years in his role of grandfather to five grandchildren. I have no doubt that he has helped to instil in them an understanding of the importance of non-racialism and equality in every aspect of their lives.

Jannie travelled a long journey through the history of South Africa - and emerged both enlightened and lightened from the load Apartheid had placed on his shoulders. He has left a legacy that can only inspire young South Africans to do even better, as they chart the future together.

Ahmed Kathrada

28 August 2011

CHAPTER 1

EARLY YEARS

I was born on the 27th of July, 1938, into a staunchly Nationalist family, to whom the National Party was not just a political party, but also a way of life. My father, Niels Petersen Momberg, was a wine farmer near Stellenbosch, with very limited academic qualifications. In spite of this, he was a highly successful businessman, who was well regarded in the community. He married late in life, being 40 years old when he wed my mother Magrietha Gertruida, a Brink from Molteno in the Eastern Cape.

My father was strongly against the War, and pro-German. It must be understood that at the time South Africa was deeply polarised between those supporting Britain and those supporting Hitler. This led to the collapse of the Coalition Government of Smuts and Hertzog, and caused bitter animosity between people. Those who supported Germany formed an organisation called the Ossewa Brandwag and some of the more extreme members even committed acts of sabotage, which led to my father’s resignation from the organisation.

I still remember vividly one morning in 1945 when I came into the kitchen, and noticed my father sitting with his head in his hands, crying softly. I immediately knew something was badly wrong, because I had never seen my father so upset before, and I asked my mother: Why is Pa crying? She hinted with her eyes that I should not approach him or speak to him, and replied: Hitler is dead.

Today, more than 65 years later, this may seem weird, but it must be remembered that 1945 was only 43 years after the end of the Anglo-Boer war, with all its suffering and hatred for the British. It was therefore not strange that a large number of Afrikaans-speaking people, in particular, were German supporters. Our ancestors had also come from Germany. Nobody knew of the atrocities perpetrated by Hitler and his Nazis, and most of the same people, who supported Hitler during the War, were appalled when these came to light. I was therefore brought up in a highly politicised home, which left an indelible mark on me for the rest of my life.

I was almost 10 years old in 1948, when I experienced my first political awakening, with the General election. Every Nat expected that they were going to do well, but very few thought that they could win. My father, who was a highly respected pillar of the community, left the house on the morning of the elections and only reappeared after three days, having celebrated the unexpected Nat victory from house to house. I experienced the thrill of an election for the first time, listening to the radio as the sound of the toot-toot-toot warned us of another impending result. The high-points of the election were the defeat of General Smuts by Wennie du Plessis, and Piet van der Bijl by the unknown Bredasdorp farmer, Dirkie Uys.

From then on, for the rest of my life, I was hooked on politics. Because my father knew them all, I became acquainted with various Nat politicians, like Dr Daniel Malan, Polla Roos and Otto du Plessis.

I never questioned the introduction of Apartheid, because one grew up with it, and whatever the leaders said was alright by me. As a youngster aged about 12, I started accompanying my father to Parliament to listen to debates, and I sat transfixed by the green seats of the Assembly Chamber, wishing that one day I might be a Member of Parliament myself.

I matriculated in 1956, and became a Law student at Stellenbosch University. There I threw myself wholeheartedly into politics, becoming a member of the Nasionale Jeugbond (the National Party’s Youth Wing.) I was elected to the committee and helped to fight my first election in 1958.

When I was a first-year student, my father told me to take the farm labourers to cut Dr Malan’s lawn, and prune his roses. (He had retired as Prime Minister in 1954 and lived in Stellenbosch.) It was a beautiful July morning, and at about eleven o’clock Mrs Malan pushed the old man out in his wheelchair. I joined him for tea, and it was the last conversation I ever had with him. He said to me: Now young man, tell me where you stand in politics. I have known your father for many years, but what about you? I replied with the impetuousness of youth: I am a supporter of Hans Strijdom and what he stands for. He looked sternly at me, and said in his deep voice: Remember if you allow the pendulum of a watch to swing too far to the right and you release it, it will swing as far to the left. It is better to stay somewhere in the middle.

Dr Malan died on the 7th of February, 1959, and I was phoned that same evening by oom Baken Smit, the local organiser of the NP. He explained that they wanted students to dig the grave, and that we should report at the cemetery on Sunday the 9th.

I arrived at the cemetery with a raging hangover, having drunk too much at a wedding the night before. There were four of us, Laurie Macfarlane, Pierre Briers, Fanie Pretorius and me. When we got down to work and the pickaxe said, "ping! we immediately knew that we were going to suffer. In February the soil is as hard as concrete and we were in trouble. None of us had ever done this type of work before and my head was pounding madly. I went to the home of the official gravedigger, Andrew, and asked him: Andrew, what do they pay you per grave? He replied: 10 Shillings (about R 2.00), so I said to him: If you dig that grave for us and finish it by 12 o’clock, I will pay you Ten Pounds (about R20.00.) He finished the grave well before the time and the newspapers came to take posed pictures of the students digging the grave. We never told anybody that we had not actually dug the grave, and that a Coloured" had done the work for us. At the funeral we were even thanked by the leader of the NP in the Cape, Dr Eben Donges, for our selfless act!

The funeral also had a bizarre twist to it. The service took place in the Studente Kerk (Students’ Church) on the afternoon of Monday, February 10th. It was not a State Funeral, but a huge crowd turned up, including many dignitaries. The Governor-General at the time, Dr E.G. Jansen, was ill and his wife attended the funeral alone. Her official car was parked immediately behind the hearse carrying Dr Malan’s coffin. In front of the hearse was a group of six motorcycles. At the conclusion of the service, Mrs Jansen got into her car and told the driver to leave, as she was not going to the cemetery. When the official car pulled out, the motorcyclists followed her, and the driver of the hearse thought he was supposed to follow them, so off they went. All his life Dr Malan had been a slow speaker and a slow mover. On his last earthly journey, he was carried through the streets of Stellenbosch at 90 kilometres an hour! The last people were still leaving the church when the coffin arrived at the burial site.

My father died in 1959, when I was only 21. Although I did not know him for very long, he had a profound impact on my life. He was a special person with huge compassion for the needy. After his death we received numerous letters from people he had helped financially to further their studies, something he never spoke about. I think my compassion for the plight of the disenfranchised masses came from him.

I was only 21, but I had to suspend my university studies to join my cousin, another Jan, on the family farm Middelvlei. It really hurt me not to have completed my studies and I constantly felt that something was missing. (Ten years later I went back to University and completed my studies. In 1970 I obtained a BA degree with History and Economics as my Majors.)

In 1963, I sold my half-share of Middelvlei to my cousin, and bought the famous Neethlingshof Estate for the astronomical price of £103,000 (R206,000.) At the time it was such a huge amount that it set tongues wagging for weeks. Dire predictions were made about me and people suggested that it was just a question of time before I went bankrupt. The farm was relatively run-down and I had to spend a lot of money to bring it to top production. When I bought Neethlingshof, it was producing about 600 tonnes of wine. By 1975 we were producing about 2,000 tonnes.

The house on the farm was an old Cape Dutch homestead, and a National Monument. As I was unmarried, my mother lived with me and took care of me. At the time, the infamous dopstelsel (tot system) was still in full swing. Farm labourers were given wine at various times of the day, as part of their wages. This was nothing but an enslavement system, which caused unbelievable hardship, and led to thousands of Coloured people becoming alcoholics. It was also very difficult to stop, because if you didn’t give wine to the labourers, they would simply quit and go to work for a farmer who would give them their dop. When I arrived at Neethlingshof the labourers received a tot before they started work (in summer that meant at about five o’clock in the morning.) They then got a tot at breakfast, one at eleven, one at lunch, one at four o’clock and two tots at the end of the day. The wine was a terrible concoction and was served in a cut-off bully beef tin. I knew that this had to stop, but realised it was going to be very difficult. What I did was this: every time I raised their salaries, I took away one tot, starting with the pre-dawn tot. It took me about five years to end the dop system on Neethlingshof. (Unfortunately, this practice continued for many years on certain other farms, although I believe that by the 1980s, the Stellenbosch area was totally free of the tot system.) I also really tried my best to improve the living conditions on the farm. I built new houses, installed running water as well as electricity in all homes, and tried to make life as easy as possible for the farm workers.

Shortly thereafter I became involved in National Party politics. While at university, as mentioned earlier, I had belonged to the Youth Wing of the NP. After I left university, I was elected Secretary of the local branch. I remember when, in 1960, Prime Minister Dr Hendrik Verwoerd was due to speak in Stellenbosch, and I was given the task of going through town with a bakkie and a loudspeaker to advertise the meeting. I drove up and down the streets, broadcasting the event: Ladies and Gentlemen, please come and listen to our beloved leader of the National Party and Prime Minister, Dr Hendrik Verwoerd, tonight at eight o’clock in the Stellenbosch Town Hall. As I went past the home of Dr Malan, I got mixed up with the names and invited the people to a public meeting to be addressed by the late political leader, instead of Dr Verwoerd. I don’t know whether it was true or not, but I was told that Mrs Malan had been in the kitchen when I went past, and on hearing her husband’s name shouted out, had promptly fainted!

In 1961, I was very involved in the Yes campaign for the Referendum regarding South Africa becoming a Republic, and was given the responsibility of Postal votes. One day I was sent to Joostenberg Vlakte, to assist an old man in his nineties to vote. He had fought in the Anglo-Boer War in 1899. He was very frail, as well as blind. As I sat down, he asked me: How is General Smuts? I had to think quickly. If I had replied that Smuts was dead, it could have upset him, and he might not have voted, so I told him with a straight face: He is not well, but still going strong. The old man was satisfied and we helped him to put his cross opposite the Yes box.

In 1961, the guest speaker at a branch meeting was the then Deputy Minister of Education, John Vorster, and that is how I became friends with the Vorster family. I was very fond of Mrs Tini Vorster, who always treated me like a son, and I also took a fancy to their daughter, Elsa, who was in Matric at the time. (Years later, after we had both married, our children went to the same school in Bloemfontein and Elsa was very kind to our boys.) I remember asking Mr Vorster for an autographed picture of him, and telling him that one day when he became Prime Minister, I would hang the photo on my wall. In 1966, after the assassination of Dr Hendrik Verwoerd, Vorster was elected Prime Minister. That evening I phoned their home and congratulated him on his election. He asked me: Are you going to hang up my picture now?

I started attending NP Cape Congresses in 1961 and did not miss one for the next 24 years. I became good friends with most of the Cape MPs as well as Ministers. I developed skills for fighting elections, which helped a lot in my later career. At that time the Cape NP organisation was very good and it taught me excellent skills. I think I was a born organiser, being involved with the Farmers’ Association, Wine Route, Food and Wine Festival, athletics and cricket. These things