Political Ban on Signs Ends in Cape Town
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — Law and Order Minister Louis le Grange on Thursday lifted Cape Town’s ban on political badges, signs, bumper stickers and T-shirts, just one day after it was imposed.
The controversial ban was issued by Brig. Chris Swart, the Cape Town police commissioner, in advance of today’s opening session of the South African Parliament. Under the nation’s state of emergency, anyone violating the order could have been jailed for up to 10 years and fined $10,000, with no right of appeal.
Le Grange said the ban was aimed at black demonstrations rumored to be planned for today. In lifting it, he warned that police will take strong action against any protest that disrupts “the public peace” during the first weeks of the Parliament session.
‘Ridiculous, Absurd’
Frederick van Zyl Slabbert, leader of the white opposition Progressive Federal Party, had denounced Swart’s order as “probably the most absurd and ridiculous instruction ever issued by this government.”
President Pieter W. Botha is to open Parliament today with a speech expected to include some reforms of the white-minority government’s policy of racial separation, known as apartheid.
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