Mandela Calls ANC Talks the Way to S. Africa Peace

PAARL, South Africa —  Jailed black nationalist Nelson R. Mandela, in his first officially sanctioned public statement since his conviction a quarter-century ago, said that meeting South Africa’s president last week was consistent with “the position I have taken over the past 28 years, namely that dialogue with . . . the African National Congress is the only way of ending violence and bringing peace to our country.”

In the terse, three-paragraph statement, released Wednesday night by the South African Prisons Department, the 70-year-old leader of the banned guerrilla group also said his release “is not an issue at this stage. . . . I only would like to contribute to the creation of a climate which would promote peace in South Africa.”

Mandela said that Justice Minister Kobie Coetsee’s account of the prisoner’s July 5 meeting with President Pieter W. Botha “was an accurate reflection of what happened.” Coetsee had said the meeting, over tea in the presidential mansion in Cape Town, was a “courtesy call” at which no negotiations were conducted and no policy matters were discussed.

Word of the Botha-Mandela meeting, the first known face-to-face encounter between the two men, has touched off frenzied speculation in South Africa.

Government officials hailed it as one of the most important events in modern South African history. Anti-apartheid leaders, including ANC leaders at their exile headquarters in Lusaka, Zambia, said it was a government “public relations exercise” and not a significant event.

Liberal whites and moderate blacks in South Africa have sided with the government’s view, saying the tete-a-tete signaled the first step on the road to Mandela’s release and negotiations toward a peaceful resolution of the racial conflict here. They said the meeting was a ground-breaking move by the white rulers, who have until recently portrayed Mandela and his ANC as the greatest threats to peace and security in South Africa.

But local black leaders in the mass democratic movement, which includes the United Democratic Front anti-apartheid coalition and others of Mandela’s most loyal followers, have cautioned that the meeting was an isolated event designed to improve the government’s image and raise the hopes of the nation’s black majority.

“It’s a mistake to think that the government can grab hold of one of us and convince our constituency that they are serious about any changes,” one of the country’s most respected anti-apartheid leaders, who is under restriction orders that prevent him being quoted by name, said in an interview with The Times this week.

Urges Talks With ANC Head

“The ANC is led by an executive committee, and nobody is going to succeed by playing one of us against another,” the leader added. “If they (the government) are serious about getting down to talks, they will talk with that national executive, not to a person who is under their control in jail.”

Tom Sebina, a spokesman for the ANC in Lusaka, told The Times that the ANC was not informed of the Botha-Mandela meeting in advance and “we don’t think much significance should be attached to the meeting.”

“In the past, people’s hopes have been unnecessarily raised only to be later dashed,” Sebina added.

Mandela said his statement was issued “in response to comment in the media” concerning his meeting with Botha, the 73-year-old head of state who, under pressure from his own ruling party, is leaving office after elections Sept. 6.

He said there was “no deviation from the position I have taken over the past 28 years, namely that dialogue with the mass democratic movement and, in particular, with the African National Congress, is the only way of ending violence and bringing peace to our country.

“I believe, however,” Mandela added, “that at this early stage further statements to the press as a means of conducting possible future discussions would not be the appropriate course of action to promote peaceful development.”

Jailers Released Statement

Mandela wrote his message here at Victor Verster Prison, about 40 miles from Cape Town, on Sunday and handed it to his jailers, asking that they release it. It is highly unusual for the government to release the statements of prisoners, who by law may not be quoted, and Mandela’s previous messages to his followers have been smuggled out of prison through visiting family members or his attorney.

Although prison officials could have altered the statement, anti-apartheid leaders said Wednesday night that it appeared to be genuine and verbatim.

Mandela, serving a life term for sabotage and attempting to overthrow the government, has talked extensively with government officials in recent years. But his meeting with Botha took many of his followers by surprise.

Under South African law, neither Mandela’s words nor his photograph may be published or broadcast in South Africa. But this statement appeared to be an exception, and the state-run television station led off its Wednesday evening newscast with Mandela’s remarks, translating them into Afrikaans, the language of the Dutch-descended white rulers.

Mandela’s last officially sanctioned public remarks came during his trial, which ended in June, 1964. His lengthy testimony, setting out the reasons he and other ANC leaders turned in desperation to the armed struggle against Pretoria, has been the ideological bible for ANC activists ever since. It also has made Mandela an almost mythological hero of the resistance movement, and his followers number in the millions.

A statement from Mandela was smuggled out of prison, and then read publicly by his daughter, in 1985 when President Botha had offered to release Mandela on the condition that he renounce violence. In that brief statement, Mandela bluntly spurned the offer.

“Only free men can negotiate,” he said. “Prisoners cannot enter into contracts. . . . I cannot and will not give any undertaking at a time when I and you, the people, are not free. Your freedom and mine cannot be separated. I will return.”

Since then, Botha has appeared to soften his conditions for Mandela’s release.