History Paper 2 Addendum - Grade 12 June 2021 Exemplars

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ADDENDUM

QUESTION 1:	HOW DID SOUTH AFRICANS REACT TO P.W. BOTHA’S REFORMS IN THE 1980s?
SOURCE 1A
This extract focuses on the reforms implemented by the apartheid regime to transform apartheid.
The new Botha administration thus began to transform apartheid. It granted rights to African trade unions and allowed important privileges for the urban workforce, but it was the government’s attempt to create a black middle class that impacted most on Soweto. The government hoped that this class of black people would have too much to lose to help the struggle for liberation. Central to the government’s reform initiative was the reintroduction of 99-year leaseholds. Sowetans were once again allowed to buy rather than rent, newly built houses as well as the older matchbox houses. They could also renovate their homes. The government embarked (started) on an advertising campaign using the slogan, ‘Buy now, improve and feel secure’. Although few houses were sold initially, after new loans were made available to buyers, many houses were SOLD [From Soweto: A History by P Bonner and L Segal]

SOURCE 1B

This extract focuses on the role played by the UDF to resist apartheid.

A vacuum was created in the townships and ordinary black men and women realised that all South Africans who opposed apartheid now had to unite in a nationalist struggle to force the government to negotiations. It was in this space that important new political figures such as the Reverend Allan Boesak, Albertina Sisulu and Patrick ‘Terror’ Lekota, including many others, came together to launch a new broad anti-apartheid organisation.

The United Democratic Front (UDF) was formed on 20 August 1983. The goal of the UDF was to bring together various groups in South Africa who were fighting for the same goal: freedom from the apartheid regime. After the Soweto Uprising more youth, students and workers became involved in the anti-apartheid struggle. Their new tactics of resistance were more aggressive and militant. The UDF wanted to take these changes to the political level and called for change through mass mobilisation and resistance. The UDF operated under the slogan, “People’s Power”, stating that in order to change the political system it must start at the local level. The UDF soon realised that it was very difficult for the state to suppress the multiple local level resistance campaigns, especially their ungovernable tactics of consumer and rent boycotts and protest.

In January 1986 the UDF met with the African National Congress to determine in more detail the UDF and its role against the apartheid regime.

[From www.ancarchives.co.za. Accessed on 11 May 2021.]

SOURCE 1C

This is a poster used by the UDF in its anti-election protest against apartheid in 1984.

[From South Africa-info.com/history/nelson-mandela-timeline/attachment/united-democratic-front-elections-boycott-poster-1984/ Accessed on 11 May 2021.]

SOURCE 1D

The source below explains the role played by civil society against apartheid.

The clashes of 1984–1986 ushered in a new phase in popular resistance in South Africa. In many townships across the country, civilian government collapsed, and was replaced by alternative unofficial organisations that insisted on ‘people power.’ In many cases, youth organisations took the initiative, although they received support from a broader sector of the community than was previously the case. There was more effective liaison between students and workers. Street committees organised coordinated actions such as rent boycotts and consumer boycotts of white businesses to persuade the owners to support the demands for desegregation and reduction of oppression by the state.

The events of the mid-1980s were certainly marked by the emergence of a young male assertiveness in the political arena previously expressed through gangs.

[From The Making of Modern South Africa by N. Warden]

QUESTION 2:	HOW SUCCESSFUL WAS THE TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION COMMISSION (TRC) IN DEALING WITH THE DEATH OF ACTIVIST LENNY NAIDU?
SOURCE 2A
The following source is a short explanation of Lenny Naidu and his activities with the ANC in THE POST, dated 24 June 2018 by Arushan Naidoo.
Durban – Surendra ‘Lenny’ Naidu was a fighter of the underground struggle as a member of the ANC’s armed wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), a student activist and a hero to many. Naidu dedicated his life to advancing the idea of non-racialism and unity, fighting tirelessly for South African freedom and striving to improve the quality of life of all people. As a member of the Natal Indian Congress (NIC), he participated in all their campaigns and strived to forward the NIC’s goal for equal rights for all. In November 1986, Naidu became a member of the ANC and contributed to the underground struggle by joining Umkhonto we Sizwe. He was subjected to constant harassment from the police, which forced him into exile. He departed for Lusaka, where he would receive further instructions, before reporting to Angola for military training. In May 1988, Naidu left Angola to head home. He made his way to Zambia before catching a flight from Mozambique that would see him land in Swaziland. Naidu continued to reside in Swaziland as he awaited orders on how he would go about infiltrating (enter) South Africa. On June 8 1988, Naidu and MK comrades Makhosi Nyoka, Lindiwe Mthembu and Nontskilelo June Rose Cotoza were gunned down near Piet Retief in an ambush co-ordinated by former police colonel, torturer and assassin under the command of the apartheid government, Eugene de Kock. Four days later, police forces were told to return to the vicinity (area) by a collaborator (police spy). There they took the lives of five young MK members. [From https://www.iol.co.za › thepost › lenny-naidu-the-making-of-a-hero-15631. Accessed on 20 October 2019.]

SOURCE 2B

The following source is a written copy of evidence that Leslie Naidu gave before the TRC regarding the murder of his brother and student activist Lenny Naidu in 1996.

COMMISSIONER: Mr Naidu, both Mr Naidu’s, you heard the comments that I made earlier to the witness before you, Gloria Nyoka, and I repeat those for your benefit as well. We can only imagine what you and your family must have gone through to have to identify your brother, and your son, in the condition in which you found him. He was a young person who, as you have said, devoted much of his younger life to doing voluntary work for others. He became politicised. He left the country. If you just consider that if he had been arrested and charged according to the law in those days, charged for being a member of the ANC, charged for leaving the country unlawfully, or without a passport, there’s no doubt that he would have been alive and free today. But that's not how it happened in those days, and the overwhelming probabilities are – taking into account that both these groups died on different days in exactly the same circumstances, the overwhelming probabilities are that they were simply murdered, and placed – as I recall from those times – on top of each other in a prison cell, where you had to identify them.

We know that Mr de Kock and Mr Nafumela have applied for amnesty, and we will be having a very close look at those applications for amnesty to see whether they make full disclosure, as they are obliged to do, and to see what their version is of these events. It is also possible that when de Kock gives his address in mitigation (less serious) of sentence – as you know he's just been sentenced on 89 charges, including six of murder – when he gives his address in mitigation of sentence it is expected that he will refer to other incidents, and that also may be some lead in to find out what happened in June 1988 to your brother, to your son.

So we thank you for having had the courage to have come forward today.

[From http://sabctrc.saha.org.za. Accessed on 20 October 2019.]

SOURCE 2C

The following newspaper article entitled ‘TRC to hear about Piet Retief killings’ was written by Sue Blaine. It appeared on the Independent online website on 26 July 1999.

Former Vlakplaas commander Eugene de Kock makes another amnesty application to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission on Monday, telling of the security police ambushes of eight Durban-based anti-apartheid activists.

De Kock and 21 other policemen are set to tell the TRC hearing at the Durban Christian Centre, Mayville, how two sets of Umkhonto we Sizwe cadres were ambushed (sudden attack) at Piet Retief, on the Mpumalanga border, and killed by Vlakplaas operatives in 1985. In the first ambush, Durban ANC activist Lenny Naidu and three women were killed when the security police, waiting in ambush, opened fire on a vehicle in which the four had been transported across the Swaziland border into South Africa ...

Apparently the Piet Retief police had infiltrated the MK network, gaining information regarding the movements of cadres across the Swaziland border and asked De Kock to assist in an operation. On 8 June 1985, a Vlakplaas driver cited by the TRC only as LT Moshe, picked up the four cadres, Lenny Naidu, Charity Nyembezi, Makhosi Nyoka and Nonsikelelo Cothoza, and drove them to a pre-arranged spot. The driver then ran from the vehicle and the security police opened fire, killing all four.

The second ambush, which took place a few days later on 12 June 1985, employed the same modus operandi (method) ... a group of MK operatives led by Charles Ndaba, including Boxer Mthembu, Jabulani Sibisi, Sifiso Nxumalo and Innocent Thenjwayo, were fetched by a Vlakplaas driver and were taken to a certain spot and ambushed ...

Fifteen applicants, including De Kock and former security policemen Paul van Dyk, Johan Tait, Marthinus Ras and Cornelius Botha are involved in this application.

[From httos:/Awww.iol.co.za/news/politics/trc-to-hear-about-piet-retief-killings-6460. Accessed on 21 October 2019.]

SOURCE 2D

The cartoon below by Zapiro depicts Archbishop Desmond Tutu receiving Eugene de Kock’s application for amnesty in Pretoria in 1996.