Blue Dog Jewellery looks at an inspirational South African woman
These two articles about the anti-apartheid campaigner, Helen Suzman, appeared in the Guardian today:
Fearless anti-apartheid campaigner Suzman dies
• MP was often lone critic of regime in parliament
• Mandela foundation pays tribute to a 'great patriot'
- The Guardian, Friday 2 January 2009
- Article history
Tributes were paid yesterday to the South African anti-apartheid campaigner and Nobel peace prize nominee Helen Suzman, who has died at the age of 91.
An outspoken critic in the South African parliament of the old apartheid regime, and honoured by Nelson Mandela after he was released from prison, Suzman died peacefully at her Johannesburg home.
"She really was indomitable," said Archbishop Desmond Tutu yesterday. "She used to visit Robben Island at the time when Nelson Mandela and others were held there." He said that "just by being stroppy" she was able to effect change. He added: "We owe her an enormous, enormous debt ... She was a powerhouse against apartheid."
The chief executive of the Nelson Mandela Foundation, Achmat Dangor, described her as "a great patriot and a fearless fighter against apartheid".
The African National Congress also paid tribute to her campaigning work over the years. "She became a thorn in the flesh of apartheid by openly criticising segregation of blacks by a whites-only apartheid system," it said.
Her daughter, Frances Jowell, told the South African Press Association that there would be a private funeral this weekend and a public memorial service to be held in February.
First elected to the all-white South African parliament in 1953, Suzman was often a lone voice speaking out against the inequities and atrocities of the National party government. She served as an MP until her retirement in 1989 and was by Mandela's side when he signed the country's new constitution in 1996 as its first black president.
Mandela, to whom she sent classical music records in prison, awarded her the Order of Merit (gold) in recognition of her work in 1997. "It is a courage born of the yearning for freedom," he said of her at the time, "of hatred of oppression, injustice and inequity whether the victim be oneself or another; a fortitude that draws its strength from the conviction that no person can be free while others are unfree."
He said of her visits to the political prisoners on Robben Island, that it had been "an odd and wonderful sight to see this courageous woman peering into our cells and strolling around our courtyard. She was the first and only woman ever to grace our cells".
In the foreword to her autobiography, Mandela wrote: "Without apologising for her using the South African parliamentary process, Helen's participation in opposing the complete absence of democracy in South Africa under the National party rule must be applauded."
Born Helen Gavronsky in the mining town of Germiston, in the Transvaal, to Jewish immigrants from eastern Europe, she was a lecturer at Witwatersrand University before she entered politics as an opposition MP, initially for the United party. She later helped to form the liberal Progressive party, for whom she was the sole MP for more than a decade.
She was often mocked and heckled in parliament by the supporters of apartheid who told her: "Go back to Moscow" or "Go back to Israel".
President PW Botha accused her of trying to bring the country to its knees and of helping the enemies of South Africa. She responded: "I am not frightened of you. I never have been and I never will be. I think nothing of you."
She said of Botha: "If he was female he would arrive in parliament on a broomstick."
Over the years, she received 27 honorary doctorates from universities around the world. She was made Dame of the British Empire in 1989.
At her 90th birthday, she expressed her disappointment at what she saw as a lack of progress in South Africa in addressing crime, unemployment and poverty.
She was also highly critical of Robert Mugabe, the president of Zimbabwe, who declared her to be an "enemy of the state" for her criticism.
Remembering Helen Suzman
The anti-apartheid campaigner's death leaves a gap in South African society which will not be easily filled
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- guardian.co.uk, Friday 2 January 2009 11.02 GMT
- Article history
Helen Suzman, who has died aged 91, earned worldwide fame during the 13 years in which she sat as South Africa's lone Progressive MP, the sole voice in the all-white parliament to oppose apartheid root and branch.
The child of prosperous Lithuanian Jewish immigrants, she had married Moses Suzman, a successful neurologist, had two daughters and lectured at the University of the Witswatersrand, before she became an opposition United party MP for Houghton in 1953. Houghton was at once the richest, the most Jewish and the most liberal constituency in the country but the UP, shocked by the victories of the Afrikaner Nationalists in the 1948 and 1953 elections was trying hard to convince the electorate that it was no less committed to white supremacy than the Nats. Helen was increasingly uncomfortable in the party and it was at her house that another 10 UP MPs gathered in August 1959 to plan the breakaway Progressive party, committed to non-racialism.
Even decades later Helen never lost her admiration for some of her colleagues then from less blue chip seats than her own who sacrificed their careers for sheer principle. In the 1961 election she alone held her seat – by a bare 500 votes.
For the next 13 years – the very height of apartheid and a period in which each year brought more repressive legislation – she was the lone but hugely energetic voice of opposition, savaging the government's laws for detention without trial and was far more outspoken than anyone else in exposing police torture, abuses in prisons, and the general cruelty and irrationality of apartheid. She had a firm grasp of parliamentary procedure, an energetic research team backing her up, a sharp sense of humour and an even sharper tongue in debate. She was utterly loathed by the Nats. When she was re-elected in 1961 Hendrik Frensch Verwoerd warned Jewish South Africans that their behaviour "has not gone unnoticed" and when she got up to speak in the house she was often greeted by such pleasantries as "Karl Marx was also a Jew!" No one hated her more than the later president, PW Botha, who regarded her as a hell-cat and even accused her of responsibility for Verwoerd's assassination.
Perfectly aware that many of her Nat opponents, including the prime minister, BJ Vorster, had been keen pro-Nazis in the war, she was wholly unafraid and unabashed. Hendrik Van den Berg, one of these pro-Nazis, became head of the much-feared security police. She called him "South Africa's very own Heinrich Himmler" and told Vorster, who was even more feared, that he should visit his constituency "heavily disguised as a human being". Many Jews were proud of her but not a few quailed at what she might be provoking.
Suzman took it upon herself to defend the whole range of apartheid's opponents, including the jailed Mandela, making it clear that she did not necessarily agree with them but that in a democracy their voice had to be heard. She also gave heart to Mandela and other prisoners on Robben Island by frequently visiting them, making a huge fuss about their lamentable conditions and achieving a large improvement in them. She completely won Mandela's heart and they remained devoted friends to the end. Her happiness when he was released was almost tangible and he gathered her up in a huge hug. He didn't like her liberal critique of his ANC but nothing could seriously disturb his affection for her.
Helen was hugely encouraged by her reinforcement by the growing Progs but she was an instinctive loner, not a team player and never became party leader. Moreover, as the anti-apartheid struggle intensified the pro-ANC left became increasingly critical of her liberal stance. Most particularly, she fiercely opposed economic sanctions, believing both that they would hurt mainly the poor and that in any case economic growth was one of the main forces working against apartheid. Inevitably, the left attacked her as a racist for refusing to do as they wished but Mandela's attitude towards her, once he was released, made it clear how ridiculous this had always been. But, typically, she was as unabashed by black racism as she was by white racism: she was a liberal through and through, never felt she had to apologise for herself and kept on doing the best she could. After 36 years her parliamentary career ended with her resignation in 1989, just as apartheid was about to collapse.
She happily greeted De Klerk's decision to abandon apartheid in 1990 and was delighted to welcome South African democracy in 1994. Her friendship with Mandela initially made her very unwilling to criticise the ANC government but she became increasingly disillusioned, vocally so once Mbeki succeeded Mandela and proceeded to support Mugabe and become an Aids denialist. She made no secret of the fact that she felt bitterly disappointed by this turn of events but never regretted her opposition to apartheid. Twice nominated for the Nobel peace prize, the recipient of 25 honorary degrees and an honorary DBE from the Queen, she never ceased to be a feisty and irreverent presence. She leaves a gap in South African society which will not be easily filled.
Posted by Shona Lockhart, 2nd January 2009
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