New constitution adopted by South Africa parliament

[Charlotte Kates <ckates@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>X-Sender: ksm@xxxxxxxxxxxx
>Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 21:13:40 -0500
>To: cscpo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Colin Cavell)
>From: Scott Marshall <scott@xxxxxxxxxx>
>Subject: New constitution adopted by South Africa parliament
>
>**New constitution adopted by South Africa parliament**
>
>(Reprinted from the May 18, 1996 issue of the People's
>Weekly World. May be reprinted or reposted with PWW credit.
>For subscription information see below)
>
>By Jim Genova
>
>On May 8 South Africa's parliament voted 421 to 2, with 10
>abstentions, in favor of that country's first post-apartheid
>constitution. Hundreds of thousands of people, sensing that
>they are finally free of the onerous apartheid system,
>poured into the streets in celebration. The vote came just
>over two years after the African National Congress (ANC) won
>the country's first non-racial election and Nelson Mandela
>became president.
>
>Despite the National Party's support for the constitution,
>Deputy President F.W. de Klerk resigned from the National
>Unity government and went into "vigorous opposition" to the
>ANC. The National Party instituted the apartheid regime in
>1948 and ruled the country until defeated by the ANC in
>1994.
>
>De Klerk's resignation left only the Inkatha Freedom Party,
>headed by Home Affairs Minister Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi,
>in coalition with the ANC. It was uncertain whether Inkatha
>would remain in the government with its main ally, the
>National Party, now in opposition.
>
>Mandela said de Klerk's resignation was not unexpected. De
>Klerk had threatened to resign several times in the past to
>wring concessions from the ANC. Mandela indicated the ANC
>was now prepared to govern alone and said the National
>Party's move was part of the "maturation process" of a
>multi-party democracy.
>
>De Klerk said his party withdrew because of its opposition
>to wording in the constitution which allows for black
>Africans dispossessed by Afrikaaners to file suit for
>compensation. In addition, de Klerk decried the "lack of
>balance" between the rights and obligations of workers and
>employers. De Klerk said the National Party would explore
>their options in building a coalition to "restore employers'
>collective bargaining rights" - a thinly veiled threat of
>economic sabotage aimed at the ANC's attempt to build a
>welfare state with substantial workers' rights.
>
>Some observers said they believed the new situation would
>give Mandela and the ANC more room for maneuver in
>implementing its election promises. The National Party can
>no longer block government policy. However, the danger of
>ethnic strife remains a concern, now including an Afrikaaner
>ethnic minority lacking any direct access to the state for
>the first time since the Dutch settled in the region about
>400 years ago.
>##30##
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