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By Root 3188 0

that I would be meeting the mayor and a few other dignitaries, perhaps some old acquaintances. Instead, 25,000 people were awaiting me. I was plunged into — at times, to the horror of my detectives and staff, almost sank into — a huge crowd of cheering residents, before being squeezed through and onto a large platform from which I had to give an unscripted speech — always the best. Later, during the Gulf War scud missiles from Iraq fell on Ramat Gan. The people of Finchley raised money to rebuild the houses that had been destroyed. This, I thought, was what ‘twinning’ should be all about.

AFRICA

The Problem of South Africa

I no more shared the established Foreign Office view of Africa than I did of the Middle East. Whereas Israel was considered the pariah of the Middle East with which we would be ill-advised too closely to associate, this role was allotted within Africa to South Africa. The basic, if usually unstated, assumption seemed to be that Britain’s national interests required that we should ultimately be prepared to go along with the opinions of the radical black African states in the Commonwealth. In fact, a clear-sighted analysis suggested something rather different.

Admitted that fundamental changes must be made in South Africa’s system, the question was of how best to achieve them. It seemed to me that the worst approach was to isolate South Africa further. Indeed, the isolation had already gone too far, contributing to an inflexible, siege mentality among the governing Afrikaner class. It was absurd to believe that they would be prepared to relinquish power suddenly or without acceptable safeguards. Indeed, had that occurred the result would have been anarchy in which black South Africans would have suffered most.

Nor, I knew, could the latter be considered a homogeneous group. Tribal loyalties were of great importance. For example, the Zulus are a proud and self-conscious nation with a distinct sense of identity. Any new political framework for South Africa had to take account of such differences. Not least because of these complexities, I did not believe that it was for outsiders to impose a particular solution. What I wanted to achieve was step-by-step reform — with more democracy, secure human rights, and a flourishing free enterprise economy able to generate the wealth to improve black living standards. I wanted to see a South Africa which was fully reintegrated into the international community. Nor did I ever feel, for all the sound and fury of the Left, that this was anything other than a high ideal of which no one need be ashamed.

It was also true that Britain had important trading interests in the continent and that these were more or less equal in black Africa on the one hand and South Africa on the other. South Africa had by far the richest and most varied range of natural resources of any African country. It was the world’s largest supplier of gold, platinum, gem diamonds, chrome, vanadium, manganese and other vital materials. Moreover, in a number of these cases South Africa’s only real rival was the Soviet Union. Even if it had been morally acceptable to pursue a policy which would have led to the collapse of South Africa, it would not therefore have made strategic sense.

South Africa was rich not just because of natural resources but because its economy was at least mainly run on free enterprise lines. Other African countries, well endowed with natural resources, were still poor because their economies were socialist and centrally controlled. Consequently, the blacks in South Africa had higher incomes and were generally better educated than elsewhere in Africa: that was why the South Africans erected security fences to keep intended immigrants out, unlike the Berlin Wall which kept those blessed with a socialist system in. The critics of South Africa never mentioned these inconvenient facts. But simply because I recognized them did not mean that I held any brief for apartheid. The colour of someone’s skin should not determine his or her political rights.

President P. W. Botha was to