Читать книгу The People’s Paper - Christopher Lowe - Страница 20

That ANC politics were prominent in Abantu-Batho flowed naturally, given that the movement’s founder, Seme, backed by the SANNC executive, had also founded the paper. The 1919 constitution of the Transvaal Native Congress (from the 1920s Transvaal African Congress, or TAC) recorded Abantu-Batho as its organ and in the late 1920s it became the organ of the national ANC. Based in Johannesburg, editors tended to have overlapping membership of both. Congress office bearers and politicised correspondents made good use of the paper’s pages to announce and report on meetings and to air differences with government and among themselves. It remains unclear how Abantu-Batho structures related to ANC structures: whether any directives flowed from Congress bodies to editors, or whether they all felt obliged to explicitly canvass support for Congress or follow its policies in editorials. Seme, Msane, and Selope Thema, and later Mweli Skota and Gumede, were leading Congress office holders during their time as editors, although others, such as Kunene and Grendon, were less prominent. Seme’s overall role is unclear: he began as managing editor and at the start may have been involved in setting overall editorial policy, although this influence faded by the end of World War I and the paper’s increasingly radical tone would have been anathema to him.

There is nothing about a press organ in the 1919 SANNC constitution or its draft predecessors, although recording secretary duties included being ‘newsagent of the congress’, reporting to the executive all press comments affecting or concerning Congress and ‘generally report[ing] to the press the proceedings of the Congress’.⁸ In April 1913 there was reference to six ‘Newspaper Press Organs’ of the SANNC: Abantu-Batho, Umlomo wa Bantu, Ilanga lase Natal, Naledi ea Lesotho, Tsala ea Batho and APO.⁹ On the other hand, Article 19 of the 1919 TNC constitution specifies that ‘[t]he official organ of the Congress shall be the “ABANTU-BATHO”’. Here, organisational ties were close: Sesotho editor Letanka was TNC vice-president and journalist Selope Thema general secretary.¹⁰ Over the years the paper carried many editorials favourable to the national and provincial Congress (if at times critical of the former), and thus is identified with them.

Being a Congress organ or mouthpiece, Abantu-Batho recorded much detail of its doings, including constitutional amendments. A fragment from a February 1926 issue carried changes to sections 104–5 and 106–7 of chapter VII of the ANC constitution on forwarding monies and debts, as mandated at a special conference of January that also amended sections 83–87, 90–91 and 98 of chapter VI so that ‘each and every member’ in ‘all Provinces shall pay a membership fee of 2s. 6d. and a monthly levy of 1s’; any territory, province or branch defying this would ‘forfeit its right as a branch’.¹¹

That Abantu-Batho gave ample and sympathetic coverage to Congress affairs makes it a seminal source for ANC history. Matters of organisation and ideology feature. ‘What is wanted is organisation’, it reported in 1917 in light of problems such as members having to pay their own expenses to conferences invariably held in Bloemfontein, which was fast becoming a ‘dumping ground’ for meetings.¹² Reports on Congress are often effusive, as on the ninth meeting of the TNC in April 1919 marked by an attendance that was ‘very large indeed’. Yet they also reveal problems in organising in rural areas such as Lydenberg and Barberton, where organisers ‘have actually miles and miles under difficult climatic conditions, yet zealously preach their mission to their own compatriots’. White farmers could be ‘very antagonistic’, yet organisers ‘press on preaching the gospel of unity and wakefulness’.¹³ In these varied reports, a nascent African nationalism was ever present. In 1924 the American magazine Living Age, after citing rumblings of resistance in Kenya, detected the ‘same spirit of protest’ in a recent Abantu-Batho editorial that stated:

Rome, mistress of the world, ruled supreme … and erected …. ‘The Temple of Eternal Peace’. Nineteen hundred years have passed, and that temple is now buried among the ruins of ancient Rome, and other temples have been erected for the purpose of preaching peace …. Yet there is no peace … the nations of the world are only taking a breathing space before they once more come to grips in a deadlier and more destructive war. With such a conception of peace, the strong and rich oppressing the weak and the poor, with the canker of racial prejudice eating at its very vitals, how can the white man expect peace …? Who can think that he can come to my house, put me out, take all I possess, and then talk to me about peace and justice, and … a League of Nations for peace?¹⁴

Internal debates were aired. Randfontein branch chair S. B. Macheng replied to TAC general secretary Moses Mphahlele’s proposed election of provincial presidents, agreeing that they should appoint their own officials, but adding that, having ‘elected a Moses to lead the Africans to the land of promise’, they now needed an Aaron to follow his commands. He proposed S. P. Matseke, who served under Gumede and Seme, for unity.¹⁵

Editors used their prerogative to intercede on matters of principle. In 1916 they printed a letter to Saul Msane requesting repayment of a loan of £27 8s extended by the London Missionary Society and Aborigines Protection Society to the SANNC delegation to England. The editor (probably Grendon) appended a caustic cautionary note:

The Congress at Kroonstad, we were told, undertook in August last to pay the sums demanded as above. The above letter shows that Congress has not yet discharged the obligation undertaken on behalf of its delegates. Note, O Bantu, the tardiness of your stewards in this matter. Where are your Treasurers? Call them to their duty without delay, ere the patience of your benefactors across the pond become taxed beyond the mark.¹⁶

If some debate surfaced, there was also as in most political papers a degree of intolerance. ANC president Makgatho, in a letter to Umteteli in March 1921, accused Abantu-Batho editors of being a clique that hurled insults at political opponents:

It seems that any person regardless of his/her level of education, if one does not go along or work together with the ‘Bantu-Batho’ clique, is deemed to be uneducated/ poorly educated; and does not have the ability to lead the nation! … We watch with trepidation as canons and pistols are being shot at the late son of Msane. … It is from this same clique that we heard loud noises of grievances against Reverend Dube. … Now today we see the clique publishing further insults in its newspaper suggesting that the President of the S.A.N.N.C and the President of the Transvaal Native Congress [Makgatho] is just poorly educated, someone who should be thrown out of office! … We cannot talk and now our members are scared of our organization, of Congress because of this Jeppe bush clique. Many rumours are circulating within the community that the President of the Congress is being pulled by the nose by the Jeppe bush clique. Let me inform the community that no, the President of the Congress has his own independent and complete mind. … Now is electioneering time, so stop insults, ‘Bantu-Batho’.¹⁷

This tags a dogmatic streak in some editors or their factions. Yet Makgatho had earlier used the paper for such ends to snipe at Dube (as had Msane) and continued to publish there, suggesting a need to maintain broad factional support or editorial changes pursuant to his criticism. More ironically, Umteteli concurred with Abantu-Batho’s New Year message: ‘[L]et our leaders and people exercise a spirit of toleration to one another’.¹⁸

Questions of tolerance and inner-party democracy are worth pursuing. If the editors’ ‘poison pen’ touched a nerve and revealed an unfortunate tendency to intolerance, they also staked out a distinct style based on a claim to national representativeness and ‘direct-action’ journalism. Adopting an apolitical, pro-Chamber of Mines ‘line’ pursued by Umteteli (whose editorials could be just as vituperative) was hardly an option. Editors simultaneously sought opportunities to soften and moderate comments, as in the above-mentioned paeans to esteemed white officials mentioned below or olive branches extended to Jabavu and Dube, and gave generous space to a wide range of political and religious bodies. After all, operating on a far-from-level playing field, they needed allies. What is harder to determine, given the leading role played in Transvaal ANC politics by Mvabaza, Mabaso and Letanka, is whether the paper or the party wagged the editorial tail.

There are many cases where Abantu-Batho declared in favour of the democratic interests of ‘the masses’. This included sympathy for struggles of women and workers, as outlined below. Sometimes this was more in the vein of reporting than editorialising. In July 1918 it reported that a meeting of the Congress committee handling the idea of a strike had agreed to let representatives elected by mine labourers accompany a delegation of ten elected by Congress, although the labourers would be under direction of the ten.¹⁹ At other times, the ‘Letters to the Editor’ column spoke for democracy. In 1931 correspondent L. S. Motsepe used it to assert that ANC leaders had neglected his Pretoria branch and Seme, who had ridden roughshod over inner-party democracy, was plotting to undermine Abantu-Batho. F. Bryn of the same branch echoed these comments and the branch pledged ‘emphatically our allegiance to the Independent African National Congress’.²⁰

A host of local correspondents gave insights into regional politics. They boosted local subscriptions and reported a wide range of events. In 1920 Moses Ngqase reported from Sterkstroom on local politics and other affairs from the Bhunga to Smuts. The same issue had reports on the Newcastle branch of Congress and by Rev. E. L. Mkize of Roberts Heights, Pretoria; Joseph Kgaphola of Premier Mine; S. J. Chuthlane of the Vryburg branch of Congress, and various other accounts from as far afield as Bloemfontein and Sophiatown. Correspondents included Thema, C. S. Mabaso, Henry Reed Ngcayiya, Thipe Ditshego, J. T. Gumede and Johannes Nkosi.²¹ From the paper, we learn of an ANC branch active in Alexandra in 1923 presided over by John Mophosho (Mposho) with T. S. Mngadi as general secretary, but driven, perhaps, by the chameleon-like E. P. Mart Zulu. And we also hear of local parties and advisory board politics in Evaton.²²

ANC coverage was not limited to the Transvaal. For example, Abantu-Batho reported Orange Free State (OFS) Congress news, where by 1917 changes in leadership led to a ‘heated dispute’ about credentials, which was ‘finally amicably settled’. It also covered discussions on justice and legal discrimination at the April 1918 conference in Waaihoek.²³

The various papers soon became embroiled in internecine scuffles. By 1914 there were rumblings of turf battles around Dube’s presidency.²⁴ At first, relations were cordial. All lacked ready access to expensive news agencies (see the Introduction and chapter 11 in this volume) and tended to reprint stories from one another. Abantu-Batho, commenting on Eastern Cape elections, was careful to mention ‘the venerable IMVO’ (Imvo Zabantsundu), whose editor promptly reprinted the article.²⁵ Ilanga regularly reported the comings and goings of the editors of its Rand sister paper, while an Abantu-Batho article discussed the complex politics of the SANNC and Natal Native Congress (NNC).²⁶ When Ilanga turned its guns on mission paper Izwi la Kiti, which ‘bears by baptism a Bantu name but in spirit is not Bantu at all’, for it maintains ‘disunion amongst natives’, it complimented its sister paper for criticising Izwi: ‘Many thanks to you of the “Abantu-Batho” for this action.’²⁷

Eventually, however, political rivalries, especially between Saul Msane and Dube, but also between the provincial Congresses and their effective organs, began to take their toll. Abantu-Batho aired deep-seated antagonisms between the two men focused on the alleged mismanagement of the funds of the delegation to Britain. An article by Msane attacking Dube provoked a unanimous resolution in support of the latter at an NNC meeting of April 1916, reported in Ilanga,²⁸ which also printed a trenchant open letter to Abantu-Batho by Thema cautioning the editors from giving vent to divisive views. Unity, he urged, was more important than ‘the proving of Mafukuzela’s [Dube’s] or Mayimayi’s [Msane’s] innocence …. But alas! the “Voice of the Native Races of South Africa” has only one mouth and therefore cannot speak for all the people’. As Christison shows in his chapter, there was also ‘bad blood’ between Grendon and Thema, with the latter aiming his barbs against the former, who as English editor was leading this attack ‘in the language with which the large majority of the people are not acquainted’. Thema’s claim that Abantu-Batho was responsible for divisions was a case of shooting the messenger, but his comment that it had ‘become a party paper’ was accurate under its TNC constitutional ambit. In the eventual spill two months later, Msane and Grendon were dismissed (possibly by Seme) as editors, and Dube lost the presidency.²⁹ In these jousts, Abantu-Batho would often – as it did in 1920 – question whether Natal ‘was playing its part towards Africanism’.³⁰

In all this, press lobbying by Rand-based Zulus was a factor. At first cordial relations prevailed. The Ikomiti lamaZulu ase Goli held a meeting at the Abantu-Batho offices just before Christmas 1916. In late 1917 Abantu-Batho was careful to report that a special meeting of the SANNC executive in Bloemfontein took cognisance not just of TNC protests against the Native Affairs Administration Bill, but also the ‘forceful and straightforward speaking’ of NNC members at Ladysmith, Pietermaritzburg and Durban, as also the protests of Zulu chiefs in Vryheid.³¹

But when Msane was pilloried by Abantu-Batho in 1918, NNC members on the Rand such as A. W. G. Champion came to his defence, criticising Abantu-Batho for being used by Makgatho’s Transvaal group in factionalism against Dube (and Natal).³² Msane gave his own view of events in a letter sent to Abantu-Batho, but published just before his death in Ilanga in May 1919.³³

The shifting maelstrom of Transvaal politics would see Makgatho soon make a similar accusation against the paper. Some years later Champion would come full circle to defend Abantu-Batho. For his part, Seme gave up on Abantu-Batho, started the Eshowe-based Ikwezi le Afrika in 1928, and used the pages of Ilanga in 1929 to launch his drive for ANC power.³⁴ The press was therefore an essential cog of any political machine. Without more evidence it is hard to claim which faction or its paper was telling the truth, but we may follow Foucault in emphasising the development of a certain ‘free-spokenness’.³⁵

Accounting for this factionalism is not easy. La Hausse de Lalouvière points to some evidence that ‘Zulu’ influence was on the wane in the TNC by then. I tend to agree with Lowe that most Abantu-Batho actors had never had much to do with the NNC.³⁶ Later, Gumede made use of the rival Natal African Congress to boost his national political profile, just as Seme would turn his back on Abantu-Batho and found his rival Ikwezi, for the same purpose. Abantu-Batho may have become the meat in the political sandwich, or equally it seems to have been an active player in the eventual triumph of TNC forces in the ANC.

But we can discover much more than rivalry in this journal. We can chart the formation of Eastern Cape ANC bodies. While writers assume this region was the seedbed of African nationalism, this truism does not always extend to the detail of ANC politics. Walter Rubusana, Meshach Pelem, E. P. B. Koti and E. J. Mqoboli were early (notional) executive members of the SANNC for the Eastern Cape but they did not do a great deal in the body.³⁷ And the national Congress lacked a solid foothold there until April 1918, when its representatives Richard Msimang and Levi Mvabaza accepted an invitation to address a meeting of chiefs and other leaders in Mthatha.³⁸ The Congressmen advised the meeting ‘on many intricate points’ and, ‘on their advice, it was agreed to establish an association for the Transkeian Territories’, ‘by the inauguration of a local association’. This served to establish ‘a link with the northern movement’ on ‘a more secure and connected foundation’. Office holders elected ‘for the Territory between Umtata and the Umzimkulu’ were Rev. Jonathan Mazwi, J. Xakekile and E. Tshongwana.³⁹ Msimang and Mvabaza then attended a meeting in Queenstown that resolved to support the formation of SANNC branches,⁴⁰ before returning to the Rand, where Abantu-Batho greeted the ‘northern emissaries’, who declared ‘the Cape is ripe for Congress’ and in need of leaders ‘who will infuse a spirit of NATIONALISM and individual assertion’.⁴¹ However, Mazwi soon joined up with Pelem to fold this new Native Convention of the Transkei into the Bantu Union,⁴² which quickly moved away from the orbit of Congress. It would not be until 1925 that an ‘ANC-Transkeian Territories’ finally joined the ANC.

One effect of Seme’s 1930 victory as ANC president was greater attention by Abantu-Batho, now led by his rival Gumede, was greater Abantu-Batho attention to more radical provincial branches. It gave detailed coverage of the 1930 police killings of Western Province ANC members.⁴³ Resolutions of the 1930 Bechuanaland (now Botswana) and Griqualand West Province conference were carried in great detail, as were speeches by Z. R. Mahabane, Conan Doyle Modiakgotla and J. S. Likhing. The Sesotho columns of the same issue carried stories on the Communist Party and the OFS ANC.⁴⁴ Abantu-Batho owner Gumede, from 1927 close to the Communist Party, moved closer to the Independent ICU after losing the presidency and Abantu-Batho advertised meetings the independent union called across the Rand in Springs, Benoni, Boksburg and Pretoria.⁴⁵

Interestingly, Abantu-Batho also published material by rivals such as the Bantu Union, including a report by its secretary, A. K. Soga (a SANNC founder), that openly canvassed support for the new body.⁴⁶ At first, there may have been thoughts of an alliance and Pelem, Cape Bantu Union president, would open the ninth SANNC conference at Queenstown on 24 May 1920.⁴⁷ In this context, editors gave some space to dissonant voices. In July 1918 a correspondent styling himself ‘Fingo’ criticised the ‘neglectfulness’ of Congress – even as he called on readers to join the body.⁴⁸ In 1919 W. J. Mama attacked ‘Mr. Makgatho’s Congress’ of ‘Squatters’ and ‘town cranks and youngsters with no experience but swollen heads’, calling instead for provincial autonomy. He criticised Makgatho for seeing the Bantu Union as a branch of Congress, for claiming that Rubusana represented the Cape on the SANNC and for arguing that ex-German colonies should come under the mandate of the United States, not South Africa.⁴⁹

Abantu-Batho soon spelt out its attitude to the Bantu Union. The presence of Cape Congress delegates at the SANNC meeting in Queenstown would overcome a ‘secessionist movement in disguise under the name of Bantu Union … which exists merely by name’. Behind the Bantu Union stood ‘self-appointed’ leaders for whom ‘the white man has got the lever because of their bigotry and selfishness’. Because the Bantu Union had failed to seek unity with the Cape Congress and affiliate to the SANNC, the editor charged it was opposed to ‘Union of the people and Unity in action’. Congress, by contrast, sought ‘cooperation and unity of action with everyone and therefore the door is always open for anybody to come along and grasp hands’. The metaphor of ‘grasping hands’ was indeed the symbol on the Abantu-Batho letterhead (see Introduction, Figure 10).⁵⁰ Abantu-Batho followed up this criticism by publishing a series by Congress stalwart Henry Ngcayiya relating how Seme came ‘with great inspirations from the Universities of Columbia and Oxford’ to form Congress, how Pelem and Soga, appointed to an SANNC central committee to raise funds for the 1914 delegation to Britain, then ‘sounded a discordant note’ and withdrew. Ngcayiya alleged they had ‘diverted many of the funds raised’ to the Bantu Union.⁵¹ Such comments paralleled earlier criticisms directed at J. T. Jabavu. There had been cordial relations with Imvo, but in May 1918 Abantu-Batho published ‘The Bantu Awakening’ on regional rivalries, trenchantly criticising the misunderstanding, ‘inactivity and indifference’ of Cape leaders; Imvo had stigmatised Africans north of the Orange River for their opposition to the Land Act but Abantu-Batho pointed out the struggle gave ‘rise to a wave of nationalism unknown before in the history of our race’ from which would ‘emerge a new nation’. The Act had ‘organised the once disorganised’ northern provinces and gradually we ‘are bringing in within the gates of the National Congress the Bantu tribes of the South’.⁵² An editorial the following week underlined that white oppression was ‘a crucible in which we are being made into a nation’.⁵³

Criticisms of provincial leaders by the editors continued over the years. In 1930 they lampooned Cape Congress president Rev. Elijah Mdolomba, who had attacked ‘foolish leaders and agitators’; and yet, argued Abantu-Batho, ‘Jesus Christ Himself was an agitator’ and agitators were the product of racialist legislation. The ‘duty of the church’ was to publicise the gross violation of Christian principles in South Africa. Citing Rev. W. A. Cotton’s The Race Problem in South Africa on the limitations of the white churches, the leader article urged African clergy to emulate such criticism.⁵⁴ In regularly airing issues, editors added their own comments. In 1920, when inviting people to attend the SANNC conference, the editor did not know the precise agenda (communications could be slow and Congress apparatus unwieldy). Yet he speculated it would include the Land Act, pass laws, finance, the delegation to Britain, ‘how to solve the starvation question – wages amongst labourers’ and confirmation of its constitution. He lambasted provinces other than the Transvaal for failing to generate funds. ‘A bad spirit prevailed, to the effect that each Province should have its own delegates.’ His remarks provide insight into ANC problems. He called for all branches to send ‘delegates, with sound resolutions’. Cape members should ‘roll up satisfactorily’ as Congress had gone to the trouble of shifting the venue from Potchefstroom to the Cape and against the protests of the OFS. ‘What of Natal? It is difficult to speak of it, because there’s some misunderstanding between the members – at present … its branches are idle.’⁵⁵

‘L. M. P.’ of Volksrust attacked those who did not attend meetings, but complained of their results, engendering misunderstanding and friction:

The Transvaal Congress consists of organisers, who will go about preaching about it amongst the people. It is plain that in other places the Chairman and Secretary do nothing but strive to retain their positions. … If you want to have your own unnecessary disputes, [with] Congress, you had better not interfere with the organisers, whose duty it is to build [Congress] into one. … You evil speakers and doers of contradictory things to Congress, get out of the way.⁵⁶

By 1921 there were signs of moderation. Ilanga thought so, citing criticism in Abantu-Batho of ANC leaders as ‘unfit’, suggesting it may be ‘turning a new leaf’. The relevant article had argued, ‘[a]t this critical moment, the work of the Congress has become so large and important that its present leaders are not equal to the measure of the task’. Indicative of the above-mentioned feud between editors and Makgatho, it asked ‘how they ever became to be recognised within the inner councils of people’s affairs’:

Congress affairs demand men possessing moral force – men who will appeal to the people by their respectability and good behaviour, not men who shelter their body habits, unsuitability, and sinfulness behind the clamour of popular upheavals. People are tired of ministers without congregations posing as leaders; are sick of men without any work or occupation who want public offices …. It is no use to elect men on their chairs without doing any work.

Ilanga’s editor mused that if this were a ‘genuine’ shift in tone then it would signal ‘a great upheaval in that Native Newspaper as the majority of the foremost leaders in the Transvaal are members of the staff of Abantu-Batho’. Yet, aware of editorial complexity in the multilingual paper, he added that a new dawn in accord with the people’s wishes was predicated on the views of the ‘responsible English editor’ being ‘in harmony with his Associate Editors’.⁵⁷ The bruising encounter with Umteteli in 1920, the violent defeat of the miners’ strike and the rise of rivals such as the Joint Councils may have sobered the English editor, whose identity is uncertain (it may have been Thema, who, if now contributing to Umteteli, had written for Abantu-Batho the previous February).

Abantu-Batho editors continued to publish voices critical of some ANC leaders. They used a report on the first meeting of the All-African Convention in 1924 openly to criticise the ANC. The gathering ‘serves to demonstrate one big lesson .… The National Congress lacks leaders.’ The article praised the Convention’s manifesto for urging black voters not to support particular white parties, but candidates who supported black rights. In contrast, the editor was ‘disappointed’ in an ANC resolution in favour of voting for the Pact Party: ‘The Congress of late has behaved like one devoid of natural senses’, referring to a ‘babyish outburst’ of a 1923 resolution in favour of a republic ‘dictated by passions of despair or vengeance born out by consciousness of weak leadership’ and mentioned Thema by name: ‘that great protagonist of the Republican ideal.’⁵⁸

In Abantu-Batho’s last two years, perhaps influenced by Skota’s moderate editorship from 1927, its pages opened to a wider group of writers from rather different political perspectives. The paper reported across wider social strata. While ceasing operations before his rise to political prominence, it began to note the growing social presence of a young physician later to lead the ANC, Alfred Bitini Xuma.⁵⁹ Some correspondents remain obscure. In 1930 G. M. Pakade of the Bantu Help Association in Christiana wrote to inform readers of his association, as well as touching on Congress and the ICU, while Simon Ratlou announced the Northern Native Association. In the same year the W. W. Rand Advisory Board in Benoni advertised its meetings.⁶⁰

Less obscure was the maverick S. M. Bennett Ncwana, who roamed widely from party to party. He contributed a typically animated article arguing that the ‘righteous ambition to uplift’ of traditional ‘Pharaohs’ and the egalitarianism of Victorian-era rulers had given way to a post-1910 era of new ‘Pharaohs’ driven by the ‘dictates of political necessity’.⁶¹ Another political non-conformist, Rev. Petros Lamula, graced the cover of an October 1930 issue, reporting on the last meetings of Inkatha ka Zulu in Zululand.⁶²

Other political mavericks also found space. W. B. Mkasibe, a discontented ANC activist who, outraged at the ‘womanish show elections in Bloemfontein’ that elected Seme over Gumede, wrote to say that he had defected to found ‘a new opposition party’, the Africa Party (by 1932, renamed the equally obscure General African Party), to be ‘composed only of young men and women’ who would ‘oppose the redundant’ ANC. He called for boycotts of foreign churches and eating places.⁶³ His rhetoric provoked discussion. F. G. Segale replied, supporting the new, week-old ANC executive and claiming that Mkasibe was an egotist. Mkasibe retorted that he would continue to oppose ‘a clique … which excluded the masses’. In turn, a founder of the Bechuanaland and Griqualand West ANC, perhaps J. S. Likhing, wrote to support Segale and added that the recipe for ANC political success was the disbanding of provincial presidents and the sending of dues directly to head office.⁶⁴ Such ongoing debate is not always strongly evident in the extant pages of Abantu-Batho, but it is there. At the time, none of these other organisations would seem to have ever posed a serious challenge to Congress, and the editorial ‘tolerance’ apparent in their inclusion in the press may have been less politically risky. Bodies associated with the white supremacist state were quite another matter, however.