Looking back on SEIFSA ’ s first four decades , its former President , Graham Boustred , was happy to beat the drum . SEIFSA , he said , had led the country in forward-looking industrial relations : “ We were the first major industry to eliminate completely the concept of race from our agreements and the SEIFSA minimum wage has been a target of achievement for many other industries .”
SEIFSA ’ s founder members expected that it would make progress in dealings with the trade unions . It had lived up to these expectations .
SEIFSA had provided a stable environment in which the industry would experience “ phenomenal growth ”. Thanks to a Main Agreement on employment conditions that was “ a remarkable instrument ”, the time lost to the industry through work stoppages had been minimal .
The Federation had steered its industry to significant black advancement . The wage gap between unskilled and skilled workers had been narrowed from a ratio of 5:1 in 1961 to 2,8:1 in the early Eighties .
In the second half of the decade , pressures on the Nationalists intensified , within and outside the country . Demonstrations and riots continued to wreck the townships . Troops moved into areas where rampaging youths were burning schools as well as shops seen as supporting the system .
The government sought to appease an increasingly hostile world by pulling down long-standing pillars of social apartheid . “ Mixed marriages ” and sex across the colour line were no longer banned . Public amenities were opened to all and influx controls – the hated pass laws – were abolished . A tricameral Parliament was established , with separate Houses for Whites , Indians and Coloureds .
State President PW Botha declared that these reforms showed that South Africa had “ crossed the Rubicon ”.
Yet the ANC , the PAC and other black resistance organisations remained banned , with their leaders in jail or in exile .
South Africa ’ s key trading partners , the European Economic Community and the United States , introduced punitive economicsanctions . The Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act , signed into law in the US in October 1986 , was seen by many as the final blow that would break stubborn Nationalist resistance . Yet in Nerves of Steel , his book chronicling the story of the Haggie group , former Rand Daily Mail Editor Rex Gibson observed : “ As it happened , though , the wound was painful but not mortal ”.
Nevertheless , as it had been for communism for some time , the writing was on the wall . Then Anglo American Chairman Gavin Relly led a high-powered business delegation to Lusaka for talks with the ANC . He and his party came home convinced that the government had to free Nelson Mandela and negotiate the country ’ s future .
Industrial unrest and intimidation continued . Reports streamed in of illegal strike action , overtime bans and factory occupations . Union members gave their support to sanctions and disinvestment . In 1988 the National Union of Metal Workers of South Africa ( NUMSA ) triggered the industry ’ s first national strike by 25 000 members at 120 companies . It lasted three weeks .
President Botha bowed out , to be replaced by a man widely viewed as more enlightened and flexible – FW de Klerk . The path de Klerk was to take would dramatically re-shape the nation ’ s destiny …
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