Not long ago, the sight of armored troop carriers rolling through the narrow streets of South Africa's townships sent chills around the globe. They were ugly symbols of a racist regime that relied on military might to oppress the black majority and brutally suppress hopes for freedom. But in recent days the big armor has rumbled with the support of Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress, stalwarts of the antiapartheid struggle. The new mission is to stabilize blood-soaked Natal province and pave the way for this month's all race election. The oppressors of old might well be the force that saves the new day.
The fact that South African troops operating under a state of emergency have become midwives to democracy is an indication of what a difficult birth democracy can be. Building a nation or holding one together in the face of ethnic or factional tensions is a daunting task many have failed to achieve. Witness Bosnia, the former Soviet republics and more than a dozen African states. America itself nearly split in two 130 years ago. No nation with an ounce of diversity, it seems, is immune. Given that record and their own past, South Africans have set themselves a remarkable goal -- the building of a multiracial, multicultural democracy on the ruins of a system based on racism and repression.
The tensions surrounding that process cannot be a surprise. What is startling is that most South Africans -- black and white, English and Afrikaner, Zulu and Xhosa -- stand ready to make a break with the past. The violence now jarring the society derives from the clash between those who want majority rule under a democratic constitution and those who want to carve out an island void of democracy, a white homeland or a Zulu state. Democracy's foes could disrupt the election, make South Africa violent for years to come and eventually divide the country. There is no guarantee democracy will succeed, no assurance that all South Africans will ever accept the idea of a single nation ruled by the majority. Some would rather die first -- or kill.
But bloodshed obscures the beauty of what has been settled in four years at the negotiating table. Until 1990, Mandela was a prisoner of the white regime and the African National Congress was banned. Apartheid laws segregating life from cradle to grave were still in place. Thousands of political prisoners sat in jails. Thousands more were exiled because of political activities and beliefs. And blacks could not exercise the most basic right of democracy, the right to vote in the country of their birth.
As a result of a settlement between major parties, South Africans of all colors shortly will choose a government. The very fact of the election is a victory over the past, a tribute to an enduring drive for equity. It is also a triumph for the concept of majority rule. Now the issues are who will choose to vote, how they will vote and what their votes will bring. The issue is no longer which South Africans have the right.
