Six months after the declaration of the State of Emergency and with a major nationwide anti-apartheid campaign underway, the regime extended its emergency powers with the stated objective of denying 'the revolutionary forces the publicity they require to further their aims'. (BBC 16.12.86)
On 11 December 1986 regulations amending and repealing major sections of the existing emergency powers were published. Severe restrictions on anti-apartheid activities were reinforced as were controls on the dissemination of information about their campaigns and police and army action in suppressing resistance.
The wording of the new regulations was apparently aimed at closing loopholes which had emerged when courts dealing with legal challenges found sections of the original regulations too vague to be valid. New restrictions specifically directed at grassroots structures were added and even tighter controls were imposed on the dissemination of information about those detained under the Emergency.
'SUBVERSIVE STATEMENTS'
Since the Emergency was declared it has been an offence to make or report a 'subversive statement' – this includes statements intended or likely to incite or encourage participation in 'unrest' actions, restricted gatherings, boycotts, illegal strikes, acts of civil disobedience or the undermining or discrediting of military conscription.
The new regulations extended the definition, redefining 'civil disobedience' to include the refusal to pay rent or service charges to local authorities, and stipulated as 'boycott actions' boycotts of specific firms or types of firms, products or educational institutions. And in an attack on local street and area committees set up by communities in opposition to apartheid local authorities, a new clause was added: statements inciting people to set up 'structures purporting to be structures of local government', to exert power through such structures or to support or subject themselves to them are also 'subversive'. The same applies to 'unlawful structures, procedures or methods purporting to be judicial structures' – referring to courts set up by township residents as an alternative to those of the regime.
MEDIA RESTRICTIONS
It has been illegal since June to report in any manner on a variety of actions by members of the 'security forces' in connection with the Emergency. Journalists have had to rely increasingly on government sources. The new regulations extended the definition of a 'security force' to include police under the control of local authorities.
The ban on journalists being within sight of any 'unrest', restricted gathering or 'security force' action, issued in terms of a police order in September, was formalised in the new regulations. In addition, it became illegal to report the effects of boycotts as defined in the section on 'subversive statements'. Nor may the media report on the manner in which people are 'incited, intimidated or encouraged' to take part in or support boycotts, street committees and alternative courts or subject themselves to their authority.
Two further media restrictions were imposed. The reporting of any details of a planned gathering restricted under the Internal Security Act or the emergency regulations, and on the statements of any speaker at such a gathering was prohibited. A ban was also placed on the publication of statements by anyone restricted by the Minister of Law and Order on their release from detention under the emergency regulations, insofar as it 'threatens or is intended to threaten public safety or order or delays the termination of the Emergency'.
Sections of the original emergency regulations relating to the seizure of 'subversive' material, which were declared invalid in a Supreme Court ruling in August, were reinstated in a modified form. The Minister of Home Affairs or a police commissioner may order the seizure of any such material and the Minister may ban all issues of a periodical for up to three months. A further ban was placed on blank spaces and the deletion or obliteration of portions of text or photographs as a reference to censorship under these regulations.
A new body, the Inter-Departmental Press Liaison Centre (IPLC) was set up by the government to make decisions on the legality of articles submitted by the press.
On 6 January the UDF and the Release Mandela Campaign brought an urgent application against the new regulations in the Supreme Court in Pietermaritzburg. They applied for the regulations to be declared null and void, or alternatively for key sections to be declared unlawful. The case is due to resume in April.
ORDERS AGAINST ORGANISATIONS
Police orders were issued under the emergency regulations over the Christmas period to curb the activities of progressive organisations. These included church and labour groups previously excluded from such restrictions.
In the Western Cape people were banned from participating in the activities of 12 organisations insofar as they might encourage the public to support calls for the release of detainees, the unbanning of the ANC or any other banned organisation, the withdrawal of police and troops from any areas where they 'perform functions in connection with the state of emergency', or to protest against any 'security force' actions under the State of Emergency. Participation in the Christmas Against the Emergency campaign was also banned. The organisations affected included the UDF, Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), End Conscription Campaign (ECC) and the South African Council of Churches (SACC).
In the East Rand certain activities of the UDF, the National Education Crisis Committee (NECC), COSATU, the Campaign for National United Action and the SACC were curbed in seven magisterial districts.
In early December many UDF, ECC and other activists were restricted from participating in the activities of certain organisations. The Minister of Law and Order, Adriaan Vlok, warned that propagating boycotts was illegal and action would be taken against organisers. However, boycott committees in the Eastern Cape continued functioning, while the Campaign for National United Action promoted its Christmas Against the Emergency programme, which included a boycott of stores outside the townships.
ORDERS AGAINST NEWSPAPERS
Within a week of the publication of the new regulations the Witwatersrand Divisional Police Commissioner served restriction orders on three Johannesburg newspapers, the Sowetan, Weekly Mail and City Press, prohibiting them from publishing, within the greater Johannesburg area, statements from a number of organisations which 'advocate, further or support' the Christmas Against the Emergency campaign. As well as the campaign organisers - the UDF, COSATU, SACC and the NECC - the organisations affected included the Detainees' Parents Support Committee, ECC, Federation of Transvaal Women, Johannesburg Democratic Action Committee, National Education Union and the Transvaal Indian Congress. The orders followed the publication of advertisements for the campaign in all three newspapers.
While the orders were being contested in court, more severe restrictions were served on the three papers by the Commissioner of the South African Police, and the previous ones withdrawn. The new orders applied throughout the country, prohibiting the three papers from reporting on the campaign at all, and specifically banning them from publishing statements about the campaign by any person or organisation. An identical order was served on the New Nation newspaper in January.
The Commissioner of the South African Police used powers under the new regulations to apply further restrictions when 22 newspapers published advertisements issued by the UDF, NECC, SACC and 15 other organisations, calling for the unbanning of the ANC on its 75th anniversary on 8 January. Notices published in the Government Gazette declared 'subversive' any statement supporting an organisation banned under the Internal Security Act and prohibited the publication by any newspaper, magazine or periodical of material calculated 'to improve, or to promote the public image' of any such organisation or 'to amend, to defend, to explain or to justify an action, policy or strategy of such an organisation, of resistance against or subversion of the authority of the State.'
Police opened an investigation into the advertisements and into others placed by the Release Mandela Campaign calling for the lifting of the State of Emergency and the release of all political prisoners.
