Issued by: Office of the Presidency
5 May 2001
For public information purposes, the Presidency is releasing the full transcript of the President's interview with ITN conducted on 3 May 2001.
Inquiries: Bheki Khumalo 083 256 9133
(Transcribed by: Government Communication & Information System (GCIS))
ABBREVIATIONS:
P - Presenter Mbeki: - President Thabo Mbeki
P: Mr President, with Nelson Mandela in Britain and Celebrate South Africa and the Finance Minister out there in Washington this plot business, the timing is appalling.
Mbeki: Yes, I agree, it was an unfortunate incident I think. But perhaps I should say that whatever is being said, any impression that gets created that there are some members of the ANC who want to stop people from campaigning in the ANC, nobody would think to stop them. It is a democratic practice in the ANC, and so anyone who wants to run in opposition, by all means. What I understand from the Minister responsible for Safety and Security is that they get allegations about all sorts of nasty things, that I was involved in the death of Chris Hani. So they decide that this is serious charge and they must investigate, which is fine. But certainly it isn't any effort to compromise democratic practice within the ANC.
P: But everyone involved is in the ANC and aren't you using the police to resolve what is an internal party matter.
Mbeki: No. None of them have said that they are campaigning for any position I have no knowledge that they are campaigning for any position, so if any allegation is made that they are campaigning for certain positions and therefore they do certain things and we respond in a particular way, who ever made this charge must prove it. Because honestly I don't think that anyone of them is involved in any such campaign.
P: But the risk of exposing this whole issue at this time is so great that we are concerned that the risk that in some way you are in danger is very high. So should we take that risk to name names and launch an inquiry?
Mbeki: Well the charge that I would have been involved in political assassination is a very serious matter indeed.
P: But that is not what they are investigating. They are investigating whether these people were plotting against you.
Mbeki: No as I understand from the Minister, they have received documents and he has seen a videotape of this charge being made. So in the first instance this is what they have to investigate. That is how the matter arose of the possible reopening of the Chris Hani investigation so that they see what is the truth and substance to this matter. I think if the truth is that the President was involved in a thing like that the law will have to take its course. They have got to look at the question.
P: Last night the party spokesman said that this whole business could have been better handled.
Mbeki: The matter arose in the media. The press reported that there had been these reports and so on. And in the end the particular programme on which the Minister for Safety and Security appeared where he mentioned names, was a report by the public broadcaster. They said, this is the information they have this is what they know, Minister make a comment about this. So the matter was being reported by the media: it did not originate with government and the Minister then made this particular comment. He says to me that he was asked, "When people talk about people plotting and saying all of these things, who are these people?" He then responded. Maybe he should not have mentioned the names.
P: But you in person do not really think that Cyril Ramaphosa for example really intends you personally any harm.
Mbeki: No, no I don't. As I say I don't even think that. I have no reason to think that they are involved in a campaign to become President and in order to do that they must harm me, I don't think so.
P: So is it worth all this terrible kafuffle and the risk it poses to your standing, the standing of the government and the standing of South Africa to investors in the west and to those people who want to see South Africa prevail?
Mbeki: But you see I think that when an allegation is made of the possible involvement of the President in murder, I don't think you can ignore that. You may find that in the end there is no substance to it. But as I have understood it from the Minister the things that have come to them merit an investigation. They could not just say well this is just a crazy person or crazy persons putting out these things. So they had to investigate it. There is a price to it but I don't know if you would leave a matter simply because the President is involved, you can't. People say "murder" and you can't say, because Thabo Mbeki is sitting as a President, that you can't investigate allegations of murder because he is the President. It would be incorrect.
P: But there is a suspicion too that you may have been trying to flush your opponents out, smoke them out with these ...
Mbeki: They are not, they are not my opponents. There is no way. I do not know anyone who can demonstrate in one way or another they are such opponents. I have no sense of any such opposition from them. I sit with Cyril Ramaphosa in the National Executive Committee of the ANC. I had a very good meeting with him not so long ago discussing black economic empowerment. Very good, very active and warm. I have no sense of that, so there will be no reason for me that somebody needs to be flushed out for what ever reason.
P: You see, the movement that he led in the struggle to defeat apartheid, Cosatu, really apparently really is quite angered about all this. They are asking for an apology. If anything they would like the Minister involved both to apologise and possibly even to go. And that is an old alliance you are dependent on the trade unions.
Mbeki: But you would have seen of course the statements that have been made by the leadership of Cosatu during the May Day celebrations this week. They are saying that the alliance stands firm. I think they are entitled to say, as they have been saying and as I am sure everybody would say, let any investigations move forward speedily. Let's have a resolution to this matter and not have it hang around for a long time. I think that is a perfectly correct decision.
P: Do you think that there is a danger in a way that you have such a big job that you are yourself kind of isolated from the hurly burly of what goes on quite naturally in politics and the rumour mongering and the rest of it and then suddenly somebody comes to you and you are not in a good position to judge whether the action being taken is sensible or not.
Mbeki: Well, anybody in my position would pick up some of those rumours, that kind of thing, that rumour mongering. I see lots of things said about me in the press. I don't respond, I let them be, lots of things that are wrong. But you know people have got a particular perspective and perceptions. But you know one hears a lot of that and we have not in any instance jumped up as though there was a crisis. I have said in this instance that there is not any crisis with regard to this matter.
P: Seven years of democracy in an environment where there is a danger for example in Zambia the President is tying to extend his mandate and it is happening in Namibia and elsewhere, this presidency is seen as a beacon as a democratic beacon, is it under siege, is there a danger that the democracy in South Africa will come to grief?
Mbeki: Not at all, not at all. I think one of the things that people must not forget is that we struggled for democracy the reason that the Mandelas, the Mbekis and Sisulus sat all these years in jail, people ended up in exile, people died, was we were struggling for democracy and we are not about to turn against precisely the thing for which we paid such a high prices. So no, no, there is not going to be such a turning back.
P: And you would be happy for example for someone to be put up against you in the leadership of the ANC.
Mbeki: By all means anybody can contest any position; this is not a problem at all not in the least. They must do it openly, within the context of the ANC if it is an ANC election. It is not a problem whatsoever. I would encourage it and I would be against the kind of whispering campaigns because they produce rumours and destabilise. Let people participate without fear. If they want any position in the ANC as I say we have sustained this position for eight decades almost nine and we are not going to change that tradition.
P: You will be making a state visit to Britain in about a month's time, the beginning next month. Do you think you can have this out of the way and buried and finished by then or is it still going to be gobbling on?
Mbeki: Well I don't know, as I say it really is not a point of crisis. It is not any matter that I think about myself. There are a lot of other things to do, a lot of work to do and hopefully people can see it for what it is. Let the investigations that the Minister is talking about go on.
P: Have you set any deadline?
Mbeki: No we have said to him that it is clearly necessary that this thing should be completed as quickly as possible so that we do not have it hanging for a very long time.
P: And if he has got it all wrong, I mean might he have to resign?
Mbeki: No, what he has got to say are the allegations, which they got, are all these allegations correct or not correct. They have got to come to that determination as quickly as it is possible and therefore make a statement to say the material we received we have now found in fact that there is no substance to these things. That needs to be done as quickly as possible. If there is substance to it then the law must take its course. Even if there is evidence that it is the President who was involved in the assassination of Chris Hani I think that the law must still take its course. They have got to do that investigation complete it quickly and then let what needs to follow, follow on that completion of that investigation.
P: One of the things people say you have really achieved, as President is management of the economy in a very difficult time. You have got 3,8% rate of growth forecast, but you are still looking for investment. Investment is terribly dependent on the environment. Now aside from the internal issue, one of the most gripping issues is that of Zimbabwe because a lot of people think that, so close to South Africa, so bound up with South Africa, if you don't take a tough line on, it could come and visit South Africa.
Mbeki: Well you see the position that we have been pursuing with regard to Zimbabwe is that there are problems there, which need resolution. There are things that have gone on in Zimbabwe which are wrong and we have said so to the Mugabe government, you know, the occupation of farms, violence and all of those things, issues about the rule of law and that these matters have to be addressed.
P: And the latest situation whereby Mr Mugabe is saying that the welfare and safety of diplomats cannot even be guaranteed. Now very few countries on earth have ever had to make that statement.
Mbeki: Indeed it is a wrong position and we have said so. You saw recently that these war veterans went into some commercial establishments and we have said that these things are wrong.
P: So do they take any notice of you?
Mbeki: I think so. What we have agreed now is that we need to meet again and what we are doing is we are preparing our own detailed response with regard to all of these matters to really make sure that they are addressed. The critical challenge for us as neighbours is that we don't want Zimbabwe to collapse; we don't want Zimbabwe to deteriorate further.
P: But it is collapsing and it is deteriorating and he is intending to run again.
Mbeki: We have to do something about it. Your observation may be correct, but what is the response? I can stand on the mountaintop and say nasty things, that I am walking away. We can't walk away. If there is a collapse in Zimbabwe the first people that will feel that is us, people will come across the border, as they are coming across the border.
P: Does Mr Mugabe know that you don't think that he should run again?
Mbeki: We have discussed the matter, that it was necessary to address this among the whole plethora of issues: of proper political conduct, political stability in Zimbabwe and openness. We have spoken to the opposition and they all want to work together and to strengthen the democratic system. We have raised these things; we will come to them again. Because that stability for us is a very critical matter, we have to do what we can to achieve it. I am not saying it is easy but we really can't possibly walk away from it.
P: Do you calculate what affect it has actually had on your economic well-being?
Mbeki: Many people have made comments about this: senior business people, bankers, the governor of our central Reserve Bank and so on. They have made these observations and we have communicated all of this. You see the problems that face Zimbabwe are not just problems of the people of Zimbabwe; they affect the region as a whole. And therefore we have got to really try and find a solution.
P: Now I hate to keep this interview to problems because you would much rather like to talk about things that are going right in your first two years. But one is bound to raise the issue of AIDS. Mr Museveni in Uganda for example has used absolutely every single box of mechanisms in his armoury - advertisements, his own commitment, every single speech - to raising this issue. Do you do enough?
Mbeki: Well I think if you spoke to the people who more directly deal with this, I am talking about the health workers, even a study that has just been announced, there is a very good response from the South African population towards these preventative measures, the use of condoms and all these kind of things. The message certainly has gone through to the people and there is a response. Some of it is reflected in drops in the levels of incidence of sexually transmitted diseases, venereal diseases for instance. Because of the measures that we are taking against the Aids problem, you are getting that response of a drop in the incidence of STDs, you are getting a drop in the numbers of childhood pregnancies, teenage pregnancies, so there is a response.
P: But it is still a crisis isn't it? 4.7 million people with HIV.
Mbeki: Well yes, that is what you said, but you see what we have got to do is to sustain a campaign to make sure that the population responds in a way that recognises the fact that this is a serious thing. I am quite certain that even independent people including health workers would say, there is a good response from the population. We have got to sustain this campaign in all of its elements in dealing with the Aids question including issues what we have raised now of home-based care, so you don't throw away people. All of these things are being done. Clearly we need to continue and sustain that campaign.
P: Do you regret the original stance you took questioning the link between HIV and Aids?
Mbeki: But I didn't, that was misreporting as you get so often happening. The point I was making, which I would make still, is this. It seems to me from reading all of the things that have been written about this, that in the collapse of people's immune systems, a virus is part of that but there are other factors, which cause the collapse of the immune systems as a result of which people suffer from Aids. And therefore we need a comprehensive approach to the matter. The matter of nutrition: ask any doctor and they will say the matter of nutrition and therefore the struggle against poverty, the matter of clean water, these are critical to the protection of the immune system. So I was saying, we can't just say we focus on one thing. This is a country that is very poor and indeed that level of poverty will impact on the capacity of the immune systems to survive. Let's have a more comprehensive approach to this matter. That is what I was saying.
P: Why do you think you have been so misunderstood? Because you decided to take the drug companies on, do you think they deliberately have misrepresented your position? Where do you think the problem is?
Mbeki: I think the problem arose because there was a slogan that says "HIV causes Aids" and therefore you respond like this. When you say let us look at the matter broader, more comprehensively, the response is that you are questioning orthodoxy. I think for a long time people didn't want to listen, but I think the atmosphere has changed. Certainly in this country people are saying, medical people, yes indeed we need a more comprehensive response to this challenge rather than just one narrowly focussed on a virus. It includes the virus, but must include all these other elements, which relates to the question of what does Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome mean. There is an immune deficiency - how does it come about? How is it acquired, and what is the syndrome that results? If you ask these questions they are simple. You acquire that immune deficiency via a virus, via bad health conditions, which will destroy the immune system. So let's deal with everything that leads to immune deficiency, which leads to the syndrome and all the various diseases. But when you say that, in a situation where people are accustomed to a particular formulation, they might very well have thought that it is a sacrilege.
P: What is your proudest achievement in the first two years of your presidency?
Mbeki: What has happened in the first two years is really an outgrowth of the previous five years. Because we had essentially established the policy base in the first five years for the construction of a non-racial society, an anti-apartheid society, it became possible to ask the question: What is it that we are doing in order to make sure that those policies result in actual change in the lives of the people. So what has been happing is that I think that we have had better focussed programmes better organisation of the government machinery to end the situation, for instance, where you have under-spending of poverty relief money in a country which has got millions of poor people, in which you end up with money is not used because the capacity is not there. The building up of this capacity, the improvement of service delivery and so on, that I think is a critical achievement.
P: And has it been easy to follow Nelson Mandela and do you share the same rainbow concept of the racial makeup of South Africa?
Mbeki: Certainly yes. That is old ANC policy. It was clear to us from many years ago that you couldn't for instance deal with the white population in South Africa as a kind of foreign settler population that must leave. This is a South African population and for us to make a success of this country it is necessary that all the people of South Africa, black and white, work together. So sure we have to sustain that position and that is what is happening.
P: And following from Mandela?
Mbeki: I don't know, it will require an outside observer to make an assessment about that. But you see, from my point of view, I come from the same organisation as Nelson Mandela. His actions, vision and outlook were informed by the same perspectives so there is no disjuncture. That continued, so that's what it feels like to me. And in terms of the response of the South African population, well to take a crude measure. The ANC in the 1999 election, the second elections, increased its majority from something like 62% in 1994 to about 66% in 1999. So the people themselves were not concerned about the change of leadership, or concerned about where the country is going. And when I go around the country now, as in one of our provinces last week, they turn out in their thousands. So I think as far as the South African population is concerned what their focus is, is: where is the country going and what does President Mbeki represent? I think if we veer from the positions of the ANC, which talks about a non-racial South Africa, a South Africa made up of all of these racial groups pulling together in one direction, I think the ANC will lose support.
P: Let me ask you a last thing. When you come to Britain what is the one thing you want people to do in celebrating South Africa and in perhaps looking into the future. What do you want from the outside world, investment?
Mbeki: Investment is a critical matter. The British corporate world has sustained a very close interest in the South African economy, we would surely want to move that further.
P: Because that is still basically absent, the real response of new investments just has not been forthcoming despite the good shape of the economy.
Mbeki: No I would not be absolute about that. I would not make absolute statements like that. If you look for instance at just one sector, the automobile industry in this country has grown very, very sharply in the last three or four years - new investments, cars being produced exclusively from South Africa and exported to world markets, and so on. I can talk about other things such as clothing and textiles. The South African clothing and textile sector can today stand up to international competition which it couldn't six years ago. And you see it in those growth rates that they are talking about. I have seen people saying this economy is going to grow at more than 4%. It is because there is new investment. It is because the competitiveness of the economy has improved, it is because the skills are improving and so on. No I think that there is progress. Sure, there is an absolute need to attract larger volumes of foreign capital, as much as there is need to encourage greater levels of investment by South African domestic investors, that is necessary. It is true that all of those things must happen. But you don't achieve great growth rates of 3,8% or 4,8% or 4% or whatever without new investments. And remember we are coming from a situation of negative growth before 1994, an actual decline in the rates of investment in the South African economy. It has turned around I think quite strongly but it is necessary to move that matter forward and certainly we are keenly interested in a larger involvement of the British corporate world in South Africa.
P: President Thabo Mbeki, thank you very much with speaking with us.