South Africa Meeting of Different Minds

By Scott MacLeod/Johannesburg

From his prison quarters in South Africa's wine-producing region near Paarl, Nelson Mandela has been conducting a quiet diplomatic campaign. Last July he accepted an invitation from his adversary, former President P.W. Botha, for a historic face-to-face meeting. Mandela has since received a series of visitors at the Victor Verster Prison Farm, where he is serving his 26th year of a life sentence for plotting to overthrow white rule. Most of his powwows have been with leaders of rival antigovernment groups. But last week Mandela, 71, a leader of the banned African National Congress (A.N.C.), traveled under escort 30 miles to Cape Town for his first meeting with Botha's successor, President F.W. de Klerk. By granting his request for a meeting, De Klerk signaled that Mandela will play a crucial role in proposed negotiations aimed at giving black South Africans the right to vote.

Mandela's prison dialogue with the government on one side and antiapartheid forces on the other is making him ever more indispensable in efforts to bridge the gap between the country's 5 million whites and 26 million blacks. "He is the man who can create a basis upon which the authorities and the liberation movement can come to terms," says Yusuf Cachalia, a veteran antiapartheid activist.

Justice Minister Kobie Coetsee said the two men explored "ways and means to address the current obstacles in the way of meaningful dialogue." The government did not say when it might release Mandela, muting hopes of a Christmas homecoming, but Coetsee said De Klerk wants to resume talks with Mandela next year.

Not all of Mandela's A.N.C. comrades were pleased by the exchange. Many were similarly disgruntled over the July meeting with Botha, an encounter of less import, considering that Botha was a lame duck. Some A.N.C. members seem to object to Mandela's taking a supreme role in the organization, officially headed by the ailing Oliver Tambo, 72. Still, none suggested that Mandela had compromised the A.N.C. goal of one-man, one-vote black majority rule, although younger militants are afraid that he has grown too soft and too accommodating. The group officially opposes talks with the government until several preconditions are met, including an end to the 1986 state of emergency and the legalization of the A.N.C.

Mandela's top priority might be negotiating peace among blacks. A unity conference held by the A.N.C.-allied Mass Democratic Movement in Johannesburg last week was most notable for its failure to include its two main rivals: < Inkatha, the Zulu-based organization led by Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi, who heads a Pretoria-created homeland; and the Pan-Africanists, an A.N.C. splinter group that seeks to crush white "colonialists." Much of the tension stems from the A.N.C.'s insistence that it alone can negotiate on behalf of blacks.

As Mandela and De Klerk chatted, a virulent outbreak of black-on-black violence continued to spread in Natal province. Officials said at least 71 people have been killed since Dec. 1 in a turf war involving A.N.C. and Buthelezi supporters. Pan-Africanists have warned that they would join in fighting the A.N.C. if it strikes a separate deal with De Klerk. What Mandela can do to unite blacks and lead them into negotiations will be better known when he is out of prison and able, for the first time in a quarter-century, to act freely.