Third Force (South Africa)
The "Third Force" was a term used by leaders of the ANC during the late 1980s and early 1990s to refer to a clandestine force believed to be responsible for a surge in violence in KwaZulu-Natal, and townships around and south of the Witwatersrand (or "Rand").[1]
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) found that:
while little evidence exists of a centrally directed, coherent or formally constituted ‘Third Force’, a network of security and ex-security force operatives, frequently acting in conjunction with right-wing elements and/or sectors of the IFP, was involved in actions that could be construed as fomenting violence and which resulted in gross human rights violations, including random and target killings.[2]
Post 1994 use [edit]
Today the high rate of Protest in South Africa is often attributed to a 'third force', often assumed to be linked to foreign intelligence agencies and white intellectuals.[3][4] However, S'bu Zikode of the shackdweller's movement Abahlali baseMjondolo has famously deconstructed the term by claiming the third force is the anger of the poor.[5]
The ANC also often refers to protestors and other critics as 'counter-revolutionaries'.[6]
The Mail & Guardian has reported that: "According to grassroots activists the accusations of "criminality" and "third forces" are familiar: used to delegitimise and dismiss dissent and grievances - and perpetuate the notion of a society homogenously content with an ANC-led government."[7]
The newspaper also quoted activist Ayanda Kota as saying that these allegations: "take the agency away from us. It's the same argument used for the mineworkers fighting for a living wage: they are being used by some 'third force'… Poor people…apparently can't organize. It was the same with Steve Biko and the Black Consciousness Movement - the CIA were behind them."[8]
See also [edit]
- Civil Cooperation Bureau - an apartheid era military hit squad
- Inkatha - Zulu cultural and political organisation
Notes [edit]
- ^ The Historical Significance of South Africa's Third Force, Stephen Ellis Journal of Southern African Studies, Vol. 24, No. 2 (Jun., 1998), pp. 261-299
- ^ "Section 4 Appendix: The ‘Third Force’", Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa Report (pdf) 6, 2003, p. 584
- ^ Abahlali’s Vocal Politics of Proximity: Speaking, Suffering and Political Subjectivization, Anna Selmeczi, Journal of Asian and African Studies, October 2012 vol. 47 no. 5 498-515
- ^ On the Third Force, SACSIS, 2012
- ^ Zikode, S'bu (2006), We are the Third Force, Abahlali baseMjondolo
- ^ The ANC's imagined and real enemies: 'Creeping counter-revolution' vs. creeping scandals, Ranjeni Munusamy, 21 January 2012
- ^ Activists decry talk of 'third force' at Marikana, Niren Tolsi, Mail & Guardian, 24 August 2012
- ^ Activists decry talk of 'third force' at Marikana, Niren Tolsi,Mail & Guardian, 24 August 2012
