South Africa becomes a Republic 1961

• Republic


  A form of government where the head of state is not a monarch
• The National Party came to power advocating that South Africa should be a republic
• The republican issue was not a priority in the 1950s
• The National Party gradually renegotiated its relationship with Britain
• The Simonstown naval base passed to South Africa in an agreement of 1955
• Verwoerd felt sufficiently confident to announce a whites-only referendum on the question of a republic by early 1960
• The 1958 election had given the nationalists a secure majority, with 66 percent of parliamentary seats and 55 percent of white votes
• Verwoerd saw the referendum as an opportunity to rally support beyond the constituency that usually backed the National Party
• Verwoerd was determined to stamp his authority as a representative of hardline Transvalers, against the influence of the more moderate Cape nationalists
• Verwoerd bolstered his support in the Afrikaner Christian nationalist association, the Broederbond
• Hendrik Thom, Rector of the University of Stellenbosch, was displaced as head of the Broederbond by a Transvaal Afrikaner
• Dr P J Meyer, a former member of the Charwaddy (an Afrikaner organisation that had campaigned against support for Britain in the Second World War) was appointed to the influential position of head of the South African Broadcasting Corporation
• South Africa had no television until 1976 to help the government curtail the influence of global news and opinion at the height of apartheid
• Cold War


  The tension between the West and the communist East that dominated international politics after the Second World War
• Harold Macmillan, the Conservative prime minister of Britain, visited South Africa in February 1960 as part of a month long tour of Africa
• Macmillan's trip had already been planned when Verwoerd announced the South African referendum on republican status
• Macmillan was attempting to steer a careful line: celebrating 50 years of the Union of South Africa; responding to Verwoerd's call for a republic; and anxious not to polarise the position
• Macmillan was aware of the criticism from Indian and African leaders for visiting South Africa and being hosted by the National Party
• Macmillan was equally keen to keep South Africa within the Western mainstream
• Macmillan spent much of his speech to the white members of parliament in Cape Town praising South Africa's achievements and the beauty of its countryside
• Macmillan noted that much of the progress in industry was a result of British investment and that in 1956, nearly two-thirds of external investment was from Britain and a third of trade with Britain
• Macmillan emphasised the value of partnership and praised General Smuts, as well as South Africa's contribution to the War and the Commonwealth, and noted its capacity to offer technical assistance to Africa
• Suez Crisis


  The crisis in 1956 when British and French troops were sent to Egypt to protect their interests in the Suez Canal, which was taken over by the new president of Egypt, Nasser
• Macmillan's memorable phrase, the 'wind of change blowing through Africa' was not intended to call for radical change but articulated the conservative realism that was guiding his government to pursue decolonisation
• Macmillan saw the problems of an aggressive defence of the empire after the Suez Crisis in 1956 and Britain was also faced with major wars against insurgents in Malaysia and Kenya
• The costs of empire were rising and American pressure on Britain to decolonise was increasing during Macmillan's premiership
• Macmillan hoped that rapid decolonisation would bring independent countries that could then remain important markets and sources of investment for Britain
• Macmillan attempted to present African nationalism as natural and to indicate that white South Africans needed to accept it
• Macmillan did not directly say that white South Africans should give black South Africans political rights, but this was implied
• Verwoerd emphasised the white determination to stay in power in response to Macmillan's speech
• Macmillan's visit, together with the changing face of Africa, cemented in Verwoerd's mind the idea of an internal decolonisation of South Africa through the Bantustan or homeland policy
• Harold Macmillan makes 'wind of change' speech on tour of Africa


  1960
• The speech was made by Harold Macmillan, the Prime Minister, in the Houses of Parliament at Cape Town on 3 February 1960
• The country is becoming an armed camp, the Government preparing for civil war with increasingly heavy police and military apparatus, the non-white population for a general strike and long-term non-cooperation with the Government
• We have called on the Government to convene an elected National Convention of representatives of all races without delay and to charge that Convention with the task of drawing up a new Constitution for this country which would be acceptable to all racial groups
• In March 1961 a special Commonwealth Conference was called, largely to consider South Africa's position. Verwoerd attended with an application to remain as a republic in the Commonwealth
• The Asian and African heads of state were strongly against South Africa remaining in the Commonwealth as long as apartheid was government policy. Britain, Australia, New Zealand and the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland supported South Africa
• The new Commonwealth leaders, such as Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, were not keen to polarise the position and split the organisation while there was still some hope that South Africa would shift direction
• In 1953, a Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland was established, partly as a counterweight in the region to apartheid South Africa
• By the early 1960s, African nationalists in Nyasaland (Malawi) and Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) believed that independence from Britain would only be possible if they broke away from the Federation