Page 3696 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 17 October 1990
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the decision to enter political life means that we forgo salaries, advancement and personal wealth because we believe in what we are doing and in advancing a political goal. That applies equally to both sides of the house.
But it is impossible for us to imagine what advancing a political goal means in a country like South Africa. For many, it has meant life. Many have died in the struggle for basic democratic rights in South Africa. For all, it means not the occasional late night phone call from a constituent who is irate about an aspect of ACT administration; it means regular late night harassment by the South African police; it means being dragged out of bed at 3 o'clock in the morning, tortured and thrown into prison, never to be released.
Mr Speaker, it is impossible for any of us to understand fully what that has meant. But many Australians of good will across the political spectrum have, over the years, stood firmly against the repressive policies of the South African government and have saluted the courage of men and women such as Nelson Mandela.
Today I will not refer to the regular and distinguished history of my party in opposing the South African governments, but I will quote the words of a then obscure Federal backbencher in 1960, shortly after the Sharpeville massacre. That was Malcolm Fraser. I am prepared to salute his longstanding objection to South Africa. It has often been said that Fraser jumped on the band wagon after he lost office, but he has long opposed the views of South Africa. In 1960, after the Sharpeville massacre, he noted that the time of colonialism had passed and said:
Anything that flies in the face of this spirit cannot stand and will be pushed aside in the present age. Africans in South Africa are second class citizens without political rights. They are subjugated and often treated in a brutal fashion.
He went on to say that that would not be tolerated by the brother nations of the Commonwealth. That is the sort of view of a person of good will that has dominated the Australian view of South Africa in the last 20 years. For many years the Menzies Government took a different view. But it is clear now that there is a non-partisan opposition to, and abhorrence of, apartheid and a bipartisan support for those in South Africa who are prepared to stand up for their rights.
Mr Speaker, I was appalled to hear an echo of the 1960s in some remarks of Mr Duby. We heard those famous words of the 1960s - that a State Department report indicates that a particular body is dominated by communists. I thought the world had advanced beyond that. I will quote to the Assembly the so-called Fraser report, which is the report of the Eminent Persons Group Commonwealth mission to South Africa in 1986. Referring to Mr Nelson Mandela, at page 73, that report states:
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