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Helen Suzman, OMSG, DBE (née Gavronsky; 7 November 1917 – 1 January 2009) was a South African anti-apartheid activist and politician. She represented a series of liberal and centre-left opposition parties during her 36-year tenure in the whites-only, National Party-controlled House of Assembly of South Africa at the height of apartheid.

She hosted the meeting that founded the Progressive Party in 1959, and was its only MP in the 160-member House for thirteen years. She was the only member of the South African Parliament to consistently and unequivocally oppose all apartheid legislation.

Suzman was instrumental in improving prison conditions for members of the banned African National Congress including Nelson Mandela, despite her reservations about Mandela's revolutionary policies, and was also known for using her parliamentary privilege to evade government censorship and pass information to the media about the worst abuses of apartheid. She was twice nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Early life and education

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Suzman was born Helen Gavronsky in 1917 to Frieda and Samuel Gavronsky, Jewish Lithuanian immigrants.[1][2] She was born in Germiston, then a small mining town outside Johannesburg. Her mother died shortly after she was born.[3]

Suzman matriculated in 1933 from Parktown Convent, Johannesburg. She studied for a bachelor's degree in commerce at Witwatersrand University. At age 19, she married Dr. Moses Suzman (who died in 1994), who was 33, and an eminent physician; the couple had two daughters, one of whom became a physician.[4] Helen Suzman returned to university in 1941 to complete a degree in economics and economic history. After completing her degree she spent the rest of the war working for the Governor-General's War Fund and as a statistician at the War Supply board. In 1945, she became a tutor and later lecturer in economic history at Witwatersrand University.[5][3]

Career

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Career before Parliament

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After Suzman completed all levels of her college career, she was prompted to help her country by becoming a member of the war supplies board. Her position consisted of carefully calculating the statistical reality of various supplies, equipment quantities, and shortages of manufactured goods. Ultimately, Suzman pursued this career for a short period from 1941 to 1942. Later, in 1944, she followed in the footsteps of her husband by becoming a professor at the University of Witwatersrand, teaching economics [1]. Suzman then decided to leave lecturing behind to conquer the political atmosphere in South Africa.[2]

As a member of the South African Institute of Race Relations, she was involved in preparing evidence for the Fagan Commission's inquiry into laws applying to Africans in urban areas and into the system of migrant labour. She attributed this experience to her first real awareness of the hardship and difficulties experienced by Africans seeking work in urban areas.[3]

Parliamentary career

[edit]

Suzman has been described in The Guardian as having had "among the most courageous Parliamentary careers ever".[6]

She was elected to the House of Assembly in 1953 as a member of the United Party for the Houghton constituency in Johannesburg.

The United Party caucus supported the second reading of the 1953 Separate Amenities Bill that provided for separate (and effectively unequal) facilities for Blacks, Coloureds, Indians and Whites. When the vote was taken, Helen Suzman and one other UP member refused to vote and walked out of the House.[3]

Dissatisfied with the supine stance of the United Party to the apartheid policies of the Government, Suzman and eleven other liberal members of the United Party broke away to form the Progressive Party in 1959. The party rejected race discrimination and advocated equal opportunities for all with a qualified franchise with a common voter's roll.[3]

Suzman with the breakaway Progressive Party's House caucus in 1960. This was prior to the disastrous 1961 election that left Suzman as the sole parliamentarian opposed to apartheid for 13 years

In the 1961 South African general election, all the other Progressive MPs lost their seats, while Suzman retained hers by a margin of just 564 votes.[5] This left Suzman as the sole parliamentarian unequivocally opposed to apartheid for 13 years from 1961 to 1974.[7][8]

The solo years: 1961–1974

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After the 1961 election, Prime Minister Hendrik F. Verwoerd announced in Parliament that he had never believed the Progressive Party would be a threat and, turning towards Suzman, said "I have written you off". Suzman replied "And the whole world has written you off".[9]

As the sole representative of her party in Parliament, she sought to do the work of an entire opposition party by herself. In her first session she made 66 speeches, moved 26 amendments and put 137 questions. Most of her questions concerned treatment of Black, Coloured and Indian people – on issues such as housing, education, forced removals, Pass Law offences, detentions, bannings, whippings, police brutality and execution.[3]

Mandela later wrote: "She was undoubtedly the only real anti-apartheid voice in parliament and the discourtesy of the Nat MPs towards her showed how they felt her punches and how deeply they resented her presence."[10]

For two more general elections (1966 and 1970), she was again the sole member returned for her party to Parliament. As a result, for 13 years, she dined alone in Parliament with no other MP to discuss tactics or approach. Often, as apartheid legislation was introduced, she would call a division of the house, a process whereby the members of the Parliament had physically to stand up and be counted. On many such occasions, as when opposing the infamous 90-day detention law, she found herself alone at one side of the Parliamentary chamber and all other MPs at the other side.[9][5]

An eloquent public speaker with a sharp and witty manner, Suzman was noted for her strong public criticism of the governing National Party's policies of apartheid at a time when this was atypical of white South Africans. She found herself even more of an outsider because she was an English-speaking Jewish woman in a parliament dominated by Calvinist Afrikaner men. In her 13 years as the sole member of her party in the South African Parliament, Suzman made 885 speeches on almost every conceivable subject and posed 2,262 questions. In a period in which there were numerous laws passed imposing censorship on the press, parliamentary privilege ensured that her exchanges in Parliament could be published.[11] She was once accused by a minister of asking questions in parliament that embarrassed South Africa, to which she replied: "It is not my questions that embarrass South Africa; it is your answers."[12]

On one occasion, Prime Minister Verwoerd announced in Parliament to her: 'You are of no account. Your days in Parliament are numbered.' Suzman replied: 'Why? Are you going to put me under house arrest or put me on Robben Island?'[3]

Early in her career, a white woman said at a caucus meeting, "Well, I don't know about Mrs Suzman, but when I go to a museum, I don't like it if some strange black man rubs himself up against me". Suzman retorted: "Don't you mind it if some strange white man rubs himself up against you?" Later in her career, she mused in Parliament: "I do not know why we equate—and with such examples before us—a white skin with civilisation".[9]

Abuse and Suzman's responses

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Suzman was subject to antisemitic and misogynist abuse by Nationalist MPs in Parliament and out. Frequent comments were made to her in Parliament such as "We don't like your screeching Jewish voice" or "Go back to Israel!"[13] One Nationalist MP, Piet Koornhof, said to her in Parliament: "If I should come home one evening and my wife should rant and rave the way the hon. member for Houghton did this afternoon, there would be only one of two things that one could do to her... I think she deserves a good hiding". In May 1965 P. W. Botha (then Minister of Coloured Affairs) remarked: ‘The Honourable Member for Houghton... is in the habit of chattering continually. If my wife chattered like that Honourable Member, I would know what to do with her. There is nothing that works on my nerves more than a woman who continually interrupts me. She is like water dripping on a tin roof.’ In 1986, she had the following exchange with the then State President Botha: "Helen Suzman: Stupid! P. W. Botha: Woman!"[9][3]

When Prime Minister Verwoerd was assassinated in the Parliamentary chamber in 1966, P. W. Botha, then Minister of Defence, had accused Suzman of being responsible, saying: "It's you! You liberals did this! Now we'll get you!" She demanded, and eventually received a formal apology, but the enmity between the two remained. In the early 1980s, she had stayed to observe police dismantle shacks in a black settlement and take the occupants to jail. P. W. Botha warned in Parliament that her conduct was bordering on illegal and said "I am telling you that if you try to break the law you will see what happens". Suzman responded: "the prime minister has been trying to bully me for twenty-eight years and he has not succeeded yet. I am not frightened of you. I never have been and I never will be. I think nothing of you."[9] On one occasion, P. W. Botha said "The Hon. Member for Houghton, it is well known, does not like me". Suzman interjected: ‘Like you? I can’t stand you!’[3]

She was often harassed by the police and her phone was tapped by them. She listed her name in the phone book and often received phone calls with obscene, racist and threatening messages.[9] She had a special technique for dealing with such calls, which was to blow a shrill whistle into the mouthpiece of the phone.[14][9]

Marie van Zyl, of the Kappiekommando (an ultra-conservative Afrikaner women's political organization), wrote to Suzman protesting the latter's support for "heathens" and boasting that her own people, the Voortrekkers, had brought the Bible over the mountains to the interior to the blacks. She asked what Suzman's people had done. Suzman replied: “You say your people brought the Bible over the mountains and ask what mine did. They wrote it, my dear …”[15]

In February 1974, LJC Botha, Nationalist MP for Rustenburg remarked: ‘When she gets up in this House, she reminds me of a cricket in a thorn tree when it is very dry in the bushveld. His chirping makes you deaf but the tune remains the same year in and year out. In her fight for the Bantu, the honourable member... sings the same tune for year after year.’[3]

Helen, being uprooted from her Jewish ancestry was considered a secular jew, not formally representing herself in the political efforts at hand. On the contrary, she did place her motives for anti-apartheid on the prosecution of Jews. There was a time when the Jewish Board of Deputies adopted a policy to ignore all notions of anti-apartheid for the sake of keeping a certain demographic of people. Suzman was very unsatisfied with this decision and spoke up by saying "For me, for Jews to support the people who were in favor of race discrimination was the ultimate in treachery [of] the values that Jews should [3]. Throughout her entire career, Suzman used her outspoken voice and political power to say the things that people were too scared to say.

She famously advised John Vorster, Prime Minister from 1966 to 1978, to some day visit a township, "in heavy disguise as a human being". When a minister complained of the murder rate in his constituency, she advised him not to go there "or it will rise by one".[16]

Parliamentary career: 1974–1989

[edit]

Later, as parliamentary white opposition to apartheid grew, the Progressive Party gained a further 6 seats (in 1974) and Suzman was joined in parliament by notable liberal colleagues such as Colin Eglin. The party then merged in 1975 with Harry Schwarz's Reform Party and became the Progressive Reform Party. It was renamed the Progressive Federal Party when further MPs from the reformist wing of the United Party joined in 1977 and the party became the official opposition.[3]

She spent a total of 36 years in Parliament.[17]

After the 1976 Soweto shootings, MP Dr HMJ van Rensburg said: "It is a pity you were not one of them, Helen" and another called her "a saboteur of the police". Suzman herself said: "Every Nationalist MP should go to at least one funeral for unrest victims heavily disguised as human beings, instead of sitting on their green benches in parliament, insulated like fish in an aquarium."[15]

In 1982, following Neil Aggett's death, she read out in Parliament a letter smuggled out of prison concerning Aggett's torture at the hands of the security police.[18]

In 1986, there was the following exchange in Parliament when Minister of Law and Order Le Grange asked "Who is the hon Member for Houghton's No 1 man in South Africa? It is Nelson Mandela" Mrs Suzman responded: "Let him go!" Le Grange continued: "She admires him with everything she has. He is the only man who according to her can counteract the present unrest situation in South Africa and negotiate on peace". Mrs Suzman interjected: "That's right!"[9]

Extra-parliamentary activity

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Suzman was a frequent visitor to prisons to protect prisoners from warder brutality, and campaigned for improved prison conditions. She visited Nelson Mandela on numerous occasions while he was in prison and made representations to the authorities to improve his conditions and those of other prisoners on Robben Island. In his autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, Mandela wrote: “It was an odd and wonderful sight to see this courageous woman peering into our cells and strolling around our courtyard. She was the first and only woman ever to grace our cells".[5] Many of the prisoners, including Neville Alexander and Mandela himself, attributed improvements to their conditions, in part, to her visits:[19][10] In his autobiography, Mandela attributes the removal of the sadistic warder Van Rensberg (aka "Suitcase"), who had a swastika tattooed on his hand, to Suzman's visit and her subsequent representations to the authorities and in Parliament.[20] Neville Alexander, too, attributed the transfer of Van Rensberg to another prison, to Suzman's visit. Alexander noted that: "Had Mrs Suzman not come in February 1967 there is no saying what might have happened"[21] According to Neville Alexander, it was "important to note that, unofficially, the first Suzman visit is considered to be the turning point in the treatment of the political prisoners at Robben Island. This was certainly no mere coincidence..."[22] Andrew Mlangeni, a senior ANC member who was on Robben Island with Mandela, described how "[w]henever our treatment in prison tended to improve a little bit, we knew that Suzman was on her way. We would get things such as books that you perhaps ordered more than six months ago. They would give you your books if you were studying, because those were some of the things we raised on Robben Island. You would have to wait for months before you could get books prescribed by the University of South Africa and other institutions, but as soon as you got them, you knew that Suzman was on her way to see the conditions under which we were living, to see how best she could help us. Only a person such as Suzman could help us. The International Red Cross also used to visit us on Robben Island, but they couldn’t do as much as Suzman. Suzman was not afraid to go to Pretoria to the commissioner and raise these issues personally, to say that these were the conditions under which people were living, please bring about some improvement. She was a fearless lady."[23]

She visited Robert Sobukwe when he was in virtual solitary confinement for 6 years and repeatedly sought his release in Parliament.[5] During one debate in Parliament in which Suzman raised the conditions of Sobukwe's imprisonment without trial in a compound in Robben Island, Nationalist MP GPC Bezuidenhout asked: “Why do you say that he is living in a compound? Is it not a flat?” Mrs Suzman answered: “I wonder whether the hon member who is so cynical about this would care to take up permanent residence in that flat. Perhaps he will enjoy it.”[24]

She visited banned persons, such as Albert Luthuli, Winnie Mandela and Mamphela Ramphele, and made effective representations on their behalf.[5] In 1963, Albert Luthuli, then President of the ANC, wrote to Helen Suzman and expressed his "deep appreciation and admiration for your heroic and lone stand against a most reactionary Parliament...I most heartily congratulate you for your untiring efforts in a situation that would frustrate and benumb many... For ever remember, you are a bright Star in a dark Chamber...Not only ourselves – your contemporaries, but also posterity, will hold you in high esteem".[25]

She visited Bram Fischer and other ANC and Communist Party political prisoners and personally provided them with speakers and records, seeking improvements to their conditions with ministers and in Parliament.[26] She visited Fischer several times in hospital, calling repeatedly for his release and remarking in the press that with so many millions spent on security she did not understand why the government was so afraid of one incapacitated, bedridden old man. She was influential in his eventual release.[27]

She attended the militant – and often dangerous – funerals of activists whenever invited to do so in the belief that her presence could prevent police brutality.[11][15] She visited resettlement areas, townships and squatter camps, observing conditions and giving assistance to individuals where she could.[28] She used these visits to arm herself with evidence from on the spot investigations "to challenge forcefully the government and bear personal witness to the suffering inflicted on millions of South Africans".[3]

Suzman was inundated with requests for assistance from individuals harmed by the apartheid laws and bureaucracy. She regarded herself as the "honorary ombudsman of the dispossessed" and sought tirelessly to make representations on their behalf to the relevant authorities.[3] Nadine Gordimer commented: "[But over the years I have observed – that when people are in trouble, she has been the one they have appealed to. She is the one everyone trusted]…Suzman never refused anyone her help, that I knew of. No matter how unpleasant or hostile the individual's attitude to her and her political convictions had been."[29]

Other issues

[edit]

Although principally concerned with issues of race discrimination, Suzman was also concerned with other issues including women's rights. Her maiden speech was on the 1953 Matrimonial Affairs Bill. Women's rights (and in particular those of Black women) became part of the larger fight for human rights. She campaigned against gender discrimination, particularly as it affected African women whose status in customary law was that of "perpetual minors." In 1988 she was instrumental in having matrimonial legislation enacted that greatly improved the legal status of women. She fought for equal matrimonial property rights for Black women, divorce by consent and the reform of abortion laws.[30][3]

She was opposed to capital punishment and campaigned against its reintroduction.[31]

In 1971, she was the only member of Parliament who voted against what she described as "the harshest drugs law in the world" that laid down a mandatory 2-year sentence of imprisonment for possession of cannabis and a mandatory 5-year sentence of imprisonment for possession of more than 115g of cannabis. She supported the decriminalisation of marijuana use, stating publicly that possession of marijuana/cannabis (or dagga, as it is known in South Africa) for personal use should not be a criminal offence.[32][33][34]

Post-parliamentary career: 1989–2009

[edit]

She was appointed by Mandela to the first electoral commission of South Africa that oversaw the first election based on universal franchise in 1994.[35] She was chairwoman of the Vaal Reef Disaster Fund for three years, appointed to look after the widows and children of the 104 men killed in the Vaal Reef mining disaster of 10 May 1995. She was president of the South African Institute of Race Relations, one of the premier research institutions in SA.[35] She served as a member of the Human Rights Commission from 1995 to 1998.[3]

She was present with Mandela when he signed the new constitution in 1996.[36]

Speaking in 2004 at the age of 86, Suzman confessed that she was disappointed by the African National Congress. Suzman stated:

"I had hoped for something much better... [t]he poor in this country have not benefited at all from the ANC. This government spends 'like a drunken sailor'. Instead of investing in projects to give people jobs, they spend millions buying weapons and private jets, and sending gifts to Haiti."

Referring to South Africa's relations with Zimbabwe, whose president Robert Mugabe had in 2001 declared Suzman an "enemy of the state", she said:

"Mugabe has destroyed that country while South Africa has stood by and done nothing. The way Mugabe was feted at the inauguration last month was an embarrassing disgrace. But it served well to illustrate very clearly Mbeki's point of view."[37]

Suzman also stated her distrust of the racial politics of Mbeki:

"Don't think for a moment that Mbeki is not anti-white – he is, most definitely. His speeches all have anti-white themes and he continues to convince everyone that there are two types of South African – the poor black and the rich white."[37]

Perhaps conscious that she might be misconstrued, Suzman added:

"For all my criticisms of the current system, it doesn't mean that I would like to return to the old one. I don't think we will ever go the way of Zimbabwe, but people are entitled to be concerned. I am hopeful about any future for whites in this country – but not entirely optimistic."[37]

Recognition and criticism

[edit]
Western Boulevard in Cape Town was renamed Helen Suzman Boulevard in 2011.

Nelson Mandela has credited her with improving his prison conditions. Suzman spoke out against the regime but sometimes opposed Mandela's policies. She was critical of Mandela when he praised Muammar Gaddafi for his support to the anti-apartheid cause.[8]

Mandela wrote a message to Suzman on her 85th birthday, stating "Your courage, integrity and principled commitment to justice have marked you as one of the outstanding figures in the history of public life in South Africa. On your 85th birthday we can but pay tribute to you, thank you and let you know how fortunate our country feels for having had you as part of its public life and politics." Mandela added: "Now, looking back from the safety of our non-racial democracy, we can even feel some sympathy for the National Party members who shared Parliament with you. Knowing what a thorn in the flesh of even your friends and political allies you can be, your forthright fearlessness must have made life hell for them when confronted by you."[38]

She opposed economic sanctions, claiming it would be counterproductive and harmful to poor blacks, while many black in the anti-apartheid struggle argued that sanctions could not make things worse than they already were for Blacks.[39] After Mandela's release "she was prominent among those...who persuaded him to drop the ANC's revolutionary program in favour of an evolutionary one, retaining a market economy and a parliamentary democracy."[8] She continued to be a critic after the fall of Apartheid. According to her biographer, Lord Robin Renwick, before and after the ANC came to power, she continued to speak out against those in power who would "put party and state above the individual whether black or white".[8][40]

Some in the ANC and SACP were critical of her method of opposition to apartheid. She was denounced as an agent of colonialism and "part of the system" for her vocal opposition to sanctions.[8] She notably said on the subject "I am against disinvestment and sanction. I totally support Mrs Thatcher on this issue".[39] She was accused by several in the armed resistance against apartheid of having contributed to delay the end of the regime by supporting Mandela imprisonment as long as he did not renounce armed struggle, while at the same time approving in parliament weapons procurement by the Apartheid regime from the United Kingdom despite several United Nations Security Council resolutions prohibiting arms sales to South Africa, and in 1970, she opposed the decision by the World Council of Churches to grant $200 000 to liberation movements in South Africa to finance their cause, calling the move "ill-advised".[39] She supported several controversial bills that limited the rights of Black South Africans, purportedly because, as she had the habit of saying about such bills, it "represented a step in the right direction".[39] For a long time, she endorsed only a qualified franchise for the black portion of the population, under which only educated blacks would have the right to vote.[8][39] All this led the president of the ANC Oliver Tambo to quip that she was "clearly in favour of change - but determined to prevent change", while General Secretary of the SACP Joe Slovo said about her that "Mrs Suzman and I may both be against apartheid, but we are certainly not both for liberation".[39]

Nonetheless, Mandela remained an admirer, saying to her "the consistency with which you defended the basic values of freedom and the rule of law over the last three decades has earned you the admiration of many South Africans."[8] So did others in the anti-apartheid movement, including Winnie Mandela.[41]

Suzman was awarded 27 honorary doctorates from universities around the world, including from Harvard, Yale, Oxford and Cambridge.[3] She was nominated twice for the Nobel Peace Prize,[42] but the Nobel Committee preferred to reward the less controversial Desmond Tutu in 1984, and she received numerous other awards from religious and human rights organisations around the world. Former Queen of South Africa, Elizabeth II made her an honorary Dame Commander (Civil Division) of the Order of the British Empire in 1989.[43]

She was awarded the Order for Meritorious Service, Class I, Gold by Nelson Mandela in 1997. She was voted No. 24 in the Top 100 Great South Africans TV series.

She was awarded the Freedom of the City of Kingston upon Hull in 1987.[44]

Suzman was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 2008.[45]

Liberia issued a postage stamp to honour Suzman in March 2011, calling her one of the legendary heroes of Africa.[citation needed]

In November 2017, the South African Post Office announced that it "has honoured this great, brave and pioneering woman with a rare gesture of a postage stamp" as an "indication of her importance to the country and to the liberation thereof and to that of women".[46]

The Progressive Federal Party of which Suzman was the sole Parliamentary representative between 1961 and 1973 became the Democratic Party after merging with the National Democratic Movement and the Independent Party in 1989. The Democratic Party was renamed the Democratic Alliance (DA) in 2000. In November 2017, former DA leader Mmusi Maimane paid tribute to Suzman, noting that "Every value we call our own in the DA can be traced back to the principles Helen fought for over her 36-year-long career as a Member of Parliament".[47]

The poet George Szirtes wrote the poem "Song" in her honor.[48]

The Helen Suzman Foundation was founded in 1993 to honour the life work of Helen Suzman. The Foundation seeks to promote the values espoused by Helen Suzman throughout her public life and in her devotion to public service.[49]

Death

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Suzman died in her sleep of natural causes on 1 January 2009. She was 91 years old.[43] Achmat Dangor, the Nelson Mandela Foundation chief executive, said Suzman was a "great patriot and a fearless fighter against apartheid".[50] Flags in South Africa flew at half-mast in her honour.[51] She was buried in a private Jewish ceremony at Westpark Cemetery in Johannesburg led by chief rabbi Warren Goldstein.[52][53]

See also

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References

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Bibliography

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[edit]
Revisions and contributorsEdit on WikipediaRead on Wikipedia

Helen Suzman

View on Grokipedia
from Grokipedia

Helen Gavronsky Suzman (7 November 1917 – 1 January 2009) was a and anti-apartheid activist.
Suzman represented the constituency of Houghton in the as a from 1953 to 1989, initially elected with the United Party before co-founding and serving with the Progressive Party (later the Progressive Federal Party).
Throughout her tenure, she emerged as a steadfast opponent of , defending individual liberties and the against the National Party government's racial policies, often conducting fact-finding visits to prisons and townships to expose abuses.
From 1961 to 1974, following the departure of her parliamentary colleagues, Suzman stood as the sole voice in opposition to apartheid within the legislature, enduring vilification yet persisting in advocacy for non-white ' rights.
Her efforts earned international recognition, including the Award in 1978, and she continued critiquing post-apartheid governance for deviations from liberal principles.

Personal Background

Early Life and Family

Helen Suzman was born Helen Gavronsky on November 7, 1917, in , a mining town east of , , to and Frieda Gavronsky, Lithuanian Jewish immigrants who had fled anti-Semitism and pursued economic opportunities in the region's burgeoning industry. Her mother died two weeks after her birth, leaving , a self-made wholesaler in hides and skins, to raise her alongside an older sister, aunt, and uncle in a stable household that instilled values of and industriousness typical of Eastern European Jewish immigrant families adapting to 's early 20th-century frontier economy. Suzman's childhood unfolded in this modest yet comfortable setting, amid the multi-ethnic dynamics of a mining community where informal racial hierarchies already shaped daily interactions, predating the National Party's formal apartheid policies of 1948. Her family's immigrant heritage, marked by resilience in the face of persecution and economic hardship in , fostered a grounded in personal initiative and community solidarity within Johannesburg's Jewish circles. On August 13, 1937, at age 19, she married Dr. Moses (Mosie) Suzman, a physician 14 years her senior and a leading medical figure in ; the couple had two daughters, , who became an art historian, and , a medical specialist. Their family life centered on domestic stability, with Suzman managing household duties while drawing on the self-sufficient ethos of her upbringing to navigate personal and communal responsibilities.

Education and Early Career

Suzman matriculated from Parktown Convent School in before enrolling at the , where she earned a degree in 1940, specializing in and . After graduation, she served as a for the War Supplies Board from 1941 to 1944, analyzing data to support South Africa's wartime production efforts. In 1945, she returned to the as a tutor and later lecturer in , roles that honed her empirical approach to through quantitative and historical methods. She held her university lecturing position until 1952, resigning amid growing concerns over the increasing politicization of academic curricula under the National Party government. This departure reflected her frustration with institutional constraints on objective economic discourse, paving the way for direct civic advocacy prior to formal political candidacy.

Political Entry and Parliamentary Service

Pre-Parliamentary Involvement

Following , Suzman, while serving as a tutor and lecturer in at the in , joined the South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR), an organization dedicated to factual analysis of racial policies and their socioeconomic impacts. Her involvement centered on empirical research challenging segregationist measures, emphasizing data on urban African conditions and labor restrictions rather than ideological appeals. In 1946, the SAIRR tasked Suzman with assisting in the preparation of evidence submitted to the , which examined the effects of pass laws and influx control on Black South Africans; her contributions highlighted the inefficiencies and human costs of these policies through statistical evidence on migration, employment, and enforcement outcomes. This work underscored her preference for evidence-based critiques, arguing that segregation undermined economic productivity and individual opportunity by prioritizing group classifications over merit and capability. By 1952, she authored A Digest of the Fagan Report, the Native Laws (Further Amendment) Bills, and Related Matters for the SAIRR, synthesizing commission findings to demonstrate how proposed amendments would exacerbate urban poverty and restrict mobility without addressing root causes like job reservation. Suzman's exposure to these issues deepened her political engagement amid Johannesburg's liberal intellectual networks, where she networked with academics, economists, and civic leaders advocating individual rights against collectivist racial doctrines. The National Party's 1948 electoral victory and subsequent intensification of , including stricter pass enforcement, prompted her active role in the United Party's Women's Council as Information Officer and on local constituency committees. However, she grew increasingly frustrated with the United Party's tentative , viewing it as insufficiently committed to dismantling segregation in favor of universal franchise and equal legal standing, a stance rooted in principled opposition to state-enforced group identities. This dissatisfaction foreshadowed her later break from the party, but pre-parliamentarily, it manifested in advocacy for non-racial democratic principles within opposition circles.

United Party Tenure and Shift to Progressives (1953-1961)

Helen Suzman was elected to the House of Assembly in 1953 as the United Party's candidate for the Houghton constituency in , securing an unopposed victory in this affluent, predominantly white suburb. As a new MP aligned with the United Party—the official opposition to the National Party's apartheid policies—she quickly voiced concerns over racially restrictive laws, including the of 1950, which enforced residential segregation, and the Population Registration Act of the same year, which mandated racial classification for all citizens. Within the United Party, Suzman aligned with its more liberal elements, advocating pragmatic approaches to political reform such as to devolve power regionally and a qualified franchise system on a common voters' roll, rather than immediate . This stance reflected a commitment to non-racial merit-based qualifications—encompassing low educational and economic thresholds applicable equally to all—aimed at extending voting rights gradually while safeguarding minority interests against the risks of unchecked . She co-drafted policy proposals emphasizing equal opportunities irrespective of race, positioning these as alternatives to both apartheid and unqualified one-man-one-vote democracy. Growing dissatisfaction with the United Party's perceived accommodation of National Party dominance prompted Suzman and 11 other liberal MPs to break away in November 1959, formally launching the Progressive Party at its founding congress on November 13. The new party explicitly rejected in favor of meritocratic, non-racial policies, including federal structures and qualified enfranchisement to promote inclusive yet protected governance. In the 1961 general election, however, Suzman's Progressive colleagues suffered defeats, leaving her as the party's sole parliamentary representative and marking her transition to isolated opposition.

Solo Opposition in Parliament (1961-1974)

Following the 1961 , Helen Suzman became the sole representing the Progressive Party, a position she held until 1974, during which she consistently provided the only to key . In this capacity, she cast lone dissenting votes against measures such as the Terrorism Act of 1967, which empowered without trial, and the Bantu Homelands Citizenship Act of 1970, which stripped black South Africans of citizenship by designating them as citizens of nominal homelands. These votes, though numerically futile against the National Party's overwhelming majority, underscored her principled stand grounded in empirical scrutiny of the laws' human and economic tolls rather than partisan alignment. Suzman leveraged parliamentary procedures, posing thousands of written and oral questions to ministers to highlight factual inconsistencies and the practical failures of apartheid policies, including inefficiencies in forced removals and development schemes that contradicted official claims of self-sufficiency. Her inquiries often revealed discrepancies in on economic and displacements, arguing from observable causal outcomes—such as in segregated labor markets—that these policies undermined South Africa's overall prosperity. This methodical approach, informed by her background, aimed to compel through rather than , exposing how apartheid's rigid separations fostered dependency and resource misallocation verifiable in official statistics. Beginning in 1967, Suzman utilized her parliamentary privileges to visit Robben Island prison, where she inspected conditions and engaged directly with political prisoners, including Nelson Mandela, marking her as the first external visitor to do so in that year. These visits, repeated periodically through the period, allowed her to document firsthand the human costs of security laws like the Terrorism Act, relaying reports of inadequate medical care and isolation tactics back to Parliament to challenge ministerial assurances. Her interactions emphasized verifiable mistreatments over ideological narratives, contributing to incremental improvements in prisoner treatment through persistent, fact-based advocacy within the legislative arena.

Collaborative Parliamentary Efforts (1974-1989)

In the 1974 general election, the Progressive Party secured six additional seats in , ending Suzman's 13-year tenure as the sole representative of the party and allowing for collaborative opposition efforts. This expansion enabled coordinated critiques of government security measures, including detentions without trial under Section 6 of the Terrorism Act, which permitted indefinite and was frequently invoked against anti-apartheid activists. With colleagues such as , Suzman intensified parliamentary challenges to P.W. Botha's "total strategy" doctrine, a militarized approach blending internal repression with regional interventions that escalated state violence against perceived subversives. Suzman and her (PFP) allies, formed in 1977 through merger with other reformist groups, maintained a focus on safeguarding individual liberties amid rising authoritarianism. They opposed expansions of the death penalty, particularly for political offenses, with Suzman advocating a moratorium on executions in May 1989 to allow scrutiny of judicial overreach. The group also resisted amendments to internal security laws that curtailed press freedoms, arguing these measures stifled dissent and accountability by enabling prior and banning of publications critical of apartheid. Suzman secured re-election in the Houghton constituency in the 1977, 1981, and 1987 elections, reflecting sustained white liberal support in Johannesburg's affluent suburbs despite national dominance by the National Party. In her final parliamentary years, Suzman warned that proposed constitutional reforms, such as the 1983 excluding Black South Africans, inadequately addressed ethnic divisions and risked post-apartheid instability akin to tribal conflicts observed in other African states like and , where centralized power exacerbated factionalism. She prioritized federal structures with entrenched protections for minorities and a to distribute power and mitigate such risks empirically evident in decolonized Africa's governance failures. Suzman voluntarily retired in 1989 after 36 years in , announcing in May that she would not contest the September election, citing the need for fresh leadership within the PFP amid accelerating transition pressures.

Advocacy and Policy Positions

Core Opposition to Apartheid Legislation

Helen Suzman mounted a consistent parliamentary challenge to the foundational laws, particularly the Population Registration Act of 1950, which required racial classification of all South Africans to enforce segregation, and the Group Areas Act of 1950, which designated residential and business areas by race, leading to forced removals. She rejected these measures outright, arguing they institutionalized arbitrary state-imposed racial categories that undermined individual dignity and equal citizenship. In debates, she highlighted the acts' inconsistencies and human costs, such as families divided by classifications varying across legislation. During the 1967 debate on an amendment to the Population Registration Act, Suzman decried the process as revealing South Africa's "sick obsession" with race, where racial status determined citizenship tier—first, second, or third class—rather than merit or contribution. She contended that such laws causally perpetuated profound inequality by barring non-whites from economic and social advancement, fostering resentment and unrest; for instance, Group Areas evictions displaced hundreds of thousands, correlating with rising protests and violence in the 1950s and 1960s. Suzman linked these policies to broader stagnation, asserting that race-based restrictions on labor mobility and skills development inefficiently allocated human resources, hindering national productivity in an industrializing economy. Suzman advocated replacing race-enforced group identities with non-racial citizenship grounded in and universal franchise, aligning with classical liberal tenets that prioritize individual rights over collective racial entitlements. She envisioned a system where opportunities derived from ability, not ancestry, to mitigate the social divisions apartheid entrenched. Though her Progressive Party stance commanded minimal votes in a National Party-dominated assembly, her critiques compelled policy scrutiny and minor concessions, such as inquiries into implementation flaws, despite overarching legislative impotence from 1961 to 1974 when she often stood alone.

Human Rights Interventions, Including Prison Advocacy

Suzman conducted multiple visits to Robben Island prison starting in 1967, the first by a parliamentarian to inspect conditions for political prisoners, including Nelson Mandela and Robert Sobukwe, which directly prompted improvements in treatment such as enhanced recreational facilities. These visits, continuing into the 1980s, allowed her to assess and report on detainee conditions, relaying concerns about inadequate diets, limited medical access, and restrictions on study materials, leading to incremental reforms like expanded rights to educational correspondence for inmates. She leveraged parliamentary privilege to publicize specific cases without endorsing prisoner violence, focusing on verifiable abuses rather than broader political narratives. In advocating against solitary confinement, Suzman repeatedly challenged laws like the Terrorism Act that enabled indefinite isolation without trial, visiting Sobukwe during his six-year period in virtual solitary and pressing for his release in parliamentary debates. Her interventions highlighted allegations of torture and deaths in detention, using firsthand prison observations to demand inquiries and better oversight, though outcomes were limited by government resistance. These efforts secured minor concessions, such as reduced isolation durations in select cases, but did not prevent ongoing detentions. Beyond parliament, Suzman collaborated with organizations like the on detention monitoring, supporting their documentation of individual cases and petitions against emergency detentions, including those of minors, to press for releases and fair trials. This work emphasized empirical tracking of abuses over revolutionary aims, contributing to public awareness of over 3,800 detainees in 1987 alone, though systemic releases remained rare. Her focus stayed on targeted advocacy for prisoners' humane treatment, yielding tangible gains like study permissions amid apartheid's constraints.

Positions on Communism, Economics, and Sanctions

Suzman personally opposed as an , viewing it as incompatible with individual liberties, yet she consistently defended the rights of communists under South African law. In parliamentary debates, she argued against the 1950 Suppression of Communism Act, which empowered the government to ban organizations and individuals broadly defined as promoting —including any advocacy for via non-violent means—contending that such measures stifled free speech and drove dissent underground rather than addressing root causes empirically through open discourse. Her stance stemmed from a commitment to , as evidenced by her solitary opposition in from 1961 to 1974 against extensions of the Act that restricted both communists and non-communists alike, despite facing accusations of sympathizing with the she rejected. On economic matters, Suzman, trained as an at the London School of Economics, advocated for market-oriented policies emphasizing property rights, free enterprise, and foreign to foster growth and alleviate across racial lines. She critiqued apartheid-era state interventions—such as job reservation laws and influx controls—as distorting labor markets and contracting the economy, citing data on rising among nonwhites under such regulations, and favored to enable and over redistributive measures that she saw as inefficient. As a member of the Progressive Party, she aligned with its platform promoting and resource exploitation under non-racial frameworks, arguing that would empirically undermine apartheid's racial barriers more effectively than coercive state controls. Suzman expressed skepticism toward against , maintaining that they disproportionately burdened nonwhite populations through job losses and heightened scarcity without compelling policy shifts, based on analyses of earlier boycotts like the that failed to alter internal dynamics. In the , amid U.S. and global for comprehensive measures, she testified and wrote against broad economic isolation, advocating instead for targeted incentives for and internal , as sanctions risked entrenching hardliners and exacerbating hardships for the vulnerable groups she championed. Her position drew criticism from anti-apartheid activists abroad but reflected a causal view prioritizing sustained via engagement over measures that empirical evidence suggested prolonged suffering without proportional gains in .

Challenges Faced

Abuse, Threats, and Personal Resilience

Throughout her parliamentary career from the to the 1980s, Helen Suzman endured persistent heckling and from National Party members, who frequently directed anti-Semitic slurs at her, including shouts to "go back to " and complaints about her "screeching Jewish voice." These attacks often framed her opposition to apartheid policies as disloyalty influenced by alleged Jewish conspiracies, reflecting broader prejudices among hardline Afrikaner nationalists. Beyond the chamber, Suzman received a steady stream of , obscene telephone calls, and explicit death threats, which she attributed to her solitary stance against government policies. Incidents such as slashed tires underscored the physical dimension of the hostility, yet she kept her contact details public to maintain for those seeking aid. Suzman demonstrated resilience by dismissing these threats without altering her approach, responding to ministerial defenses with precise statistical rebuttals on policy shortcomings, such as inflated claims of apartheid's benefits, thereby sustaining her isolation as parliament's lone consistent critic for over a decade. In an era of escalating unrest, including targeted violence against liberal figures in the and , she adopted basic security precautions but refused to yield, prioritizing evidentiary challenges to injustice over personal safety.

Responses to Political and Public Criticism

Suzman countered accusations from National Party members portraying her as disloyal or subversive for opposing apartheid policies, such as forced removals and pass laws, by emphasizing her commitment to constitutional principles and as foundational to 's . She famously rebutted claims that her parliamentary questions embarrassed the nation, retorting, "It’s not my questions that are embarrassing , but your answers," thereby shifting focus to the substantive flaws in government responses rather than her dissent. In defending her loyalty, Suzman invoked her oath to uphold the and argued that true patriotism required confronting moral imperatives like , rejecting labels of un-South African as attempts to silence principled opposition. Facing pressure from anti-apartheid radicals who viewed her parliamentary presence as legitimizing a racist system and urged or , Suzman maintained that internal provided empirical leverage to expose apartheid's effects, citing the inefficacy of withdrawal tactics in historical contexts where opposition voices amplified injustices. During her 13 years as the sole anti-apartheid MP from to , she clinically resolved to utilize parliamentary privileges—such as questioning ministers, tabling amendments, and accessing restricted sites—to document and publicize policy failures, arguing this sustained informational channels and prevented total legislative acquiescence. She dismissed boycott advocates' smears of ineffectiveness by pointing to tangible interventions, like ameliorating conditions, as evidence that persistence within the system yielded verifiable gains over symbolic exit. In public interviews and writings, Suzman advocated gradual reform over revolutionary upheaval, warning of the risks in multi-ethnic states where unchecked could replicate oppressions without institutional safeguards like a and independent . Responding to calls for sanctions and struggle from groups like the ANC, she critiqued their alliances with communist elements and inconsistent commitments to , insisting on verifiable through negotiated checks and balances to avert chaos, as seen in her endorsement of F.W. de Klerk's reform momentum while urging reciprocal concessions. Suzman framed this approach as pragmatic realism, drawing on first-principles of stable where incremental exposure of flaws—rather than systemic rupture—minimized , a stance she upheld amid detractors' demands for total rupture.

Later Life and Post-Retirement

Activities After 1989

After retiring from Parliament in 1989, Suzman served as president of the South African Institute of Race Relations from 1991 to 1993, continuing her advocacy for non-racial policies and human rights amid the transition to majority rule. In this role, she emphasized empirical assessment of social and economic reforms, drawing on data from the institute's research to critique emerging authoritarian tendencies in the African National Congress (ANC)-led negotiations. In 1993, Suzman published her memoir, In No Uncertain Terms: A South African Memoir, which chronicled her 36 years in opposition politics, her interventions against apartheid laws, and cautious optimism about the 1994 elections while warning against uncritical adoption of socialist policies without market-oriented safeguards. The book, dedicated to her Progressive Party colleagues, reflected on the end of apartheid as a vindication of liberal principles but stressed the need for institutional checks to prevent governance failures, based on her firsthand observations of state overreach. Suzman maintained public commentary into the late , focusing on and economic mismanagement under ANC rule, which she attributed to cadre deployment and weak mechanisms eroding post-1994 institutions. She specifically condemned President Thabo Mbeki's denialism as pseudoscientific and damaging, alongside pervasive graft that undermined service delivery, advocating instead for liberal reforms like and to address empirically evident declines in growth and investment. These positions aligned with her longstanding commitment to over ideological mandates, as seen in her advisory role on the board of , where she promoted transparent governance globally.

Death

Helen Suzman died on , 2009, at the age of 91 in her home in 's northern suburbs, following a brief illness. Her son-in-law, Jeffrey Jowell, reported that she passed away peacefully. A private Jewish funeral ceremony took place on January 4, 2009, at in . Flags were flown at across as a mark of official respect. Former President , who had served as state president during the final years of apartheid, attended the service alongside family members. , whom Suzman had visited regularly during his imprisonment on , issued tributes through his foundation highlighting her role as a conduit for concerns, reflecting enduring cross-partisan acknowledgment of her efforts.

Reception and Legacy

Achievements and Recognitions

Suzman received multiple nominations for the during the 1960s through 1980s, including a documented nomination in 1972, recognizing her solitary parliamentary dissent against . She was awarded 27 honorary doctorates from universities worldwide, among them in 1978, Oxford University, Cambridge University, and the . In 1978, Suzman received the United Nations Human Rights Award for her advocacy efforts. The following year, she was honored with the Medallion of Heroism. Nelson Mandela, in his 1994 autobiography Long Walk to Freedom, praised Suzman's visits to Robben Island prison, stating they provided essential moral support to political prisoners and prompted temporary improvements in conditions. In 2002, she was granted the Liberal International Prize for Freedom for her lifelong commitment to . Marking the centenary of her birth in , tributes included a unveiling and an annual lecture delivered by former President , emphasizing her principled opposition to injustice.

Criticisms from Diverse Perspectives

Nationalist and right-wing critics, particularly from the governing National Party, accused Suzman of sympathizing with communists and undermining by consistently opposing apartheid-era security legislation, such as the 1967 Terrorism Act and subsequent detention laws, which they argued were essential to counter insurgent threats from groups like the ANC allied with the . These critics labeled her a "tool of Communist agitators" in parliamentary debates and public rhetoric, viewing her advocacy for political prisoners and rejection of as effectively aiding enemies amid perceived existential threats to , including inter-tribal violence that apartheid policies framed as justification for separate development. From the left and radical anti-apartheid perspectives, including voices within the ANC and , Suzman was criticized for participating in the apartheid , which they saw as inherently legitimizing the regime rather than boycotting it in favor of extra-parliamentary struggle. The ANC explicitly stated in that Suzman lacked "the mandate or to speak on behalf of oppressed masses," dismissing her interventions as insufficiently aligned with resistance and central to liberation efforts. Additionally, her opposition to comprehensive —arguing on February 16, 1987, that they disproportionately harmed black South Africans economically without dismantling apartheid—was decried by ANC-aligned campaigners abroad and SACP members as prolonging the system by prioritizing reform over revolutionary pressure. Within liberal circles, Suzman's early endorsement of a qualified franchise—tied to education or property standards rather than universal adult , as per Progressive Party policy until 1978—drew internal debate for potentially entrenching inequalities and delaying full democratic inclusion, even if intended to mitigate risks of majority tyranny in a multi-ethnic society. Critics like argued this stance positioned her outside the core liberation struggle led by Mandela, effectively qualifying black enfranchisement in ways that echoed moderated apartheid structures. Despite her later shift to unqualified universal franchise support, this pragmatic was faulted for lacking the immediacy demanded by radical democrats wary of incrementalism's concessions to power imbalances.

Evaluations of Impact and Effectiveness

Suzman's parliamentary tenure, particularly her 13 years as the sole Progressive Party representative from 1961 to 1974, constrained her direct legislative influence amid the National Party's dominance, resulting in few enacted reforms despite consistent opposition to apartheid measures. Her persistent questioning exposed systemic abuses, such as inhumane prison conditions, prompting incremental improvements like better treatment for political detainees, though these fell short of dismantling core policies. This minority status amplified her role in fostering internal white dissent, embodying principled opposition that challenged the regime's racial monopoly and contributed to a of moral accountability within . Her advocacy extended international moral pressure by providing firsthand accounts of apartheid's excesses, including visits to and testimonies that informed global critiques, though causal attribution to broader sanctions or remains indirect and debated against mass mobilization factors. Post-apartheid outcomes underscore the prescience of her cautions against unchecked ; in 2004, she remarked that parliamentary democracy functioned more robustly under apartheid due to vigorous opposition, contrasting the African National Congress's unchallenged dominance that enabled policy drift. South Africa's subsequent —marked by GDP per capita growth averaging below 1% annually since 2010, alongside a decline from 4.4 in 1996 to 4.0 in 2023—validates her emphasis on institutional checks over revolutionary optimism, as statist interventions like broad-based correlated with slowed private investment and rising unemployment exceeding 30%. Evaluations highlight her effectiveness in targeted interventions, such as securing releases for individuals through parliamentary leverage, yet critique her liberal framework for underestimating the ANC's post-1994 shift toward centralized control, which empirical data links to erosion rather than the mass-movement narratives prioritizing alone. While left-leaning sources, often institutionally biased toward crediting liberation fronts, downplay her systemic foresight, favors her first-principles advocacy for market-driven equality as a counter to apartheid's distortions, evidenced by the regime's pre-1994 concessions amid sustained internal critique.

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