The right-wing Conservative Party, outraged by President Frederik de Klerk's racial reform initiatives, vowed Wednesday to mobilize Afrikaners to fight for an exclusively white homeland in South Africa and warned that extremist violence may escalate.
Accusing the government of putting the fate of the Dutch-descended whites who comprise a majority of South Africa's 5 million whites at "perilous risk," the opposition party declared "there is no way that Mr. de Klerk can drag the Afrikaner people into his `new South Africa.' "Meanwhile, police reported Wednesday five deaths in black unrest across the country, including four men burned to death when unidentified persons hurled a Molotov cocktail into a passenger bus. The incident occurred Tuesday in the tense township of Botshabelo, near the central city of Bloemfontein, where unrest escalated during protests last week over a boycott-breaking English cricket tour of South Africa.
A house and another vehicle in the same area were damaged by firebombs and police fired birdshot to disperse groups stoning buses in the township, police said. Four women and a man were wounded, police said, without elaborating.
A fifth death occurred in faction-fighting in the strife torn province of Natal, police said.
Conservative Party spokesman Koos van der Merwe told reporters the party intends to mobilize 1 million people to demand a new election. He acknowledged, however, that no constitutional formula exists for having one in the next five years unless called by the president.
Van der Merwe said 1 million votes would put the party in power to pursue its plan to divide South Africa into at least two parts - one for whites, the other for blacks. The Conservative Party, largest of the right-wing groups, captured 670,000 votes in the last election.
"You can only solve the political power struggle by dividing the land," he said. "If you go through this country you will find the graves of thousands of Afrikaners who have lived here, who have died for this country, for a part of it.
"We only want that part of South Africa which is legally ours, which we have fought for, which we have spilled our blood for."
He also announced plans for a rally May 26 in Pretoria on the 42nd anniversary of the National Party's rise to power and warned of a two-or three-day work stoppage by Afrikaners to paralyze the state-run railways, hospitals, police and fire departments and schools in a demonstration of the Afrikaners' power.
"That which is facing us, ladies and gentlemen, is nothing but black, ANC communist domination in this country," Van der Merwe said. "They are trying to put us in chains and we say `no go.' We are not prepared to do that."