Spokesperson
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| Founded
| 1914, dissolution April 9, 2005
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|Political ideology
| conservatism, Afrikanernationalism
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The National Party (Afrikaans: Nasionale Party) (with its members sometimes known as Nationalists or Nats) was the governing party of South Africa from June 4th 1948 until May 9th 1994, and was disbanded in 2005. Its policies included apartheid, establishing a republic and the promotion of Afrikaner culture.
The National Party was founded in Bloemfontein in 1914 by Afrikaner nationalists soon after the establishment of the Union of South Africa. It first came to power in 1924, with J.B.M. Hertzog as Prime Minister. The Hertzog government worked to undermine the Coloured (mixed race) vote by granting, in 1930, voting rights to white women, but not to Coloured women, effectively halving the voting power of the Coloured electorate. In 1934, Hertzog agreed to merge his National Party with the rival South African Party of Jan Smuts to form the United Party. A hardline faction of Afrikaner nationalists, led by D.F. Malan, refused to accept the merger and maintained a rump National Party which he went on to name Herenigde Nasionale Party. Opposition to South African participation in World War II was used by the National Party to stir up anti-British imperialist feelings amongst Afrikaners. This led to a revival of support for the National Party so that it defeated Smuts' United Party in 1948.
Upon taking power, the National Party began to implement a program of apartheid — a policy geared to bringing about political partition for the different racial groups.
In 1951, the Bantu Self-Government Act established so-called "Homelands" (sometime pejoratively called Bantustans) for ten different black tribes. The ultimate goal of the National Party was to move all Black South Africans into one of these homelands (although they might continue to work in South Africa as "guest workers"), leaving what was left of South Africa (about 87 percent of the land area) with a White majority, at least on paper. As the homelands were seen by the apartheid government as embryonic independent nations, all black South Africans were registered as citizens of the homelands, not of the nation as a whole, and were expected to exercise their political rights only in the homelands. Accordingly, the three token parliamentary seats that had been reserved for white representatives of black South Africans in Cape Province were scrapped, since the other three provinces – Transvaal, the Orange Free State, and Natal – had never allowed any black representation.
Coloureds (South Africans of mixed White and non-White ancestry) were removed from the Common Roll of Cape Province in 1953. Instead of voting for the same representatives as white South Africans, they could now vote for four white representatives to speak for them. Later, in 1968, the Coloureds were disenfranchised altogether. In the place of the four parliamentary seats, a partially elected body was set up to advise the government in an amendment to the Separate Representation of Voters Act.
In a move unrecognized by the rest of the world, the former German colony of South West Africa (now Namibia), which South Africa had occupied in World War I, was effectively incorporated into South Africa as a fifth province, with seven members elected to represent it in the South African Parliament. The White population of South West Africa, predominantly German, considered its interests akin to those of the Afrikaners in South Africa and therefore supported the National Party in subsequent elections.
These reforms all bolstered the National Party politically, as they removed black and Coloured influence – which was generally hostile to the National Party – from the electoral process, and incorporated the pro-Nationalist whites of South West Africa. The National Party increased its parliamentary majority in almost every election between 1948 and 1977.
Various segregation laws were passed before the National Party took complete power in 1948. Probably the most significant were The Natives Land Act, No 27 of 1913 and The Natives (Urban Areas) Act of 1923. The former made it illegal for blacks to purchase or lease land from whites except in reserves; this restricted black occupancy to less than eight per cent of South Africa's land. The latter laid the foundations for residential segregation in urban areas.
Another goal was achieved in 1960, when the white population voted in a referendum to sever South Africa's ties with the British Monarchy and establish a republic, which led to South Africa's withdrawal from the Commonwealth.
Support
The National Party won all elections during the Apartheid white elections. It was mainly supported by the Afrikaners, though many Anglo-Africans also voted for the party. The party had a support of 50-65% in the elections.
In 1977 the National Party got its best-ever result in the elections with support of 64.8% of the white voters and 134 seats in parliament out of 165. After this the party's support declined.
In the late 70s the nation's white opposition was divided into many small parties.
Decline
Beginning in the early 1980s, under the leadership of State PresidentP.W. Botha, the National Party began to reform its policies. Botha legalized interracial marriages and multiracial political parties and relaxed the Group Areas Act. Botha also granted a measure of political representation to Coloureds and Indians by creating separate parliamentary chambers in which they had control of their "own affairs." Black South Africans were not included, however, and over national affairs he ensured that the white chamber of parliament retained the last word in all matters: the representatives of the white chamber had a compulsory block-vote in the electoral college to choose the State President, who had the say over which of the three chambers, or which combination of them, should consider any piece of legislation. On the central issue of granting meaningful political rights to black South Africans, Botha and the National Party refused to budge, most black political organizations remaining banned, and prominent black dissidents, including Nelson Mandela, remaining imprisoned.
In the midst of rising political instability, growing economic problems and diplomatic isolation, Botha resigned as National Party leader, and subsequently as President of the Republic, in 1989. He was replaced by F.W. de Klerk. Although a conservative, De Klerk realized the impracticality of maintaining apartheid forever, and soon after taking power, he decided that it would be better to negotiate while there was still time to reach a compromise, than to hold out until forced to negotiate on less favourable terms later. He persuaded the National Party to enter into negotiations with representatives of the black community. Late in 1989, the National Party won the most bitterly contested election in decades, pledging to negotiate an end to the apartheid system that it itself had established. Early in 1990, the African National Congress was legalised, and Nelson Mandela was released after twenty-seven years of imprisonment. A referendum in 1992 gave De Klerk plenipotentiary powers to negotiate with Mandela. Following the negotiations, a new constitution was drawn up, and multiracial elections were held in 1994. These elections were won by the African National Congress. The National Party remained in government, however, as a coalition partner to the ANC in the Government of National Unity until 1997, when it withdrew to become the Official Opposition.
In 1997, the National Party also renamed itself the New National Party in order to distance itself from its past. It lasted less than a decade before its federal council voted to dissolve the party on 9 April2005, following a decision the previous year to merge with the ANC.
