SA President P.W Botha meets with leaders of independent homelands

The leaders of the four 'independent' homelands, namely; Bophuthatswana, Ciskei, Transkei, and Venda, attended a five-nation summit in Pretoria, chaired by the South African State President P. W. Botha. At the end of the meeting a joint declaration was issued that stated, among other things, that all attempts to disrupt the economic development of Southern Africa by sanctions, boycotts and similar measures would be opposed. The leaders also declared their rejection of the political domination of any community or state by another. Many observers saw this meeting as an attempt by the Pretoria regime to gather support from these homeland leaders in case of a backlash by the banned liberation movements.  Homelands are a direct result of the Land Act of 1913, which separated South African people according to their race. This meeting was held at the time when the apartheid government was put under extreme pressure as unrest in Black townships escalated. During the year schools in townships around the country had ground to a halt, and political violence, later dubbed “The people’s war”, had spiralled out of control. This summit must also be seen as P. W. Botha’s need for reassurances that the homelands will remain loyal to Pretoria and continue as buffer against possible armed incursions, expected largely from the African National Congress’s (ANC) military formation Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK).