Leabua Jonathan - Racial Policy and Opposition To Apartheid

Racial Policy and Opposition To Apartheid

Despite Lesotho's economic dependence on South Africa and the government's official policy during the 1970s of dialogue with its neighbour, Jonathan began criticizing the South African government's policy of apartheid supporting for the prohibited African National Congress (ANC) when international advisers suggested Pretoria's days were numbered.

During the late 1970s, Jonathan, despite his regime's protests to Libya, nevertheless accused the South African government of supporting the Lesotho Liberation Army (LLA). Mokhehle is fact did indeed go over to Pretoria but only in late 1981. The main LLA force was wiped out in 1979 but later recruits were assisted by a Transkei-based American mercenary with Rhodesian army service, Major Bob MacKenzie, son-in-law of the former CIA deputy-director, Ray Steiner Cline, a former member of the 1969 Nixon administration. The South African government denied these claims but later admitted Mokhehle was part of the notorious Vlakplaas operation. Much of Leabua's unsavoury early political life history has been obscured by his late opportunistic alliance with the ANC, which itself was a highly controversial organisation despite its ostensibly principled stance against apartheid. The best accounts of Leabua's life are in archive material (included over 20 hours of audio recordings of Basotho leaders) provided to university collections by a White Tanzanian intelligence officer, Lt. Gen. Bernard Leeman PhD, who served as a Major in the Lesotho paramilitary and gathered evidence supporting the view that the 1970 was peaceful and the Police Mobile Unit was surprised when the state of emergency was proclaimed.