Gerhard de Kock, the South African Reserve Bank governor at the time, estimated the cost of Botha’s speech to the country to have been between R8-billion and R9-billion in terms of foreign exchange losses due to the depreciation of the Rand. American anti-apartheid campaigners seeking large scale disinvestment by US companies smelled blood and were now extremely positive that these measures would break the back of apartheid. The disinvestment campaign was fought on many fronts in the USA, in Congress, on university campuses, through debates and through protests. Concerts were also held to raise awareness and to bring an increased awareness of the involvement of hundreds of American companies in apartheid South Africa. It was all out war to ensure that not a single part of America was involved with the apartheid regime or in any way supportive of it. “…by the end of 1989, 26 states, 22 counties and over 90 cities had taken some form of binding economic action against companies doing business in South Africa,” writes Knight. This economic action was to include refusing bids or tenders from companies in their home towns if they were directly involved in South Africa or involved in South Africa via subsidiaries. Due to the scale of these contracts in much larger American cities and due also to the value of the dollar compared to their South African operations turning a profit in Rands, companies were forced to rethink their operations in South Africa. According to him it was not only American companies, but - due to growing student protests universities and colleges that were also forced, to disinvest from South Africa. “…after 1984 the number of colleges and universities at least partially divesting jumped from 53 prior to April 1985 to 128 by February 1987 to 155 by August 1988.” All this pressure led to a major victory for the antiapartheid movement and - with the adoption by the American parliament of the 1986 Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act (CAAA) - no doubt for the mass democratic movement in South Africa. It was the nail in the coffin for many American
companies hoping the tide would be turning in their favour as the Act disallowed new investment in South Africa, sales to the military and police and a whole host of other restrictions on the importation of goods such as agricultural goods, textiles and steel. The following table shows disinvestment (the withdrawal of US & other foreign firms operating in South Africa) by companies and the divestment (the sale of shares held by pension funds and other organisations in companies that do business in South Africa). It also shows the country of origin of these companies as well as those companies from other countries that adopted sanction measures. Cumulative disinvestment from South Africa and/or Namibia, with number of corporations at end of 1987 Disinvestment
Divesting
Remaining Number
Australia
17
—
32
Canada
21
3
12
France
6
1
15
West Germany
10
—
12
Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Denmark
12
3
27
Switzerland
2
—
32
UK
92
7
266
USA
250
21
178
Total
410
35
690
Source: Business International, based on UN Economic and Social Council E/1988/23, 8 February 1988 as illustrated in Knight’s chapter in the book Sanctioning Apartheid (Africa World Press)
Major American companies that disinvested in the period 1982 to 1989 include Pepsi, Mobil – albeit at the bitter end when conditions were such that profits were not nearly enough to be repatriated to the USA – IBM, Xerox, Nabisco, Black & Decker, GM, Proctor and Gamble and even Weight Watchers. Some companies like Coke, KFC, IBM and many others either sold their South African businesses to managers or local Afrikaner businessmen, while many other companies
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