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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by NatDemUK (talk | contribs) at 19:16, 21 February 2010 (I have made the point that the SANF may have been violent because it was run by Dave Hill who was working for Searchlight which is well known to infiltrate and damage its opponents.). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

The South African National Front, also know as the National Front of South Africa (SANF) was a neo-fascist organisation in South Africa formed in 1977. It was an initiative of John Tyndall of the British National Front; sister organisations were also formed in Australia and New Zealand at the same time.

SANF's first Chairman was Jack Noble, with the party being organised during the 1970s by Ray Hill. SANF channelled funds to the NF as part of an international network of neo-fascism. It moved beyond a mere gathering of ex-patriates when it linked up with Italian and Portugese neo-fascists and the South African Ku Klux Klan. It also tried to link with the Afrikaner Resistance Movement (AWB) and the Herstigte Nasionale Party (HNP) (from whom it received funding) with the ultimate aim of a single united racist/neo-fascist party in South Africa but this 'embryonic’ party never came to fruition .

SANF published its own magazine Hitback. It also “published a number of anti-black and ‘anti-Zionist’ pamphlets which led to calls for it to be prosecuted for incitement to racial hatred”, SANF’s policies would have led to a “massive increase in the death rate of black infants”. By 1979 SANF's anti-semitism led Jewish youths to threaten to take matters into their own hands; Harry Schwarz and Alf Widman of the Progressive Federal Party called on the government to do something about the party.

In 1979 the HNP replaced Noble as leader with Alan Fotheringham, a former HNP candidate , and Ray Hill returned to England.

SANF formed its own paramilitary wing Wit Kommando/White Commando, a not unusual development in the context of right wing South African politics.. In 1980 the Wit Kommando/White Commando began a campaign of terrorism mainly against blacks. In 1981 they planned to also attack whites whom they regarded as “white kaffirs” or race mixers. The South African police made arrests and discovered a hitlist of targets which included Bishop Tutu, the White Commando having previously "threatened him repeatedly". Fotheringham was not charged but Max Bollo, leader of the Italian associated grouping UNIDO receiving a lengthy jail sentence. SANF disbanded in the early 1980s.

It could be argued that the SANF may have been a Searchlight set-up as Ray Hill was working for Searchlight hence why the SANF caused a lot of damage to itself with its race-hating tactics as this was something of which Searchlight did to its Nationalist opponents.

See also

• British National Front
• New Zealand National Front
• National Front Australia

References

1. Hill, Ray and Bell, Andrew The Other Face of Terror Grafton (1988) p56, pp67-68
2. Term used by former member
3. Hill, Ray and Bell, Andrew The Other Face of Terror Grafton (1988) p56, pp70
4. Baron, Alexander Jew-Haters, Black-Haters, violent Criminals, hypocrites and liars condemned out of their own mouths 2nd edition Anglo-Hebrew Publishing p9 ISBN 1 898318 077
5. Article from (Johannesburg) Sunday Express 4th February 1979
6. Hill, Ray and Bell, Andrew The Other Face of Terror Grafton (1988) p70
7. It is listed as among the most “notorious” of paramilitary organisations in Johann van Rooyen Hard Right: The New White Power in South Africa IB Tauris (1994) p91-92
8. Hill, Ray and Bell, Andrew The Other Face of Terror Grafton (1988)p72
9. Allen, John Rabble-Rouser for Peace: The Authorised Biography of Desmond Tutu Rider 2006 p p207

• Organizations associated with apartheid
• Far-right politics