The ANC, long supported mainly by the Soviet Union, needs a political war chest. Mandela is shooting for $30 million. Without funds to “bring our people from their homes…to the voting booth,” the ANC could lose the election “even though we may be the most popular party,” he told one rally in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. The same day he arrived, a U.S. committee organized by former JFK speechwriter Theodore Sorensen pledged to raise $10 million. Mandela also made time to stroke American business leaders; a black government’s first priority will be to jump-start the economy, devastated by sanctions between 1985 and 1991. But Mandela stopped short of endorsing an end to the remaining U.S. sanctions against South Africa because the government has not yet approved an interim committee to oversee the elections.
De Klerk said he planned merely to brief U.S. opinion makers on his country’s transition to democracy. But he used his meetings with business leaders to lobby hard for access to loans from the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. De Klerk had planned to ask Clinton for an end to curbs on exports by Denel, South Africa’s high-tech arms manufacturer. But when it comes to moral suasion, Mandela has the upper hand-and the White House seemed to be waiting for a cue from him.
