TALI FEINBERG
Former Constitutional Court judge and fellow life-long activist, Albie Sachs, was shocked to hear of his friend’s passing. “I presented with him at an event two weeks ago. His body was frail, but he spoke with such passion, eloquence, and focus.
“We met almost 60 years ago when we both belonged to the Modern Youth Society,” Sachs told the SA Jewish Report. “I was 17 and he was in his mid-20s. He trained as a land surveyor, but he loved ideas, books, and debate. We both loathed apartheid. We loved climbing Table Mountain and hosting all night parties! And we defied the colour bar.”
Turok was born in Latvia in 1927. Speaking to the SA Jewish Report in 2013, he shared how his parents fled anti-Semitic pogroms in Ukraine. They settled in Latvia, where he and his two older brothers were born, but the family were again victims of pogroms.
“The Union of South Africa was looking to bolster its white population – even with Jewish riffraff from Eastern Europe,” he said wryly. His father came to South Africa in 1930, and brought his family here in 1934. Their home language was Yiddish.
After graduating from the University of Cape Town, Turok worked in London before returning to South Africa in 1953, where he joined the Congress of Democrats (COD) and in 1955, became its secretary for the Cape’s western region, becoming a full-time organiser for the Congress of the People.
He was arrested for treason in 1956, and stood trial until charges against him were withdrawn in 1958. Although served with a banning order in 1955, he remained active as a trade-union organiser. He became national secretary of the COD in 1958.
“Our first big campaign was writing the Freedom Charter. I remember vividly in 1953, he came to me saying he had just discovered the difference between liberty and freedom,” recalls Sachs. “He said that while liberty was simply the absence of control and restraints, freedom was much richer – it gave people the capacity to achieve their goals and work together.”
Sachs and Turok met up again in exile in London. “He did a lot of work teaching at the Open University, which was a pioneering form of education for people who did not get into university. Ben was in his element,” says Sachs. Turok obtained three degrees – in engineering, philosophy, and political science. He wrote about 20 books on Africa’s development, economics, and politics, and lectured on political economy at various African universities.
“Once, Ben was trying to sell a second-hand car,” recalls Sachs. “He and the buyer came to an agreement, but Ben wanted to show him how well the door closed. He tried to demonstrate this, but the door kept bouncing open. I call this the Turok lesson. Once you’ve come to an agreement, stop! If you push it, the ‘door’ will bounce open again – and this applies to any negotiation,” says Sachs with a smile.
Turok’s wife, Mary, was also a prominent member of the COD. Sachs says said she is both “warm and formidable”, and that their children reflect so much of their parents.
During the 1960 State of Emergency, Turok evaded arrest and went underground. In 1962, he was convicted under the Explosives Act, and sentenced to three years in prison. After his release, he was placed under house arrest, but escaped via Botswana to Tanzania, where he lived for three years together with his family until they all moved to Britain. He eventually returned to South Africa in 1990, and served as a member of parliament in various capacities from 1995 until 2014.
Former South African politician Andrew Feinstein recalls meeting Turok in the early 1990s when they were both involved with the ANC in Gauteng. “After the 1994 election, we served in the Gauteng legislature together. Ben was responsible for the Reconstruction and Development Programme in the province. We then both moved to national parliament, where we served on a number of committees together as we were both economists by training.”
Feinstein says Turok never wavered in his economic views, in spite of fierce criticism from the ANC leadership. “While others were taking a moderate path, he was absolutely insistent that we needed a far more progressive approach, focused on job creation and addressing inequality. He argued that putting income in people’s pockets would improve their quality of life and at the same time, would promote economic activity by growing the ‘demand side’ of the economy.
“It turned out he was absolutely right. His approach would have led to much less unemployment, and far greater equality in the South African economy. His views were always about what was best for the greater good of the vast majority of South Africans.”
At the same time, Feinstein says Turok was always watching closely for corruption and cronyism, long before Zuma took centre stage. “He always spoke out against corruption, and epitomised courage”.
His attitude was exemplified by his abstention from voting for the unconstitutional Protection of State Information Bill (also known as the Secrecy Bill) in 2011. The ANC’s disciplinary committee criticised his actions as “ill-discipline” and “counter-revolutionary”.
Feinstein points out that Turok’s Jewish identity influenced his outlook. “Coming from Latvia, he certainly identified with his generation of Jewish intellectuals, but while many of them were from an Eastern or Middle European milieu, he was deeply rooted in Africa. That Jewish history of suffering – some respond to it by only wanting to look after themselves. But, Ben internalised it as a deep concern for others, whatever their background and history.”
SA Jewish Board of Deputies Director Wendy Kahn agreed. “Professor Turok was a fierce opponent of all forms of racism, including anti-Semitism. In October 2013, he spoke out against Marius Fransman’s anti-Semitic comments against the Jewish community of Cape Town. As the then head of the ANC’s ethics committee in parliament, he requested that disciplinary action be taken against Fransman, who was Deputy Minister of International Affairs. He called Fransman’s comments damaging and divisive,” she said.
