The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

MR. LEHRER: Good evening. Leading the news this Thursday, the death toll in the Bangladesh cyclone continued to mount and allied troops secured a larger area of Northern Iraq for Kurdish refugees. We'll have the details in our News Summary in a moment. Robin.

MR. MacNeil: After the News Summary, we have a report on the Bangladesh cyclone disaster and discuss relief needs with that country's minister of finance and planning. Then the violence between black groups in South Africa. We have a discussion with representatives of the African National Congress, the Zulu Inkatha Party, and the white government. Finally, Time Magazine Religion Writer Richard Ostling looks at the split in America's largest Protestant church, the Southern Baptist Convention. NEWS SUMMARY

MR. LEHRER: More than 100,000 people may have died in the Bangladesh cyclone. Government officials today put the confirmed toll at 37,000, but said it would go much higher. Workers from international relief agencies already strained by the Kurdish crisis began arriving on the Southeast coast of Bangladesh, the region hardest hit when the storm swept in from the Bay of Bengal on Tuesday. We have more from Norman Reese of Independent Television News.

MR. REESE: It's an indication of the violence of the storm, but its full and brutal scale is only now being realized. The Southeast coast and islands at the head of the Bay of Bengal bore the brunt of the winds. Whole communities have disappeared. Thousands of acres of land are submerged, cattle sharing the same fate as the people. And rescue workers describe the conditions of the survivors as dreadful. These pictures are from Bangladesh television reporting their own national tragedy. British charities like Oxfam and Save the Children have already sent aid. More is needed. The storm's severity eclipsed the 1970 cyclone that left 1/2 million dead. Since then the government has established an early warning alarm system which should have given time for some people to reach safety. But some experts say there's no defense for low lying Bangladesh from a cyclone of this week's severity. Damage inflicted to the country's infrastructure will make long-term recovery slow and costly. It's a big test for newly elected Prime Minister Zia who will have to solve these problems along with a fair and speedy distribution of international aid.

MR. LEHRER: Bangladesh has appealed to the international community for $1.4 billion in emergency aid. The United States, Japan, and several European nations have pledged several million dollars. We will have more on this story right after the News Summary. Robin.

MR. MacNeil: Allied forces more than doubled the size of the security zone for the Kurdish refugees in Northern Iraq today. Twenty-five hundred troops pushed 50 miles East from Zakho just beyond the town of Amadia, where they will establish a second refugee camp. No resistance to the move was reported. Allied commanders ordered Iraqi troops out of the area, but they're letting them stay at one outpost, Saddam Hussein's summer palace. Reuters News Agency reported Saddam wants it destroyed to prevent allied troops from using it as a base. Meanwhile, more Kurds in Turkey were packing for the return trip to Iraq. For those staying, conditions have improved with more aid getting through. The commander of the United Nations peace keeping force in Southern Iraq said his forces would be fully deployed on Monday. He said the U.S. forces there should be out two days later. The U.S. has 5,000 troops from the third armored division near the Iraq-Kuwait border. Pres. Bush today disputed a report that Gen. Colin Powell, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, opposed going to war against Iraq. The report contained in a book by Bob Woodward of the Washington Post claims Powell advocated continued sanctions to drive Iraq from Kuwait. Mr. Bush responded during a White House photo opportunity.

PRES. BUSH: If an adviser of mine, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of State thought that every time they gave advice it was going to be advertised, I wouldn't get any advice. People don't want to do that and these people don't frankly -- and of course you're going to have some that are going to think one thing's going to work, but nobody could have been more supportive and nobody could have done his job better in every way than Colin Powell, whether it's giving advice to the President or whether it's saluting and marching to the orders of the President when he decided to go to war. And I don't care what kind of book they've got, how many unnamed sources they have, how many quotes they put in the mouth of somebody when they weren't there, they're not going to divide us.

MR. LEHRER: South African Pres. DeKlerk today relaxed the nation's Internal Security Act. He did it in response to a May 9th deadline set by black leaders. Those leaders have said they will abandon political settlement talks with the government if it fails to meet their demands by that date. DeKlerk's decision came after a second straight day of bloody clashes between followers of the African National Congress and their rivals in the Zulu Inkatha movement. Police said at least 37 people have died in Johannesburg's black townships over the past two days. We have a report from Judy Aslet of Independent Television News.

MS. ASLET: First light this morning and the war in the township continues. A group of ANC supporters mount an attack on Inkatha MPs inside the hostel. They say it's in response to the Inkatha attack on them the night before. And by the time the police arrive, at least another two people have died and many people lie wounded.

SPOKESPERSON: Tell us what happened.

SPOKESMAN: The Zulus got us.

MS. ASLET: A hundred meters away another woman is shot through the window of her home, a bullet from an Inkatha AK-47 killing her outright. Mrs. Mandela visited the woman's family soon after the incident and was clearly upset.

MRS. MANDELA: One can just see which direction South Africa is facing. According to eye witnesses here, the people who shot at this innocent woman were with the police and the police did nothing to prevent the shooting.

MS. ASLET: It's an accusation the police firmly deny. Pres. DeKlerk's announcement tonight meeting some of the ANC's demands on violence may help the now fragile negotiation process. But it's unlikely to stop the fighting in the townships and for now, the May the 9th deadline still stands.

MR. LEHRER: Warring parties in Angola have reached a peace accord. Representatives of the Angolan government and the Unita rebels initialed the agreement in Portugal last night. It calls for a cease-fire by the end of the month and the country's first free elections in the fall of next year. The United States and the Soviet Union will also stop supplying arms to the two sides under the deal. An estimated 300,000 Angolans have been killed since the civil war began in 1975.

MR. MacNeil: Emergency workers today discovered the body of a fourth victim of yesterday's explosion at a fertilizer plant in Sterlington, Louisiana. Four people are still missing and more than a hundred workers were injured. The force of the blast could be felt eight miles away. The area was evacuated but still police said no chemical leaks occurred.

MR. LEHRER: NASA officials said they were pleased with the space shuttle Discovery's performance today. Its seven man crew did experiments with the satellite launched from the shuttle yesterday. The satellite is designed to measure exhaust fumes. The astronauts sprayed it with rocket propellent from 111 miles away. The satellite's camera saw the propellent as a bright vapor cloud in the dark sky. The experiments are aimed at developing a system to detect enemy missiles for the Strategic Defense Initiative. Yesterday such experiments were delayed nine hours when astronauts had trouble aiming the satellite. The World Health Organization today predicted the AIDS virus will infect up to 30 million adults and 10 million children by the end of the century. That is 10 million more than the organization predicted a year ago. The WHO saidcontinued spread of the disease in Africa and Asia was the main reason for the higher estimate.

MR. MacNeil: That's our News Summary. Now it's on to the Bangladesh disaster, black violence in South Africa, and the divided Southern Baptists. FOCUS - NATURE'S FURY

MR. MacNeil: Bangladesh and the devastating impact of Tuesday's cyclone is where we go first tonight. The official death toll is now set a 37,543. But today the Prime Minister estimated that as many as 100.000 may have died in the storm with its 145 mile per hour winds which swept in from the Bay of Bengal. Most of the damage and death came on islands just off the coast of Bangladesh. We have a back ground report narrated by Lindsay Taylor of Independent Television News.

MR. TAYLOR: It seems like virtually the whole area is under water. Bangladesh's worst cyclone in 20 years. In parts the twenty foot wave simply wiped out everything crops, buildings, people. The water slowly recedes, the death toll rises. With each hour the numbers increase as the true scale of this tragedy gradually unfolds. Animals and humans have perished alike. Their bloated remains littering the area bringing the risk of disease and infection. Experts say the effect of the cyclone is almost immeasurable.

SPOKESMAN: The devastation will lead to the total inundation of the land surface. I mean you realize that Bangladesh is about a 110 million people and the land surface is all below 20 meters above sea level. 50 percent is below 8 meters above sea level. You only need a flood wave in to the coastal strip to put tens of millions of people at the risk of loss of life.

MR. LINDSEY: As well as the massive death and destruction caused by the cyclone the flood water have contaminated the wells with sea water. There is now a desperate need for supplies of fresh drinking water. A crisis that will persist until the rains come and flush out the contamination. Bangladesh is no stranger to flooding. But more frequently as three years ago it caused by heavy rains swamping the delta. It is a cruel irony but it may take river flooding like this which in itself caused wide spread misery to help desalinate the land. Given the frequency of such flooding Bangladesh despite being one of the World's poorest nations has taken steps to defend against such disasters. There is now a radio network which together with satellite information can track the approaching storm and give warning to others. Cyclone shelters have been built on pillars usually two or three stories high which can keep more than a 1000 people above the flood waters. And embankments have been built around some of the islands but they are made entirely of earth, are easily eroded and there are not enough of them.

SPOKESMAN: Though a lot of shelters have been built, embankments have been raised and indeed there has been a program over some years to try and strengthen sea embankments to try to prevent the sea encroaching and to keep out the major storm surges. But those are still not up to the scale of the catastrophic events that we've seen. Even though the Government in Bangladesh, along with a lot of foreign aid, the activities of non governmental organizations and so on has tried to provide concrete house, raised embankments. They still not have met the demand.

SPOKESMAN: They have been prepared with in the limits of their resources. They have set up studies and have set up infrastructure that would enable them to at least communicate as well as they can with in the communications that they have to the people out in the rural areas. But as we find in other areas it is very difficult to communicate to a massive population of a 110 million within a few hours.

MR. LINDSEY: A reporter in Bangladesh confirms there were warnings but they were ignored by people on some of the islands. The cyclone itself would not have been so devastating but for the shear number of people in Bangladesh, a most densely populated country. Most of the year it provides some of the richest agricultural land attracting farmers. Now a massive relief operation is need to help restore their livelihoods.

SPOKESMAN: They need very little to start off. Some times it is a question of regaining their utensils, their cooking pots and important thing they need is a utensil to carry water and to cook with and then housing. All these things we are proposing to provide assistance to loans.

MR. LINDSEY: But aid workers and scientists agree that the root problem for Bangladesh is poverty. It can not afford to pay for solutions.

MR. MacNeil: The Bangladesh Minister of State for Relief said today that his country needs 1.42 billion dollars in emergency funds to deal with the aftermath of the storm. For more on the relief effort we turn to Saifur Rahman, Bangladesh's Minister of Finance and Planning. He has been meeting with U.S. and UN Officials about the relief effort. Mr. Minister welcome and thank you for joining us.

MINISTER RAHMAN: Thank you very much.

MR. MacNeil: I understand that thousands are still missing that are not accounted for. Is there any hope of rescuing those who are still missing on those islands in the Gulf.

MINISTER RAHMAN: Well I am not quite sure because this is not the first time the cyclone has visited Bangladesh but this is the worst on our history. The missing ones, well some of them could be found because most of all the fisherman in the Bay of Bengal are the ones that were effected to begin with. They faced this nightmare and this tragedy year after year but I am not quite sure how many will be found.

MR. MacNeil: Part of your problem I gather is a shortage of helicopters to explore these islands and to bring relief. Tell me about what you have and what you need.

MINISTER RAHMAN: Well frankly speaking our facilities are inadequate to meet the gigantic task that lays ahead of us at the moment. The scale of the devastation is immense. We have a few helicopters and the area covered is the Strait of Bangladesh in the Coastal Belt and the people effected are millions. There are 10 to 15 million people effected by the cyclone.

MR. MacNeil: Are you asking for people to give you or lend you helicopters?

MINISTER RAHMAN: I am asking for relief in the form of helicopters, boats, perhaps the speed boats and so forth. All kinds of material that is needed for us to rescue the people from the off shore areas.

MR. MacNeil: And this has to be done pretty quickly?

MINISTER RAHMAN: Pretty quickly indeed because the people are now shelterless, foodless, clothesless and medicineless and we have to give immediately. And even the drinking water as you have seen is needed.

MR. MacNeil: has anybody promised you helicopters immediately?

MINISTER RAHMAN: I haven't got any promise of helicopters but I have visited U.S. officials. The Congressman and the IMF Official and this afternoon the United Nations Secretary General. And all have assured their support. Already some support had been extended. The United Nations, the International Monetary Fund is sitting tomorrow in a meeting and they are proposing for enhanced support for Bangladesh because of this relief measure but the exact quantity has not been determined.

MR. MacNeil: Are you feeling the effects of all the effort of helping the Kurdish people at the moment is this interfering with or taking away from what the World community might have given to you in this circumstance?

MINISTER RAHMAN: Well it is true some time the reliefs are competing attention of the donor countries but I think suffering humanity all over the World needs support. But the disaster in Bangladesh is very extensive and the very worst situation in maladies and I should say Bangladesh should receive priority consideration not only because off the scale of the disaster but the character of the disaster. We have the character of a disaster is immediate need for food, clothes shelter and medicine.

MR. MacNeil: Within days really?

MINISTER RAHMAN: With in days. Not provided for then the area will be visited by the cholera, the typhoid will be there and from one problem we will be facing other problems. So our need is urgent and immediate.

MR. MacNeil: Now I have seen, I have just reported, your Government has said you need 1.4 billion dollars. The amounts that I have seen offered so far might add up to 20 million. Some thing like that. I mean that is an extraordinary gap. Explain why you think you need 1.4 billion? Where does that figure come from?

MINISTER RAHMAN: Well I have been out of the country and I am not quite sure about the estimate made for this disaster but I could say the amount needed for restoring the infrastructure, to provide homes to the shelterless and also to give them compensation for going to the field for the cultivation of their crops, again for the second crop and all kinds of rehabilitation work. And also as you have seen that a new bridge which was built was blown off.

MR. MacNeil: That bridge we just saw.

MINISTER RAHMAN: The bridge has been blown off.

MR. MacNeil: Is that a very important bridge?

MINISTER RAHMAN: It is very important because it is connecting the North to the South, to the Bay of Bengal. The inter fish culture that we have developed has been damaged. So may be this computation they have made taken in to account all the existing and potential lose that Bangladesh will suffer as a result of the cyclone. One of the biggest contributions you have noted here in the report. People are still husking their paddies. We are in a critical situation a food situation already before the cyclone and food level in Bangladesh was not very comfortable. With the standing crop taken away just now finished and that area was the most fertile area for cultivation and the crop loss itself will be hundreds of millions of U.S. dollars because I believe that at least three to four hundred thousand tons of food grain will be lost due to the cyclone.

MR. MacNeil: That is a large amount of grain.

MINISTER RAHMAN: That is a large amount of grain and it is not only the economic loss but it is a loss which need to be immediately replenished and I told the UNited Nations Secretary General this afternoon immediately we need help from the food security system of the United Nations so that people do not again die from a shortage of grains.

MR. MacNeil: We have seen some of your Governments efforts with foreign aid to prevent such loss of life in cyclones. Cyclones, something like 50 of them have visited your country in the last few decades and it is very common for you to have huge loss of life. Given the nature of your country and where it is situated in the path of those cyclones do you think that you can ever build enough dikes, enough of this house on stilts, cement houses and so on to really make your population safe or is it always going to be vulnerable?

MINISTER RAHMAN: Well I think that we should not be so much hopeless that it is going to be always. Our problem as you know resource scarcity. If we have resources we can provide more shelters. THis time three million people have been evacuated. There is a democratic government in the country and the parliament members have been sent to their respective areas. They have taken people to these secure areas. But the shelter that started building from 1972 and onward are not enough to accommodate the people that has come under the cyclone devastation. I think with resources we look forward to the day when we be able to minimize that human cost and loss of property but I agree the geographical area in which we are we may not be able to altogether eliminate the scope of such a cyclone.

MR. MacNeil: Well Mr. Rahman thank you very much for joining us.

MINISTER RAHMAN: Thank you very much indeed for giving me the opportunity to reach your viewers.

MR. LEHRER: Still to come on the Newshour tonight the violence in South Africa and the split in the Southern Baptist Church. FOCUS - PROGRESS REPORT

MR. LEHRER: Next, the violence among blacks in South Africa. We get three perspectives on it after this backgrounder by Kwame Holman.

MR. HOLMAN: February 11, 1990, as the world watched, African National Congress Leader Nelson Mandela walked away from 27 years in South African prisons. Hopes were high that a budding political reform Mandela's release symbolized would lead to a smooth dismantling of apartheid and ultimately peaceful power sharing between the white minority and the black majority. Indeed, in the months that followed, South African Pres. F.W. DeKlerk in consultation with Mandela announced dramatic moves toward what the government called "irreversible social change," the repeal of the nationwide state of emergency, the unbanning of political opposition, and the opening of public accommodations to all races. But while talks between the ANC and the government proceeded cordially, relations between the ANC and its major political rival, Inkatha, continued to deteriorate. Inkatha supporters who are mostly Zulu have clashed for years with supporters of the ANC, many of whom are exhosa. It was hoped that recent talks between Mandela and Inkatha leader Mangu Suthu Buthelesi would avert further confrontations. But the meeting failed to reconcile the frictions born of Inkatha's more pro-government stance and the traditionally more militant view of the ANC. Both groups now are waging a political struggle for the support of the black majority, a struggle that's grown increasingly violent. The deadly skirmishes between mostly youthful members of Inkatha and the ANC are concentrated in the impoverished black townships and in barracks that house industrial workers. In the last two days, 37 were reported killed, bringing the death toll to 70 this week, 600 since the beginning of the year. The ANC accuses the government of encouraging the mayhem to promote the notion that blacks cannot govern themselves. Reports from the street fighting say neither Inkatha nor the ANC leadership seems much in evidence as the violence continues. ANC leaders have demanded the DeKlerk government take specific steps the ANC says will help stop the fighting. Today Pres. DeKlerk announced the government will drop several more laws opposed by the ANC. That may or may not help stop the violence.

MR. LEHRER: Now three views of the violence in South Africa. Harry Schwarz, who's South Africa's new ambassador to the United States, Chris Hani heads the military wing of the African National Congress, he joins us from Boston, Sipo Mazimula represents Chief Buthelesi's primarily Zulu Inkatha Party, he joins us from Atlanta. Mr. Ambassador, what do you think it will take to stop the violence?

AMB. SCHWARZ: I think it's necessary for people to sit down and to talk and to be genuine that they want to bring the violence to an end, and to my mind, the sooner that we all sit down and talk, the better it will be for South Africa.

MR. LEHRER: It's been suggested by the ANC and others that the government has the power to stop it if it just had the will.

AMB. SCHWARZ: Well, if the government would re-declare the state of emergency and to bring massive troops into the areas, certainly it would be brought to an end almost immediately, but I think that there would be very serious objection to that and I think that it would be counterproductive and I don't think any one of my colleagues would really like to see that happening, nor would I.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Hani, is that true for the ANC?

MR. HANI: Well, it is true. We certainly would oppose the declaration of a state of emergency, but at the same time we put forward a view that government has not taken decisive steps to curb the elements who are responsible for this violence. Certainly it is our perception that the police are not coming out to protect affected communities.

MR. LEHRER: Do you believe they could with the power that they have now, they could stop it?

MR. HANI: I think using the powers that they have by identifying the perpetrators of violence in the same way they identify those who carried out acts of violence against the state in the past, they would stop the violence.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Mzimela, do you agree that the government could stop this if it wanted to?

MR. MZIMELA: The government cannot stop the violence in the townships, the violence the government can perhaps contain it for a while by sending in troops and police, but this is basically a black and black problem. And it's only when the blacks in the warring factions sit down seriously and sort this out, it's only then that we can come up with a solution.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Hani, what would you identify as the cause of this? What do you think is the cause of the conflict between the Zulus, on the one hand, Inkatha Party, and the ANC and your folks on the other?

MR. HANI: The causes of violence are multi-fold. There's certainly the socio-economic aspects of it, the situation in the hostels and the compounds where there's no family life. Secondly, there is in our view a violence orchestrated against us because the government would want to negotiate with a weakened ANC.

MR. LEHRER: You mean the government wants you all to be weakened and as a consequence, is encouraging or at least not stopping the Inkatha?

MR. HANI: It is encouraging those who are against us, not only members of Inkatha, I wouldn't want to accuse Inkatha of being behind violence, but there are some vigilante groups who are going into trains, attacking people at random and also moving into the locations and attacking people.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Ambassador, is there validity to that charge that the government wants the ANC weakened and is, in fact, encouraging or at least permitting those who are against the ANC to do what they're doing?

AMB. SCHWARZ: I think it's quite wrong because, in fact, the government wants a negotiating partner, wants the ANC as a negotiating partner, wants Inkatha, wants all the other political parties and groupings to be part of the negotiating process, so it's utterly logical to suggest that the government is trying to weaken a party with whom it wishes, in fact, to bring about a settlement of the political problems in South Africa. I think the truth is that there are, in fact, two people fighting, two groups fighting, and they are now, or at least one of them is seeking to blame a third party. Now it just doesn't make sense because there's an easy way to stop the fighting. The two people who are fighting should stop fighting. It's as simple as that.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Hani, why don't the two parties sit down and resolve this? I mean, as the ambassador says, the police, you know, the government has a role to play but it's basically people -- your people killing their people and people and the other way around, why can't those people sit down and stop it?

MR. HANI: Well, I think the ambassador knows that will set down with Inkatha. We had a meeting early this year where there was a peace accord. Efforts have been made by both the ANC and Inkatha leadership to make that peace accord work, but yet, the violence continues. The government cannot escape the responsibility of maintaining law and order, because it is the government of the day. If it steps forward and curbs the violence, I'm sure that peace accords would be implemented much more effectively than it has been implemented in the past. The other point I want to raise is why is the government not moving in to stop the public display of what is called cultural weapons which have been used in some cases to kill people.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Ambassador.

AMB. SCHWARZ: The government's already said that, in fact, weapons of violence should not be carried, but you know it's not the cultural weapons that's the main trouble. It's the AK-47s that are shooting people, not killing people. It's Pangors that are hacking people to death and who see there's a very easy way to stop it. And it's not enough for the leadership to talk. They have to see to it that the fellows, in fact, carry out the wishes if those are the wishes. Now it's quite clear, Mr. Hani's right, it's the responsibility of the government to maintain law and order, but no government can keep a policeman at every corner 24 hours of the day, no government can stop, in fact, the kind of behavior that goes on in the middle of the night. That would require the state of emergency if the parties, themselves, want to continue with the violence. And we do not want the state of emergency and therefore, it's up to the two people who are fighting to decide to stop the fighting, and that's an inescapable fact from which Mr. Hani cannot escape.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Mzimela, the Washington Post had a story this morning where a reporter for the Washington Post observed some of the violence in one of the townships outside Johannesburg and he wrote very clearly that he saw no evidence on the part of the police or of the leadership of your organization or the ANC to try to stop the violence, that there didn't seem to be anybody who cared about the fact that these people were killing each other. What's your -- how do you react to that?

MR. MZIMELA: I don't think it will get us anywhere to be talking about single incidents. There is a culture of violence which has developed. One has to remember that most of the young people, those who are 20 and younger, had been brought up to believe that the only way they are going to free South Africa is through violence, so there's an attitude towards violence. And this is why I say the government can't stop the black on black violence. It is we, the black people who are involved in the violence, who must sit down and talk. Unfortunately, Inkatha Freedom Party has been negotiating with the wrong people in the ANC. We thought that Mr. Mandela was in control of the ANC, but it is clear to us now after many talks, even in private, with him, that he is not the one who is in charge. In fact, we should be discussing with Mr. Hani, he complains now, Mr. Hani, of cultural weapons, but he knows full well that he has been importing into the country AK-47s which the South African Communist Party members and ANC members have been hiding under their blankets and using them. Most of the people that died in the townships have died of gunshot wounds and not carries spears.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Hani, is that true?

MR. HANI: Well, that rather surprises me that Sipo Mzimela, who's an oppressed black man, doesn't know that apartheid oppressed our people with violence. If the ANC at one time has had to use AK-47, it was in response to a state orchestrated violence and I would have thought every black man would have commended the efforts of the ANC to take up arms to try and stop state violence. At any rate, to suggest that it is the ANC which carries AK-47 is ludicrous. Everybody knows that some leaders of the Inkatha have been arrested with AK-47, people like Tamba Koza and many others. AK-47s were brought into the country as well by the South African defense forces which captured these weapons in Mozambique, in Angola, in Namibia, and which captured some of them from us. So we cannot be blamed for the presence of AK-47s inside the country. Whilst it is true that we have our AK-47s, we are not using AK-47 to gain influence, nor to gain turf in our own country. We are talking to the government at the moment and we have suspended armed actions and we're sticking to that suspension.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Hani, let me ask you this. Is it your perception or your belief that the power of the -- that the leadership of the ANC, Mr. Mandela and the others, including you, have the power to stop the violence on the part of the ANC, in other words, could you stop your people from violent acts?

MR. HANI: I don't accept at all that our people have initiated violence against anybody. I think on the other hand, the ANC members are victims of violence from vigilantes.

MR. LEHRER: Okay. In other words -- but let's say -- make it hypothetically -- you don't want to concede that ANC members are committing violence -- in a hypothetical case if ANC members were committing violence, could you stop it?

MR. HANI: My response to that is that the ANC leadership, all of us, from Mandela downwards, will go out of the way to try to stop violence.

MR. LEHRER: All right.

MR. HANI: We have been talking to a number of organizations, to the PNC, even to Inkatha, in an attempt to find effective methods of stopping the violence.

MR. LEHRER: All right, let me ask Mr. Mzimela the same question. Does Chief Buthelesi and the other leaders of the Inkatha have the power to stop violence if it is, in fact, being committed by your people?

MR. MZIMELA: Yes, indeed, without any question. We actually want peace. The greatest tragedy is that last year when Mr. DeKlerk announced the unbanning of the organization, he was, in fact, announcing the defeat of apartheid. Chris Hani and myself and all others are the great grandchildren of people who started the struggle and the struggle has been finally won. The doors to negotiation are open. DeKlerk and his government are waiting for us to walk in, sit down and work out a new constitution. We could have enormous power simply by walking in, setting up committees, and actually participating in the running of the country even before we left. That's where the tragedy is.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Ambassador, having just heard what we've just heard here, and what you already know and what you already bring to this question, do you think the power rests with the leaders of the ANC and the leaders of the Inkatha to stop this if they wanted to?

AMB. SCHWARZ: Well, I think the two leadership groups could stop the violence, but they have to then make sure that the followers do what they want them to do. In other words, lip service is not enough. It's not enough to talk about it. You actually have to get your followers to do it. And I think that's what expected from the leadership of the two organizations today, see to it that your followers stop the violence, and see what you've heard today is one side blaming the other, but let me give you an example. The mayor in Miderlands was killed the other day. He was an Inkatha supporter. Now who killed him? It's a question that has to be answered. The day after, Inkatha supporters decided to take revenge. Now they were Inkatha supporters. There's no doubt that both sides are involved in the violence and if the leadership has the power which they say they have, it has been said today they have, then, in fact, either they're not exercising that power, or there's something wrong with the leadership.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Hani, is he right?

MR. HANI: Well, I think it is really sanctimonious on the part of Mr. Ambassador to stand up and to say it is the two organizations which have the power to stop the violence. He forgets the violence of apartheid, the violence of dividing our communities, and the need to re-orient it, the police force which he has always been fair to raise his voice in, a police force which has no sympathy for aspirations, that's why in our view that police is not taking decisive measures to deal with elements and those elements are there and have been identified, elements who are creating this kind of mayhem in our country.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Hani, what is your view as to what the motives of the government would be to not stop the violence? Why would they want their country torn apart this way?

MR. HANI: Well, we know that the South African government has a history of de-stabilizing communities. We saw this in action in Angola, in Namibia, in Mozambique. We agree that they want to negotiate with us. But they would want to negotiate with an agency that at the end of the day does not become a dominant party. That's why it's busy wooing certain groups and giving favored treatment to those groups in order to isolate the ANC as much as possible. It suits the strategy to connive in the killing of ANC supporters so that they should live in fear and so that they don't join the ANC.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Ambassador, that's a serious charge.

AMB. SCHWARZ: You know, I must tell you all three of us are South Africans, all three of us I think shouldn't want our country to be a wasteland. I don't think it is fair to say that the government wants that situation. I think there's no substance in it. Why do you think Mr. DeKlerk started these reforms? Why do you think we are appealing apartheid laws? Why do you think there's a commitment to negotiation? Surely, we don't want a wasteland in our country and I want to make an appeal to both my colleagues and to all of us, let's please stop fighting, let's build South Africa. Let's not look forscapegoats. Let's rather get together and look after a country that's ours and that we really want to build up.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Mzimela, how would you respond to that?

MR. MZIMELA: I'm really surprised that my brother, Chris Hani, gives the government so much power. The government doesn't have the power to control us. We defeated apartheid. The government can't make us fight one another if we don't want to fight. The problem is with us. It is we who must sit down and sort this thing out. As long as we try and find scapegoats, we are never going to solve this problem.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Hani -- excuse me, go ahead, finish, sir. I'm sorry.

MR. MZIMELA: The fact that Mr. DeKlerk has agreed to negotiations is evidence that the black people of South Africa have struggled and have struggled successfully. How can then they, the government turn around now and have so much power as to force the ANC to be weak? It can't. The ANC's too strong for that.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Hani, in addition to that point, Pres. DeKlerk said earlier this week that if this is not resolved and not resolved soon, if violence does not stop, that soon his country, your country will be in civil war. Is he right?

MR. HANI: Well, I want to begin by saying that it does appear that Mr. Mzimela is living in another country. I have just come out of South Africa. Apartheid is still in place. It has not been defeated. All powers are in the hands of DeKlerk and his minority government. For us, we have been waging a struggle, political prisoners are still in jail except for a few who have been released. Only yesterday, hundreds of our young members of the ANC Youth League were picked up, arrested and charged. Certainly, such actions do not contribute towards the creation of the climate for negotiations. I share the sentiments of Pres. DeKlerk that everything should be done to prevent our country being plunged into a civil war. But statements are not enough. The police force and the security forces in any country have got the responsibility to bring about peace and order in that country. We know the South African security forces. They have been used in the past to suppress us. What prevents them, I want to repeat this question, from dealing with people who are killing us? And the ANC doesn't have power to stop these elements. We are not a government. We don't have a police force. We share all the sentiments about a new South Africa, but the government which is responsible for all the legacies of apartheid must be seen by all of us to be acting in a fair and impartial way.

MR. LEHRER: All right. Gentlemen, we have to leave it there. Thank you all three for being with us. FINALLY - DIVIDED FLOCK

MR. MacNeil: Finally tonight a look at the split in the Southern Baptist Convention, America's largest Protestant denomination with more than 15 million members. For 12 years, Southern Baptists have been torn by a civil war between conservatives and moderates over how literally to interpret the Bible and over who should govern the vast church bureaucracy. Conservatives are firmly in control but a group of dissatisfied moderate Baptists will meet next week in Atlanta. They'll try to determine if they still have a future in a denomination they claim is becoming increasingly rigid and intolerant. Richard Ostling, the religion writer for Time Magazine, prepared this report. [RELIGIOUS SERVICE]

MR. OSTLING: Baptism by immersion is the trademark observance of the Baptist faith. So is a shared commitment to evangelism and a rock ribbed belief in the Bible. [RELIGIOUS SERVICE]

MR. OSTLING: Each Sunday morning members of the First Baptist Church of Dallas read the scriptures. But Baptists are not always in unison when it comes to the way they interpret the Bible. Conservatives say the Bible is inerrant, free of errors and a hundred percent accurate in recording history. Moderate Baptists say the Bible is subject to interpretation. In the late '60s and early '70s, many Protestants became involved in liberal social causes, church attendance fell, doctrines were modernized. Many Baptists felt their denomination was deviating from a strict view of the Bible. A major course correction was masterminded by two prominent Baptists, preacher and educator Paige Patterson, and a Texas state judge, Paul Pressler.

PAUL PRESSLER, Texas Court of Appeals Judge: It was a course correction of concerning what scripture is, not an interpretation of scripture, but what scripture is, the nature of scripture, a course correction to get back to the belief that the Bible's completely true, and approach scripture in our institutions from that vantage point.

REV. PAIGE PATTERSON, Baptist Minister: We believe that the vast, overwhelming majority of Southern Baptists were Bible believing, Christ honoring conservative people who had the same sorts of concerns we did but just didn't know how to get them expressed.

SPOKESMAN: [1979] Adrian Rogers of Tennessee received 6,129 votes.

MR. OSTLING: In 1979, Patterson and Pressler engineered the election of a conservative as president of the denomination.

SPOKESMAN: This means that Adrian Rogers of Tennessee has been elected president of the Southern Baptist Convention.

MR. OSTLING: Twelve years later, the Convention remains in the control of conservatives who are systematically taking over the positions in the Baptist bureaucracy and squeezing out moderates. Conservatives say their populist movement is still about the Bible. Moderates say the struggle is about power. [CHURCH SERVICE]

MR. OSTLING: Nowhere is the battle greater than at the denomination's six seminaries. Southwestern Seminary in Ft. Worth, Texas, is typical. Conservatives control the Board of Trustees. Many administrators and teachers are moderates like Seminary President Russell Dilday. Dilday says the Baptist tradition of soul liberty allows room for various views of the Bible.

REV. RUSSELL DILDAY, President, Southwestern Seminary: We Baptists hold to the view of individual freedom, priesthood of the believer, the idea that we argue for our faith, we defend our faith, we preach and proclaim our faith. We try to persuade others, but we do it in the freedom of a nation like ours where there's diversity and everybody's viewpoints in the marketplace and that's healthier and we believe closer to the scripture than the other, a heavy handed hardened line view.

MR. OSTLING: On the campuses, conservatives and moderates have been waging an ideological struggle over curriculum content and hiring and promoting like-minded faculty. Students are caught in the cross-fire. A seminarian at Southwestern described how his friend was denied a church job.

BRUCE WEBB, Seminary Student: He's not real into the controversy. He's real conservative theologically. But when a senior pastor saw a name of another pastor who was on the other side of the controversy, then he was automatically red flagged, and so it put a kink into his ability to become on staff at that church.

MR. OSTLING: Another student complains that conservative doctrine forbids women to become ordained ministers.

KRISTINA KIRSCHNER, Seminary Student: I know very talented women who are not just leaving the denomination, but leaving christianity behind, because they are so frustrated and so tired of being manipulated or oppressed.

ANGELA STOCKSTILL, Seminary Student: I think many of our professors are going to have to choose because of what's happening in the controversy whether or not they're going to be able to stay here in good conscience and continue to teach.

MR. OSTLING: Conservatives have collected dossiers of unacceptable writings by professors. Judge Pressler cites numerous examples where the Bible is depicted as a mixture of literal history and legendary material.

JUDGE PRESSLER: Now either it's God's word, or it's saga and legend. It cannot be both.

REV. PAIGE PATTERSON, Baptist Minister: Southern Baptists who pay the bills and support the institutions have a right to say what will and will not be advocated by those institutions. This is no interference with academic freedom. If a man does not find himself in agreement in general, broad general agreement with the direction the Convention is going, then if he has integrity, he ought by all rights to leave and go to any number of institutions in this country where they are perfectly happy with those viewpoints.

RICHARD OSTLING, Time Magazine: With seminaries now firmly in the grip of fundamentalists, other Baptist schools controlled by state level Baptist organizations are the new targets of the conservatives. One of the hottest disputes is here in Texas at Baylor University where moderate Baptists remain in control. The university's governing board has taken the radical step of rewriting the charter in order to preempt any attempted takeover by hardline conservatives. Baylor is known as the jewel in the crown of Baptist-affiliated universities. It is the largest in the world, with 12,000 students. It is a coveted prize in this battle of the Baptists. University Pres. Herbert Reynolds said he could feel fundamentalist influence eroding Baylor's academic environment.

HERBERT REYNOLDS, President, Baylor University: There were students who were working hand in hand with the fundamentalists, ultra conservatives, who would tape things in class, take them out of context, check all of our bulletin boards in the student center and various places on campus, go into the bookstore to see if there was anything there that they thought might be of an untoward nature, continuing surveillance and monitoring.

MR. OSTLING: As a result, Reynolds engineered the creation of the new charter. In January, the university attorney assured new board members that Baylor is legally independent of the Baptists' state association.

MR. REYNOLDS: Anything that you have heard in the past, and there's been a lot of confusion about owned and operated by the Baptist Convention of Texas. That's a misconception. If anyone could claim ownership of this corporation, it would be the people of the state of Texas who'd claim ownership. [CHURCH SERVICE]

MR. OSTLING: A number of local Baptist churches are preoccupied with the split as well. This is the Broadway Baptist Church of Ft. Worth, a moderate, some might even say liberal congregation, seriously at odds with the fundamentalist movement. Broadway Baptists value the individual's right to interpret scripture. Broadway Pastor Cecil Sherman.

REV. CECIL SHERMAN, Baptist Minister: Fundamentalism essentially does not trust common people. You don't know how to interpret the Bible. We've got to tell you how to interpret the Bible. And once we tell you how, you've got to believe it, you've got to get in step and conform.

SPOKESMAN: These are serious considerations and serious times for our denomination, for our church and for us.

MR. OSTLING: The rumblings of a Baptist civil war are also economic. Broadway members gathered in the church basement to decide how their offering receipts should be allocated. Some were clearly unhappy with the way conservatives were managing the money.

JOHN NICKELL, Broadway Baptist Church: There are foreign missionaries being sent home because they do not comply with the mentality of Mr. Patterson and the people in power. And many times they're being sent home without any further, you know, fare thee well, and there are a lot of people that are going to be out the door within our Southern Baptist institutions because they had the courage to be honest.

MR. OSTLING: Another group of Broadway Baptists objects to the conservative dominated Sunday school curriculum.

PAT GOTCHER, Broadway Baptist Church: The information we get is basically pablum and it leads to, it suggests that there are very simple answers to very complex issues of living, whereas, I think we feel that life is and faith in life is a very dynamic kind of a process.

MR. OSTLING: Members wonder if they should quit the Southern Baptist Convention.

ROBERT ANDREWS, Broadway Baptist Church: I'm beginning to hear more and more references to Broadway Church, rather than Broadway Baptist Church, just as a point of comment. We are separating ourselves emotionally already from the Southern Baptist Convention. There are things out there with which I don't want to be identified.

KAREN GILBERT, Broadway Baptist Church: It's finally come to a realization for many of us who have wanted to hold on but realize we aren't holding on to anything, because the old way is not there anymore. It is a completely different way of doing things than what we are comfortable with and what we believe in. [CHURCH SERVICE]

MR. OSTLING: The protests in churches like Broadway could be the start of a split to form a new denomination, but moderates and conservatives say any break away would be small.

SPOKESMAN: With 37,000 churches for a hundred and fifty to three hundred of those churches to eventually leave the convention could hardly be called a split.

MR. OSTLING: Meanwhile, dissident groups like this one are meeting regularly, charting a tentative course to an uncertain destination. They are planning a national meeting in May in Atlanta to organize and plan future strategy. Their leader is Georgia Pastor Daniel Vestal, defeated last year as the moderate candidate for president of the Southern Baptist Convention.

REV. DANIEL VESTAL, Baptist Minister: We think it's premature to say that this is a new convention or a new denomination. I'd be naive if I didn't say that that's possible. That could happen.

MR. OSTLING: As the rift deepens, Baptists hurl insults and angry charges at each other.

HERBERT REYNOLDS, President, Baylor University: They use the issue of the Bible and they know the Bible's for Bible believing people and they lie and they distort and deceive. You know, the big lie is a whole lot better than the little lie. We've learned that throughout history.

PAUL PRESSLER, Texas Court of Appeals Judge: We have extended our hand many times and had it come back a bloody nub, because every time we try to do something gracious, then they continue in their vitriolic attacks on us. [CHURCH SERVICE]

MR. OSTLING: A venerable figure in the Southern Baptist Convention is W. A. Criswell, senior pastor of First Baptist in Dallas. An unwavering inerrantest, Criswell says he hopes that someday peace will return to his contentious brethren.

REV. W.A. CRISWELL, Baptist Minister: It is hard to be in the heat of a controversy and not be overly enthusiastic or overly defensive or overly caustic. It's just difficult, because that is humanity and I regret any kind of outburst from our people that can be defined as being unchristian. May God forgive us. RECAP

MR. LEHRER: Again, the major stories of this Thursday, the death toll in the Bangladesh cyclone continued to rise. The officially confirmed toll is 37,000, but officials said it could go as high as 100,000. And allied troops occupied a larger area of Northern Iraq as a security zone for Kurdish refugees. They met no resistance from Iraqi forces. Good night, Robin.

MR. MacNeil: Good night, Jim. That's the NewsHour for tonight. We'll be back tomorrow night with our regular Friday political commentators, Gergen & Shields. I'm Robert MacNeil. Good night.