.ltSouth African democrat The Times, 9 October 1993 Helen Suzman is never off duty. I remember a Foreign Office lunch given in London three years ago for Nelson Mandela shortly after his release from prison. He was seated next to Douglas Hurd and looked exhausted. Mrs Suzman was directly opposite him. "Nelson," she shouted. "You are being very naughty about sanctions." He smiled nervously and replied defensively . . . difficult issue. . . much pressure from American supporters. "I know, I know," she interrupted, "but let me tell you what you know perfectly well . . ." and she was off. A diplomatic lunch became a Cape Town political barbecue. Mr Mandela relaxed. We listened as two people argued their country's future across the table. We should have tiptoed away and left them to it. It was their business, not ours. Helen Suzman's memoirs are published next week, and should not be overshadowed by those of another politician with whom she shares at least a bundle of energy. Mrs Suzman was never "in power" and her book is not a contender for the Nobel prize. But it tells the tale of one of the world's most remarkable-parliamentarians, properly so-called. It is a mountaineer's guide to democracy. I first met Mrs Suzman 15 years ago in her house in Johannesburg, where she shocked me by telling racist jokes about Afrikaners. I had spent much of the day hearing Afrikaners tell racist jokes about blacks, but soon learnt that gallows humour was a normal release in apartheid South Africa. I also came to realise how crucial to Mrs Suzman's 40-year campaign against apartheid was her wit. God preserve humour in politics. She seems to have had almost no allies. On the right were the battalions of Afrikaner Nationalism; brutal, sexist, anti-Semitic, engaged in the shambolic construction of one of the world's most inhumane regimes. She confronted the repulsive trio of Verwoerd, Vorster and Botha. "If my wife chattered like the honourable lady I would know what to do with her," said Botha. They muttered and sniggered during her speeches, "neo-communist . . . sickly humanist . . . go back to Israel . . . vicious little cat". They liked their women large and docile. They could not cope with this cheeky, terrier female. Yet she received equal opprobrium from the left. The heavy mob of neo-liberalism accused her of "going along with" apartheid by remaining an MP. To them she was a toy of the English-speaking rich, of her "silk stocking" Houghton constituency. Her electors could make fortunes from the blacks and salve their consciences by putting Mrs Suzman in parliament. She was "exhibit A for democracy" in a country whose democracy was good only for a sneer. "I can stand cold hate; I can't stand paternal liberalism," said the American Andy Young in an attack on her work. "I can be just as nasty to blacks as to whites," she cracked, and in his case proved it. Mrs Suzman could make Lady Thatcher seem like a shrinking violet. She spent a lifetime on democracy's wildest frontier. For 40 years she stood gazing over the precipice - for 13 of them alone - at the most appalling inhumanity. She neither flinched nor turned away. True, her background was comfortable, her supporters (including Harry Oppenheimer) were rich and her friends in Johannesburg's professional community fiercely loyal. She had the backing of an often courageous English-language press. But there were plenty of whites who ignored the horrors down the road. She did not. Her chosen witness may seem today an archaic one, membership of a parliament elected from one ethnic group. But she exploited that membership in the cause of a wider freedom. She was not an orator or an idealist or a political philosopher. She was a humble workaholic for justice who found, in South Africa's House of Assembly, an ironic vehicle to pursue it. She entered parliament in 1953 at the age of 25, finding herself in 1961 the sole survivor of the anti-apartheid Progressive party. She hesitated at the awesome task, but embraced it. She had to fight some of the most odious laws on any statute book, the Mixed Marriages Act, the Terrorism Act, the 90-day Detention Act, the Sabotage Act, countless Land Acts stripping blacks of their property. She saw the whole edifice pass into law, one rotten brick laid on another. She tore at the cement, occasionally smashed a hole. At least one South African rose in constitutional protest. Helen Suzman's battle was testament to one much-abused relic of British rule surviving on the tip of Africa, the Westminster system and a (mostly) free press. She exploited every right of parliamentary privilege, of procedure, of access, of publicity. She realised, with de Tocqueville, that prisons are the mirror and measure of any regime. She was first on to Robben Island and demanded and secured the removal of Mr Mandela's sadistic warder. She put down 200 parliamentary questions a year. When ministers protested that this avalanche "embarrasses us abroad", she cried, "It's your answers not my questions that embarrass us". Key to her success was her capacity to keep events round her in proportion. Even when faced with the implacable horror of Verwoerdism, she deferred to the Speaker, obeyed the rules of the House, realised that what she wished to exploit she must respect. She was able to read out Mr Mandela's defence speech to parliament and ensure dissemination. She was never banned nor even deprived of her seniority in the House. She took her enemies at face value. While she detested Vorster and Jimmy Kruger, she could like the latter's successor as police minister, Louis le Grange, and openly admire de Klerk. Her invective was lethal and would have led to fist fights had she been male. She told Vorster he should visit a black township one day, but go "heavily disguised as a human being". Warned to "be more wary in choosing your friends", she whipped back, "No, only in choosing my enemies!" When an odious MP complained about the murder rate in his constituency, she told him that if he ever actually went there "the rate will rise by one". Perhaps she was "exhibit A for South African democracy". I see nothing wrong in that. The lingering traces of open politics and free speech in South Africa throughout apartheid had far more to do with its collapse than any external pressure. Helen Suzman's campaign against the cruel and costly sanctions policy was not the least evidence of her courage. It damaged her image as a liberal priestess and probably cost her the Nobel peace prize, which went to Bishop Tutu. Mrs Suzman quotes the old African saying that you should never argue with the crocodile when still in the water. She taunted the beast from morning to night. She never took liberalism's cop-out, the road to ostracism, sanctions, disengagement, forgetfulness. As odious audiences in Europe and America screamed "racist" at her, she knew to bellow back in that deceptive soft South African lilt, "Get lost". Democracy needs such tonics from time to time. .lcHelen Suzman's party was the only one to oppose race discrimination in South Africa, and she was its sole parliamentary representative. .llThe Vote: Global suffrage Power: Campaigners .ll .lsWR07:WR07_09s WR10:WR10_02S .ls