South Africa's three liberal white parties merged Saturday into a new party that wants all adult South Africans to have the vote regardless of color.
At a Johannesburg congress, the 30-year-old Progressive Federal Party joined the two-year-old Independent Party and the National Democratic Movement as the Democratic Party.But major questions remained unresolved as the new party hastily took shape, with the aim of ousting the far-right Conservatives as the official parliamentary opposition in the September general elections.
The party, launched under the slogan "Getting there together," will have 20 members in the 178-member white chamber of parliament, three fewer than the Conservatives who outstripped the Progressives in May 1987 elections.
It is now headed jointly by Progressives' leader Zach de Beer, Denis Worrall of the Independents and Wynand Malan of the National Democratic Movement.