Other formats

    Adobe Portable Document Format file (facsimile images)   TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

Salient. Victoria University Student Newspaper. Volume 38, Number 7. 15 April 1975

South Africa: The Violent Society

page 5

South Africa: The Violent Society

'If this meeting was in South Africa the police would have entered, and I and the organisers would've been arrested under the Suppression of Communism Act, and detained indefinitely without recourse to any court of law, the university would probably be closed and all the students expelled. Then the Secret Police would go through all the student files to find the ones causing the trouble', Henry Isaacs told the 300 odd students who came to listen to him, last Tuesday. This man, banned from his own country, is black and is a political activist — active against the oppression of apartheid, for he is treated like a criminal in his country. His crime is that he encourages his people to defy whites, to regain basic human rights and to try and remove the oppression of Vorster's regime.

This lunch-time forum had a twofold purpose, to let Victoria varsity students have a brief but sharp taste of the reality of apartheid and to voice the proposal for the South African scholarship, organised by the NZUSA.

Henry Isaacs started with his definition of black. 'By black, I mean those South Africans who are discriminated against and who struggle against oppression'. Henry then told us what the South African society is like when you are black. 'South Africa is a violent society — not just physical violence but a violence that is structured into the institutionalised society'.

Apartheid

Apartheid is a violence which is seen in the forced removal of people from their homes. Since 1965, 3 million people have had their lives totally disrupted by their removal from and to reserves and working areas. This scheme of organised migrant labour destroys family life. Families are split up with the men being sent to one area and the women to another. After these people have been fully exploited they are then returned to the reserves.

Apartheid is pass laws where every black, male and female, over 16. has to carry an identity pass. These passes have your photograph, tribe and area of origin. They are signed by your employer every month and by the Labour Bureau in the area you are working. Failure to produce you pass means immediate arrest — 2,800 people are arrested each day for violations of the pass law. Many are imprisoned because they are unable to pay the resulting fines. In December 1974, the South African Race Relations Council released figures which showed that 75% of the Black South African population has spent time in prison.

Henry Isaacs - banned South African.

Henry Isaacs - banned South African.

Apartheid is informers, spies, Secret Police and their agents; it is arbitary laws such as the Suppression of Communism Act. Just as a matter of interest, communism in South Africa is the association between blacks and whites, it is the striving by blacks for any betterment of conditions. With this Act, like many of the other laws relating to apartheid, there is little or no recourse to Court of Law.

Apartheid is the failure to provide food. The mortality rate per 1,000 of population for a child in his first year is 32.42 for a white child and 132.72 for black children. [1968 South African Statistics].

Apartheid is not an abstract moral question, it is a matter of life and death, which relates from force and the regimentation of the majority of the population of South Africa.

The State apparatus has been constructed to effectively uphold apartheid. There is the General Amendment Act which means a person can be detained for 180 days without trial. There is the Terrorism Act which allows indefinite detention - and there are 357 other laws relating to State security. Including those that make tapping phones and opening mail legal.

In the last five years the resistance of the Black people has grown. The number of organisations within South Africa has been steadily growing. They are political organisations trying to work outside the frame of apartheid, fighting against it. One of the results is that 1250 people have been banned from South Africa for encouraging black people to defy whites.

Change

Henry went on to look at the possibilities for change. He discussed the simplistic view many people outside South Africa hold of possible peaceful change. This view suggests that one day Vorster might co-operate with the Black people, concede that whites have had a 'fair innings' and that the Black people should control their own lives. But Henry Isaacs and his people know that will not happen. The only change will come through Black people fighting for their freedom. This situation has been forced and any peaceful avenues towards sharing power and land have always met with state brutality.

Then came the questions. The first question was: 'When the blacks come to power, what will they do to the indifferent mass of whites?' Immediately came the reply, 'Many people ask this but not what is happening to 20 million blacks in South Africa today'. Many people seem to fear black vengeance but if they read Black political programmes, he said, they would find that the programmes are based on a non-racial egalitarian society, where you are assessed not by the colour of your skin, but the content of your character.

'Have you been imprisoned in South Africa?' was the second question. Henry was first arrested coming out of a shower at 6 o'clock in the morning at an Anglican Theological seminar. The crime was that blacks and whites were worshipping together. The next time was at 4 o'clock in the morning' where he was charged with being involved in an international conspiracy to cause unrest in South Africa. He was also arrested when President of the SRC and spent 40 days in solitude, with no access to family or legal aid.

Drawing of a white figure beating several black figures with a stick

Next the question of the 1976 Springbok tour was raised. Henry explained that by refusing to play unless the team was selected on merit has a definite effect on the white sportsman in South Africa. The cancellation of international tours drives home to the South African white his isolation and forces the sports administration to rethink their position. Also its a boost to the moral of those South Africans who are trying to get selection by merit. Many New Zealanders think that if we send multi-racial teams something is achieved but the problem is not NZ's method of selection but South Africa's method, and this will only be influenced by definite action.

Bantustans

Then a member of the audience asked about the Bantustans. These are the areas of land set aside for the Black people by the Government. The Bantustans make up 13% of the land surface of South Africa. On this land 87% of the Black population are restricted to this land. The reserves are barren, with little or no minerals, overcrowded and so their economic potential is limited. They are reserves of cheap labour for the mines and factories, and not the adequate provision for 87% of the black population that Vorster would like the world to believe. The inevitable question of communist support was asked. It was explained that aid in developing areas has been coming from Communist countries: not so much military aid but economic aid for countries struggling with and for their independence. For example the Chinese building the Tanzanian railway. The project the west said was almost impossible.

Finally, Henry Isaacs was asked if he would go back to South Africa? Yes one day, but not under the present regime. I'll be returning to one of the neighbouring states, my aim is to help South Africa.