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Salient. Newspaper of the Victoria University Students' Association. Vol 42 No. 16. July 16 1979

The Economic Boycott - a Failure

The Economic Boycott - a Failure

Lapsley holds that there are two ways to destroy apartheid; one is the armed struggle, the other is the economic boycott of South Africa. People say that they are racist because they don't like Black people, but the real reason Blacks are oppressed is so they can be used as cheap labour.

Most of the economic activity in South Africa is undertaken by foreign companie. The real beneficiaries of apartheid are in Britain, United States, Western Europe, Japan, Australia and even New Zealand. Two New Zealand firms, South British Insurance and New Zealand Insurance, operate in South Africa, despite continued opposition from the New Zealand anti-apartheid movement. The Black liberation movement called for an economic boycott saying that although it would hurt them, it would underpin the whole foundation of apartheid. The west has claimed thay they couldn't support armed struggle on moral grounds, but their refusal to support the economic boycott exposes their very real support for apartheid.

Photo of three people with guns

The economic basis of apartheid is obobvious when one looks at the governments "homelands" policy. The government has removed thousands of Blacks to reservations (homelands) on barren waste lands. The homelands are for the people who are of no use to the South African economy -mothers, children, the elderly, and inform. The young, healthy (well, healthy enough to work) Blacks live in cramped single sex hostels in the towns. When they grow old, or become sick they are returned to one of the homelands to die.