THE COLOUR BAR IN SOUTH AFRICA

New Zealand Listener, Volume 18, Issue 466, 28 May 1948, Page 24

THE COLOUR BAR IN SOUTH AFRICA

ETTING on for 50 years ago, an undergraduate at Oriel College, Oxford, was asked by the college authorities to meet a student from Rhodesia on his arrival. This young man, called Blakeway, was the first Rhodes Scholar to reach Oxford, and appropriately he came from the territory named after Cecil Rhodes. Oriel was Rhodes’ college when he went to Oxford. The student receiving the newcomer was Wilfred Shelley, now Father Shelley, of the Community of the Resurrection, who has come from his work in Johannesburg to conduct a mission in a number of New Zealand parishes. Father Shelley told The Listener that ‘his reception of the first Rhodes Scholar was his one claim to fame. The scholar Blakeway became a judge in Rhodesia. The Community of the Resurrection was founded at Oxford in 1892. by Charles Gore, afterwards Bishop of Manchester and of Birmingham, one of the great figures in the Church of England in the latter part of the 19th Century and the early part of the twentieth. Its priest members live a celibate life under a common rule and with a common purse, They work in England and

South Africa. Father Shelley has been working among the natives of South Africa for the last 10 years. He is much impressed by the position of the Maori, in contrast with that of the native in South Africa-he feels that here he is in _a free land. New Zealanders can have no conception of the colour bar. Natives are not allowed in cinemas or restaurants, and have to travel separately. They are barred from some churches. They have to carry a pass and are not allowed -out after nine at night. These and other restrictions spring from fear of their superior numbers. There are roughly 2,335,000 Europeans in the South African Union, and nearly nine million non-Europeans-in-digenous natives, Indians and others, including persons of mixed blood. In such conditions it is very . difficult to educate the native. There is a keen demand for education, and a good deal has been done to provide it, largely: as a result of missionary effort. Education goes up to University standard, but free education for natives applies only to primary schools. When natives are educated, the difficulty is for them to find work in which their training can be used. The University at Johannesburg admits natives to medical degrees. (continued on next page)

(continued from previous page) There are special hospitals for natives, staffed by native nurses, Native girls who are educated mostly take up teaching and nursing. One trouble with the men is that they are barred from the eki trades by the trade unions. In Johannesburg 350,000 natives work {n the mines, and 250,000 in other industries. The miné-workers live in comfpounds or locations, under contract for @ certain period, and as the men are separated from their families, the system is open to obvious abuses, The Community of the Resurrection is re6ponsible for the Church of England’s work among these communities. It has under its control four churches and six 6chools for 100,000 natives. + "They have opened up a new goldfield in the Free State, which promises to be richer than the Rand," said Father Shelley. "Yes, I suppose when the gold is dug out of the ground there, it will be stored in a vault somewhere ‘n ‘America. Sounds a bit silly, doesn’t it?

But we’ve won an important victory there. The authorities, partly as a result of representation by missionaries, have agreed to set up townships for the native workers, so that they can live there with their wives and families, There will be no compounds." | Gold-getting led Father Shelley to comment on the economics of South Africa, The whole country is largely supported by gold, he said. Some of the other industries are subsidised. But for the dependence on gold, more might be got from the land. Moreover, labour on the land is native-labour, on low wages, and relatively unskilled. Like slavelabour, it is not economic, "So you can see what difficulties face South Africa. I have been acting as liaison officer between the races. We have made some progress. ‘There has been a good response from the younger generation of Europeans. But the native mind is stirring, and so it is in other

parts of Africa."

Staff Reporter