Natal's Preoccupations
Snt,—Shongweni • is not " on the fringe of Zululand "; it is between Pietermaritzburg and Durban. " Kaffir " is no: onger used in polite speech or writing. It is resented by the'civilised Native,"who prefers
to be called an African. The " price of wives " (an inaccurate des- cription of the Native lobola system) has not gone up. To say that "social relations between British and Afrikaans . . . hardly exist" is true only of parts of the country; and Afrikaans should not be used of the Afrikaner people but only of their language. " Last thing at night . . . you bring the cat in because of the snakes." In half a century of life in Natal, I have never heard till now of this interesting custom—an odd precaution, one would think, since there are more snakes about during the day than at night.- " And you put the servants out because of apartheid." Certainly the men have their own " kia," where they are free to make a noise (for the African is a cheerful soul. given to incessant talk and loud laughter) and smoke their strong- smelling tobacco; but a solitary woman servant sleeps in the house as a rule, though it may be only on the kitchen floor.
It is a pity that so much of Mr. Kittesford's article is nonsense, because so much of it is good. It is, I think, undoubtedly true that the Nationalist extremists wish to secede from the British Commonwealth, and that the real cleavage between them and the Opposition is not so much racial policies as the threat of an Afrikaner republic. Yet the difference in racial policies is real, and must not be minimised. There is an unbridgeable gulf between the extreme advocate of apartheid, with his pipe-dream of a South Africa where the white people do all
their own work and the African is snugly banished to Bantustan, and the English•speaking liberal who works to fit black and white into a harmonious and well-integrated nation.
There is, unfortunately, less difference of opinion over the Indians, who are regarded by the majority in both camps with a detestation which these sober, hard-working and picturesque people ill deserve.
In his list of worries that keep the Natal householder awake at night, Mr. Kittesford has, I think, omitted several of the most important— the nagging anxiety over how to make ends meet, with the cost of living increasing month by month; the infringement of personal liberty by the Suppression of Communism and Group Areas Acts; the valour and the extremism of the African and Indian " defiers of unjust laws "; and the disloyalty of the malcontents who, by emigrating to happier lands, are weighting the scales against those of us to whom -South Africa is still " the beloved country."—Yours faithfully,
4 Barry Road, Wembley, Pietermaritzburg. MAPJORIE FLEMING.
Previous page
