The hearings which began on Mar. 31, will run until Jun. 19. At the third hearing Monday in this small, mining town of Witbank, some 130 kilometres east of Johannesburg, none of those who took the stage were White, a reminder of how apartheid, the policy of racial segregation, selected those destined for poverty. Worldwide, women and children wear the face of poverty, but in South Africa, there is the added dimension of race. The majority of South Africa's poor are Blacks. At least 66 percent of the Black majority in South Africa is poor, compared to two percent of the minority White population.
Racial discrimination has a long history in South Africa.
The passage of the 1911 Mines and Works Act was the first comprehensive legal colour bar, which put White and Black workers doing the same job, on different social and economic notches. In 1948, the then apartheid regime embarked on a systematic policy of unequal development and the separation of Blacks and Whites. Blacks were herded into arid and poorly developed homelands, while more than 80 percent of the land went to the Whites. Some analysts argue that this land policy, which deprived Blacks of access to land, was one of the major factors that led to the huge economic discrepancies between the two races. It is believed that one reason why apartheid lasted until 1994, is because it received support from big business and from the Whites who make up 13 percent of the population, and who until 1994, denied Blacks the vote.