Jackson advocate. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1939-current, 1960-04-09

would like TO discuss African prob
lens as representatives Of their
people with the Government Of
ficials, and they have indicated a
willingness to compromise. But
the white South Africans, partic-
ularly the Africaner Nationalists
personified by Prime Minister YER
woerd, cannot bring themselves to
deal on equal terms with Africans.
Most white South Africans re-
gard Africans either as children
or as savages. And this scarcely
provides a basis for intelligent dis
cussion of what certainly are mu-
tual problems.
Thus the Africans have been
forced to emphasize their feel
ings by mass action, such as the
deliberate failure to carry passes
and counting of arrest for this
offense, as well as participating
in work stoppages. It is likely
that many of them realize the
risk of violent reaction involved
but are willing to take it because
under the circumstances Africans
in South Africa have very little
to lose but their lives.
Determination Shown
BY declaring an emergency, the
Government appears to have
chosen the hard road in its de-
termination to prove that in South
Africa there must be no doubt that
the white man is and ever shall be
the complete and absolute master
of the black man. Under the
emergency the Government has
gained stronger powers than ever
to suppress in almost every imag-
Unable way any move that the AZ
ricans and their supporters might
make to challenge the Government.
The power to arrest and detain
persons for the duration of the
emergency is a bad enough blow
to African political aspirations
and to the organizations promot-
ing them that suddenly find them
selves without their top leaders.
But next week a law is scheduled
to be enacted banning. the Afri-
can National Congress, which was
established in 1912, and the PAN
Africanist Congress, which was
formed last year.
The plan appears to be to put
a complete end to African polit-
ical activity in South Africa on
national scale. Hereafter, it is
intended that African political ex-
preston be confined to the areas
that are being set aside for sepa-
rate development of the Africans
under the apartheid system. There
Africans are to be given certain
privileges of local self govern
ment.
Money For Housing
This at least is the theoretical
basis upon which South Africa's
Government has conducted Afri-
can relations in recent years.
On a practical levi the Gov
eminent has spent large sums to
improve African housing in many
urban areas and to provide better
medical and health services for
Africans. But African education
has become a mockery, according
to contemporary world standards,
and social and political opportuni-
ties on a national scale do not
exist.
1t is this situation that South
Africa's Government is determined
to continue and that the country's
Africans are determined to change.
Of course, not all South Africa's
approximately 100000 Africans
are involved in political activity.
As a result of conditions that pre-
vail in the country many of them
still are relatively primitive and
are not politically conscious in the
contemporary sense.
However, even the most conser-
vative estimates place the men,
bership of the African National
Congress and Pan-Africanist Con-
gress at 10000, and the true fig