Where the truth hurts
Opening Pandora’s Apartheid Box – Part 12– The Architects of Apartheid
By Mike Smith11th of May 2010
Today when one asks, “Who was the Architect of Apartheid” one would almost unanimously get the answer of “Dr. H.F. Verwoerd”. It is today taught in schools and all over the internet as “fact”...
The saying goes that when you want to beat a dog, it is easy to find a stick. Today the Afrikaners, the decedents of the Boers, are bearing the brunt of this accusation as “”The Creators, and or the Monsters of Apartheid”.
Now some Afrikaners would proudly accept that title as the inventors of a system of segregation called Apartheid and as I have said, they might even try to patent this model, but do they actually have a claim to it?
When one does the proper research one will find that the segregation policies that eventually became known as “Apartheid” was actually not started by the Boers/Afrikaners but by the British High Commissioner Lord Alfred Milner between the end of the Second Anglo Boer War and unification of South Africa in 1910.
Milner started a group called his “Kindergarten” made up of civil servants close to him. Why, you ask?
In those days and especially in 1905 the subject of “The Native” question and the “Asian menace” first came up when the Cambridge Anthropologist, Alfred Haddon, addressed a meeting between the “British Association for the Advancement of Science” and The South African Associations. (Source, A Commonwealth of Knowledge, Science, Sensibility, and White South Africa 1820-2000, Saul Dubow)
Sir Godfrey Langdon, author of “The South African Native Affairs Commission report”, urged Howard Pim to outline an overall scheme of racial segregation.
The official report from those days is called, “Report of the 75th Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science 1905 (London, 1906”).
Lord Milner was an arch racist who had some serious dualistic problems. He described himself as a “Race Patriot” in a letter to Haldane, 21Jan. 1901, “Very Confidential”, in Headlam(ed.), Milner Papers, ii.206.
Milner had no time for the Boers and many times tried to slight them on their characteristics – for example he said that the Boers can continue to fight a guerrilla war for a while, “just as low types of animal organisms will long survive injuries which would kill organisms of a higher type outright...” (M van Wyk Smit, Telling the Boer War”)
Milner could not synchronise his hatred for the Boers, their “Backwardness” as he described it, with the countless defeats of the British and the superiority of the Boers on the battlefield.
In those days the post Anglo Boer war British Government of South Africa were hoping to erase differences between Boers/Afrikaners and the English speaking South Africans. They thought it would be only a matter of time before these two groups would fully merge.
The “Selbourne Memorandum” of 1907 opens and speaks of these two principal races of South Africa - British and Dutch – to overcome their historical differences. The memorandum declared that both groups were “Teutonic in origin” and that the fusion between them would only be a matter of time as it was with the Saxons and the Normans who were distantly related.
The Selbourne memorandum said that there were more differences between the people of Ireland or Canada than there were between the Boers and the British of South Africa.
Basically, the idea before the Unification of South Africa in 1910 was to unite the two white tribes and separate them from the blacks.
Two of Milner’s “Kindergarten” group, Lionel Curtis and Patrick Duncan confided in each other,
“The fact is that we have all been moving steadily from the Cape idea of mixing up white, brown and black and developing the different grades of colour strictly on the lines of European civilisation, to the very opposite conception of encouraging as far as possible the black man to separate from the white and to develop a civilisation, as he is beginning to do in Basutoland, on his own lines.” (Patrick Duncan Papers BC294C23.3.8, University of Cape Town, Manuscripts and Archives, Curtis to Duncan, 26 Nov 1907).
The term applied to this British strategy was called “Segregation”. The Afrikaans word for it would be “Apartheid”
As can be seen so far, the idea of Apartheid came from various sources. The Whites of South Africa, whether it be Boer or Brit had an intimate knowledge of the Blacks of South Africa. It was basically a common consensus that Whites and Blacks have to be separated.
We ALL ...black and white...wanted Apartheid. This can be seen from the aspirations of the Sothos and the Swazis who wanted their own kingdoms where they could preserve their own culture, language, religion and where they could rule themselves. The Tswanas who got Botswana is another example. Therefore we are all guilty of the so called “Crime of Apartheid”.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with any nation who wishes to secure and preserve their way of life. There is nothing wrong with any nation wishing to live in peaceful harmony with their neighbours.
Segregation, Apartheid or Separate and Equal Development was a unique concept, wished by all South Africans, both Black and White. Nobody has to feel guilty about it today. It was OUR country and we had to find a solution where we could all be happy with and live with each other.
Today the critics of Apartheid are numerous, yet nobody have produced a better model for the unique South African situation. The current “Rainbow Nation” model has proved to be an abject failure.
The need for people to rule themselves and have a national identity is the most natural system on earth. It is called Nationalism. We have seen this need amongst the Basks and the Catalonians of Spain, the Croatians, Serbs, Montenegros, etc of Yugoslavia, The Irish and the Scots of the UK, The Kurds of Syria and Turkey, The Ibos of Nigeria, The Hutus and Tsutsis of Rwanda, the Muslims in Chad, The Tamils in Sri Lanka, The Greeks and Turks in Cyprus, The Walonians and the Flemish in Belgium....
This need to be separate is a worldwide phenomenon. Maybe Apartheid was not perfect, but show me a political system that is.
In South Africa we came upon a system that kept the peace and where we lived happily alongside with each other until the Communist agitators entered and disturbed our peace, where they played us off against each other after we have already fought all our battles and made peace with each other. We found our own solution. We found our own peace that was called “Apartheid”, but the communist wanted the riches of our country and made us enemies again.
South Africa will forever be a unique situation and only us...The Blacks and Whites of South Africa will be able to find a solution we can all live with in the end.
The solution for our problems will come from us who have shared this beautiful country for hundreds of years, not from outsiders who just want our gold and minerals.
Let me finish with a quote....
“You do not want any reforms; You want my country”
(President Paul Kruger to Lord Alfred Milner - 31st May1899, shortly before the outbreak of the second Anglo Boer war)
9 comments:
- Andrea Muhrrteyn said...
- wow... thanks I have been educated! thanks.
- May 14, 2010 4:27 PM
- DestuctionByOmission said...
- All I can say is Wow, blown away yet again!
- May 14, 2010 7:07 PM
- tonymcgregor said...
- "In South Africa we came upon a system that kept the peace and where we lived happily alongside with each other until the Communist agitators entered and disturbed our peace, where they played us off against each other after we have already fought all our battles and made peace with each other." - which history have you been reading? Apartheid was itself a breach of peace, a brutal subjection of people without their consent. Apart from a few leaders deliberately set up by the apartheid regime I know of no black political leader who accepted the subordinate position which whites wanted them to live under. Please read Jabavu, Soga, Plaatjie, Dube, and many7, many others, and then tell me that only "outsiders" were against "apartheid."
- Tony all the black leaders of the independent homelands such as Transkei, Bophuthatswana, venda and Ciskei accepted their independence and had good relations with SA. Many got very rich through casinos etc. Again I challenge you, as in a previous post to show me one country in Africa where it went better with Blacks than in Apartheid SA. Maybe you can think of Ethiopia under Mengistu with his Red Terror where he killed hundreds of thousands or the Congo where 3 million has died or Uganda under Idi Amin, or Mozambique under Machell...Explain to us why these blacks from Mozambique fled into "Racist" Apartheid SA, risking their lives against a double electrified fence on the Kruger Park border and facing wild animals such as lions and heyenas when Apartheid was so bad. I think you should stop reading all that poison propaganda and start thinking for yourself.
- June 1, 2010 1:21 AM
- Sonia said...
- So, what has tonymcgregor have to say in response to Mike's reply? Jabavu, Soga, Plaatjie, Dube etc. can all be expected to show a "victim" mentality because they have all chosen to believe the myriad of deceptions of the ANC and their allies, everything other than what Mike Smith has dug up. So much for what they have to say. Thank you Mike Smith for truth that WILL PREVAIL!
- June 18, 2010 12:31 AM
- Anonymous said...
- Next we shall separate the blue eyed whites, from the brown eyed whites, and then the people under 5ft 6 inches from those taller and then big noses from...etc. Stupidity. Their is only ONE planet for us all- so you'll just have to learn to get along. A.R.Lockhart
- August 11, 2010 3:49 AM
- Anonymous said...
- Yes AR. Lockhart and with that in mind surely we should be able to choose your friends, or should we all be political correct and mix against our will. Political correctness is nothing more than anti-white racism
- August 25, 2010 1:35 AM
- tonymcgregor said...
- Well what I have to say to Mike Smith is to ask again which history he (and Sonia) has been reading? If apartheid was so great, how come it had to be propped up by brutal laws and a brutal system of repression of any opposing voices? People were killed for opposing apartheid. Those "homeland" leaders were corrupt and accepted so-called "independence" because they knew they could get rich by doing so. I agree that apartheid was not the invention of the nationalist party - the racists of the British Empire had been as much complicit in it, as were the governments of the Boer republics. Apartheid was certainly not "wished" by most blacks. And apartheid was not at all a way to "live in peaceful harmony with their neighbours." There was also no justice in it at all. The Land Act of 1913, followed by other Acts like the Group Areas Act robbed blacks of their land. That is not living peacefully, that is simply a criminal act of theft. As for the victim mentality that Sonia mentions, none of the writers I cited could even remotely be accused of having such. As for ANC propaganda being responsible I think the boot is actually on the other foot - the most powerful propaganda machine was that of the apartheid regime - and that's why so many will still try to minimise the effects of apartheid. Apartheid killed, apartheid caused untold suffering, apartheid was evil, however it is looked at. It had nothing whatsoever to do with fairness, with respect. It was plain and simple racism of the worst sort. It rivalled Nazism in its evil, and in fact many of the supporters of apartheid were also Nazi supporters. Birds of a feather? Just an aside to Sonia - Jabavu was actually not an ANC supporter and was most certainly not suffering from a "victim" mentality. I would challenge you to think of what it must have been like to live as a black person under apartheid - to have to carry a pass with you at all times, to be subject to a curfew, to be forced to live in a place not of your choosing, to be unable to get a job for which you might have the skills and intelligence because it was white man's work, and so on and on. And then talk about a "victim" mentality. And by the way, I do think for myself, which is why during the apartheid years I opposed it, as I still do, and why I no longer support the ANC as it is now going the way of most nationalist parties and starting to become an authoritarian government which does not easily accept opposition. Just like the Nats. But let's not fall into the trap of trying to whitewash apartheid because of the failings of other parties.
- November 9, 2010 11:29 PM
- Mike Smith said...
- Tell me something Tommy McGreggor…? Are you aware of Godwins-Law? Look it up…It means that if you pull the Nazi invective that you lose the argument. You say Apartheid was “plain and simple racism“ So please enlighten us to what your definition of „Racism „ is. You liken Apartheid and Nationalism to National Socialism…it is clear you have no idea what the difference between Nationalism and National Socialism is. Nevertheless, you forget to mention that about 80,000 White South Africans died in the Second World War fighting Nazism, which blows your unsubstantiated drivel to pieces. I tell you what…Institute exactly the same laws against whites and give us a homeland. You can even request us to carry a pass when we come and into your country and we will gladly wear it. Please separate us as far away from blacks as possible. That is all we actually want. We never wanted to oppress blacks; we never wanted to rule blacks. We wanted blacks to rule themselves. We simply wanted nothing to do with blacks. It is fine if blacks today want to do the same to us. Please…I beg you to do the same. But no, you want to sponge on our tax money. You want to suppress us and oppress us. Blacks are the biggest racists. “You bleat, “Apartheid killed, apartheid caused untold suffering, apartheid was evil, however it is looked at. It had nothing whatsoever to do with fairness, with respect. It was plain and simple racism of the worst sort. “ How many did Apartheid kill? More than the 3000 white farmers to date? More than the 18,000 people per year? Here is a fact for you Sparky. More Blacks today are dying under the ANC than ever under Apartheid. About 500,000 die of AIDS alone every year purely due to the HIV AIDS policies of the ANC who believes garlic and beetroot will cure it or like Zuma believe a shower…hehehe But hey…if you want to believe Apartheid was the most evil system then don’t let me stop you. Just spare a few moments for the 20+ million people who died under Stalin’s Communism or the 70+million who died under Mao Ze Dong and hiss „Great leap Forward“. Not sure what history YOU are reading and whether it is history at all. Sounds more like you have been indoctrinated through ANC and Communist propaganda.
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