My Life

My Life - Oswald Mosleywhite territory by the Christian Europeans, but in black territory disappeared evenmore completely than the Red Indians in America.On every ground of history, geography and moral right the Europeans have a properplace in Africa, and on the even stronger ground of existing facts it was clear that theywill either continue to govern in regions where they have lived and ruled for centuriesor will die to the last man in defence of their homeland. Practical statesmanshiptherefore had the task of finding workable solutions to historic and existing facts, andthe division of Africa between white and black governments was our answer in 1948.That policy was rejected on principle by the British Government, but since then morethan water has flowed under the bridges and soaked into the tragic soil of Africa.Separate development or apartheid on a big scale right through Africa could then havebeen secured by a decisive initiative from Britain, and would have averted many pasttragedies and many present difficulties. The emotions of the present had not yet beenengendered. The destruction of the beautifully varied tapestry of nature's design hadnot yet been made an article of faith by those whose deep desire is to make the worldas grey as themselves; they seek to turn a complex into a religion. It was still possiblefor an Archbishop of Canterbury to say: 'If it were entire separation . . . two separatecountries, with separate cultures and customs and governments, there would be muchto be said for it' (The Times, April 22,1953). There was still time for the wind ofreason rather than of chaos to bring change to Africa. The British Governmentpreferred to import the present situation to Africa, and the American problem toBritain, in pursuit of some of the strangest aberrations which have ever bemused thethinking and distorted the morality of a generation whose sense of guilt, derived froman ancestral past, inhibits calm consideration and solution of the present.It is necessary to face facts as they are. The present form of government in SouthAfrica will not be overthrown except by armed intervention of a major power, andthis will not occur because neither America nor Russia can afford to have the other inpossession of that territory, and the South Africans have the science, the arms and thewill to inflict on an invader terrible losses in a larger war than the modern world daresto contemplate. Present tendencies will therefore continue in South Africa, with theend result that white labour with modern machinery will ultimately replace the presentblack labour in the existing main centres of South Africa, while the Bantustans nowbeing inaugurated will develop their own industries with black labour at a differentstage of development. In this phase the logical outcome is for the white area to belinked with the European community and for the black labour to be linked with theeconomic community of black Africa; like with like in economic terms can reducemany difficulties.This is an apartheid which does not perpetuate but effectively brings to an end the oldcolonialism. There is so much confusion over terms like apartheid, partly just muddleand partly deliberate misunderstanding or misrepresentation. I have stood throughoutfor a 'genuine apartheid', a real separation of the two peoples into two nations whichenjoy equal opportunity and status: 'not the bogus apartheid seeking to keep the Negrowithin white territory but segregated into black ghettoes, which are reserves ofsweated labour living in wretched conditions'.Meantime, white and black are living in the same economic community in South406 of 424