Letter from Africa

The South African Imbroglio

South Africa is a beautiful, rich, but tragic country, dramatically divided between two European nations (the British and the Dutch Afrikanders), and between the whites and several racial strains—principally the Bantu Negro, the “Colored” (a white, Negro, Indian, and Malay mixture) and the East Indian. The whites number only 22 per cent of the total population and that percentage—owing to a heavily restricted immigration and a colossal native birthrate—is diminishing steadily. On top of it all, the whites are not of one mind or heart. In order to understand the antagonism between Afrikanders and Britishers one has to visualize a somewhat analogous American situation: imagine the South, defeated in 1865, humiliated by carpetbaggers, treated as a colony, but given equality with the North eight years later: suppose, finally, that through the democratic process, sheer numbers, and a certain amount of gerrymandering, that South attained absolute leadership in the union. This, in turn, would provide the opportunity to disenfranchise the peoples of mixed blood and to return the South’s own party to power, election after election, thus getting even at long last with the hated North. Imagine, furthermore, the supremacy not of the Southern gentleman but of the poor Bible-Belter—and this with a colored population amounting to 78 per cent and increasing steadily.

EK

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Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn

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South Africa

The South African Imbroglio

South Africa is a beautiful, rich, but tragic country, dramatically divided between two European nations (the British and the Dutch Afrikanders), and between the whites and several racial strains—principally the Bantu Negro, the “Colored” (a white, Negro, Indian, and Malay mixture) and the East Indian. The whites number only 22 per cent of the total population and that percentage—owing to a heavily restricted immigration and a colossal native birthrate—is diminishing steadily. On top of it all, the whites are not of one mind or heart. In order to understand the antagonism between Afrikanders and Britishers one has to visualize a somewhat analogous American situation: imagine the South, defeated in 1865, humiliated by carpetbaggers, treated as a colony, but given equality with the North eight years later: suppose, finally, that through the democratic process, sheer numbers, and a certain amount of gerrymandering, that South attained absolute leadership in the union. This, in turn, would provide the opportunity to disenfranchise the peoples of mixed blood and to return the South’s own party to power, election after election, thus getting even at long last with the hated North. Imagine, furthermore, the supremacy not of the Southern gentleman but of the poor Bible-Belter—and this with a colored population amounting to 78 per cent and increasing steadily.