Cape Town 6-7-86 Cape Town Viewed

By Bob Van Leer
(Cape Town, South Africa, June 7, 1986) “ We spent the day touring the Cape Town area and in the evening had dinner with the highest level representative of the South African government we have talked to yet.

In the morning we awoke to a magnificent view of Table Mountain, a world-renowned sight. The weather was absolutely clear and sunny, not especially normal for this time of year. We took a cable car ride to the summit of the mountain, 3500 feet above sea level. The view from there on a clear day is incredible, somewhat akin to being in a stationary helicopter. A chart of distances from cities around the world on top of the mountain settled one question for us: how far are we from home? According to the chart, we are 10,239 miles from San Francisco.                
  By bus we toured around Cape Town and visited the South African museum. Many of the exhibits were on Bushmen and other black native Africans. This is a beautiful city with a climate similar to San Diego. We are in a different world here and almost everything is strange. At home the sun is always somewhat in the south. But there it is in the north. Cold winter winds come in from Antarctica to the south.
  The pressure of current events on racial problems is not great here. Cape Town is the home of the Cape Colored, the mixed race of whites: the original Bushmen: the Malays the Dutch brought here from the East Indies; and anyone else who happened by in the last three centuries. The number of Blacks has been small until recently and jobs were reserved for Coloreds and available for Blacks only if Coloreds were not available. This has changed, leading to the establishment of shantytowns such as Crossroads which was in the U. S. news recently when much of it burned down. Tomorrow we may get a visit there. I was never able to arrange a visit to Soweto in Johannesburg but we did see some of the black township of Alexandra in Johannesburg from a distance. Even the blacks I talked to said it was not safe for us to visit there.
Diamond Cutting Demonstration
  In the afternoon we were treated to a demonstration of diamond cutting (diamonds are a big industry in South Africa) and then retired to our hotel, the Cape Sun, to rest up for the evening dinner with Louis Nel, who is Deputy Minister of Information in the South African Government and director of the Bureau of Information as well as being a member of the South African Parliament. When you read a statement of the official position of the South African government it comes from Nel.
  Labor appears to be cheap in South Africa and shows in the staffing of the dinners we attend. Usually there is one waiter (never a waitress) for every four diners, a headwaiter for every four waiters, and sometimes a separate bartender. For our little group of fourteen there may be six people waiting on us. And that’s all they do. Between service of courses they stand with their backs to the walls, available if we need anything. If a wine glass is empty you need only to point to it and a black hand fills it up.
  Nel, in his speech before questions, made some excellent points about South Africa’s problems. But, as is the case with a number of others we have listened to, he simply has no real understanding of what is happening in the U. S. now concerning South Africa. Nel said that the South African society is the most heterogeneous in the whole world. The radio stations broadcast in eleven languages and the TV stations in four. Among Blacks alone there are nine ethnic groups. He said that democracy in Africa has been a complete failure. Nel said that when African states were decolonized they started out democratic but no protections were made for different ethnic groups and so mostly all now are one-party states or military dictatorships. No country in Africa has democracy the way you know it, he stated. The only places where there is democracy are states where there is a homogenous population such as Botswana.
  He said South Africa is to the point where democracy can be extended, but if must be by "civilized norms". He said South Africa is committed to a new deal and the next step in negotiations between blacks and whites, but there are elements, including the African National Congress, that don’t want a peaceful settlement: they want revolution.
Abolish Apartheid
  Nel said the government is determined to abolish apartheid and bring Blacks into the government, but only those not committed to terrorism. (That means rule out the ANC.) Nel noted, as have others of our speakers, that five southern African states depend on South Africa and if you bring down the South African economy you bring them down also. "Those who suffer first from sanctions will be the blacks."
  He said that if a true picture of sanctions was presented the campaign for it would not proceed. He sees that in five years ahead blacks will be brought into the economy at the highest levels and will be stronger economically. He also said the presence of American companies has increased Black expertise in South Africa.
  In one of the contradictions we are getting used to seeing, Nel quoted extensively from an article in Penthouse magazine about South African Black Bishop Desmond Tutu to demonstrate his points. But on questioning, Nel said the magazine was banned from being sold in South Africa.
  Tomorrow, Sunday, we have no speakers scheduled and we go on a tour which includes the Cape of Good Hope, the southern end of the world, where the cold waters of the south Atlantic meet the warm waters of the Indian Ocean.