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The Rhodesia Herald, July 14, 1949
THE opinion that the European in Africa could only survive if the racial division between white and black on economic ground was vertical instead of horizontal, expressed by Dr AM Keppel-Jones yesterday in an address to the Rhodesian National Affairs Association.
Dr Keppel-Jones said that the position of the white races in Africa was really that of an aristocracy, and that no aristocracy could survive unless it was in fact an aristocracy, or a leading class.
The European in the Union, he said, was against the employment of skilled natives, even if these natives were to be paid equally high wages.
This attitude was understandable because of the fear that in times of depression the fact that the native was able to exist on a lower standard would cause a breakdown in the artificial barrier of equal pay, for equal work.
LESSONS FOR TODAY
Despite the different schools of thought on the merits and demerits of white supremacy, it is quite clear that the colonisers, before setting foot on the African continent, had already worn the aristocratic badge, and made sure that blacks would be subservient to him/her.
The supremacist ideology was from the explorers the likes of David Livingstone, Henry Morton Stanley, etc.
If white settlers had come to Africa with a mind-set of universal human rights and equality, they would have co-existed with indigenous people as brothers and sisters. They would have equitably shared Africa’s rich natural resources. But just because the settlers thought that they were aristocrats, who deserved a larger percentage of Africa’s resources, they took advantage of Africans.
This led to genocide on the continent as Africans fought for their independence and self-determination.
Just as the black person could not branch out into skilled labour, the white man thought that he could not undertake unskilled labour because he would not be prepared to accept the low wages paid.
Segregation meant that black people were excluded from political power, possession of land, which was the major reason why the liberation struggle was waged.
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