Anglicans 'trouble-makers in South Africa'

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32566, 27 March 1971, Page 5

Anglicans 'trouble-makers in South Africa'

(New Zealand Press Association) AUCKLAND, March 25. All trouble-makers in South Africa were Anglicans, the president of a pro-South African society said in Auckland.

Some of them had made such nuisances of themselves that the Government had been forced to deport them, said Mr J. B. Bruce, president of the Australia-South Africa Association, which is based in Perth.

Bishop Edward Crowther, the former Bishop of Kimberly who is now touring New Zealand, was an example of Anglican troublefnakers, he said. Others included Bishop Ambrose Reeves, Canon Collins and Father Trevor Huddleston.

“Anglicans are anti-South Africa because they hate the Afrikaner,” Mr Bruce said. “They have been against the Afrikaner since 1820. They also hate the Scots, who founded the Dutch Reformed Church in South Africa and gave it its early ministers.” Mr Bruce, a Scot who is now an Australian citizen, lived in South African for 35 years. He worked as an agent for the Newspaper Press Union and became involved in politics shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War. He left the country in 1960, when South Africa became a' republic. He accused Bishop Crowther of “giving an un-

fair picture of conditions in South Africa” and eaid: “Why doesn’t he go on about the treatment Africans and whites are getting all over the continent? “Africans in South Africa, particularly those working on the gold mines, are far better off than they were before the war. They are also better off than Africans elsewhere on the continent.” “ONLY HUMANS” Bishop Crowther did not know about the way the South African economy worked, Mr Bruce said. “He only sees the problem from the human angle. “In any event, his tour should be discredited because it : is being sponsored by the Defence and Aid Fund, an organisation which is banned in South Africa.” Apartheid was the only answer for Southern Africa and it looked as though it would win in the end, Mr Bruce said.

“Rhodesia is already a protectorate of South Africa and if she faced an enemy tomorrow, the South African police would be in 30 seconds later.

“The South African police force is a military body,

trained in military tactics, which already has 1500 troops fighting terrorists in Rhodesia.” Mr Bruce said that he had recently managed to have a large sum of money, collected by the Anglican Church in Perth, confiscated by the South African Government. “The church claimed it was destined for the legal defence of political prisoners: but we know it goes to terrorists.” The Rev. E. G. Buckle, executive officer to the Bishop of Auckland, (the Rt Rev. E. A. Gowing) said that funds provided by the Anglican Church in New Zealand went to the normal missionary channels in the Pacific Islands, relief work in India, Pakistan and also to some of the dioceses in other parts of Africa. Mr Buckle said that to the best of his knowledge no money had reached the missionary workers in South Africa, let alone the resistance movements. “The Anglican Church in New Zealand has no knowledge whatsoever of such activities. I personally doubt the authenticity of the statements that have been made,” he said.