BISHOP PYATT SAYS: “We just don’t realise .."

Press, 5 August 1976, Page 15

BISHOP PYATT SAYS: “We just don’t realise .."

The goodwill New Zealand had enjoyed among African countries has gone as we have given the impression we are prepared to support policies of oppression being put into practice in South Africa and Rhodesia. This is the view of Bishop Allan Pyatt, Anglican bishop of Christchurch.

He also considers that too many New Zealanders fail to think of Africans as civilised people. “In breeding, sophistication, and education, the leaders of these countries are often the equal, and sometimes the superior, of most New Zealanders. We just don’t realise how hurt and how threatened they fell by the great power of South Africa.”

Bishop Pyatt looks on the All Black tour not just as a churchman, but also as a rugby enthusiast — he played representative rugby both in New Zealand and overseas during the Second World War, and was a rugby referee in Wellington. Earlier this year, a special committee of the Anglican Church made an appeal to sports bodies which now appears prophetic. They were urged, “to recognise that to play in South Africa jeopardises New Zealand’s relationship with Black African nations, undermines international efforts to bring pressure for change, and does not take seriously the plight of 17 miliiion non-whites, victims of apartheid.” Bishop Pyatt, who was chairman of that committee, says that no-one needed to be too much of a prophet to make that statement.

The bishop feels that most New Zealanders want a multi-racial society, although some will react against it when they come up against what is involved on their own doorstep. “Maybe I am not facing up to some of the realities, but I still feel New Zealanders I know are sincere in wanting to make it work,” he adds.

Bishop Pyatt considers part of the problem is a lack of appreciation by New Zealand of the international significance of the All Blacks’ South African tour. Generally, he says, New Zealanders are not strong on foreign affairs unless they concern Britain or Australia. “But the late Mr Norman Kirk’s first report to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, termed a moral look at foreign affairs, although it was ridiculed at the time, to me is still one of the greatest documents to come out of Parliament.”

The bishop describes as one of the saddest sights he has ever seen, the All Blacks leaving with police surrounding their bus. But now the team was there, he followed its fortunes just as keenly as anyone else.

However, he is totally opposed to a multi-racial Springbok team touring New Zealand. As he sees it, selection of such a team by a white South African Rugby Board would be an extension of apartheid. Acceptable would be a team selected as a result of trials and on ability, and not picked on grounds of race. But in saying this, one had to realise that not

many blacks or coloureds were qualified to take part in trials. He does not see any rugby exchange, or any sporting contacts for that matter, as being acceptable as long as apartheid continues in South Africa. Apartheid had to be regarded as evil, and many New Zealanders did not realise the full horror of the system. People who visited South Africa often had contact with whites who led a glorious existence if they did not dwell on the possibilities of the future,

and whose work was mostly done by black labour. But blacks were being deliberately looked upon as lesser people because they were of a different coloiur. New Zealand did not' bring sport into politics — this was done by South Africa through its apartheid policy. *And we have no hesitation in regarding the poilicy as a ’foreign court’ dcictrine,” he adds, recallinig that the Prime Ministar of South Africa (Mr Viorster) had spent some

time in Nazi Germany. The way Bishop Pyatt sees it, no aspect of life can be separated from politics, and sport is no exception. Politics govern the way our life is ordered.

The Government was quite right not to interfere with the rights of the Ail Blacks to travel to South Africa, Bishop Pyatt affirms. But he does consider the Ministry of Foreign Affairs should have shown more willingness to inform the New Zealand Rugby Union of the implications and inevitable outcome of the South African tour.

“I would also hope that the political implications would have been pointed out to the rugby union, especially by a National Government, and that even the rugby union would have listened.” Commenting on recent condemnations of HAR T, and C.A.R.E., the bishop says that the most damning statements had come from the Minister of Recreation and Sport (Mr Highet), who had said that in the opinion of everyone on the Government’s side of the House, both organisations were traitors to the country. The bishop is not a member of either organisation, although he supports “the general side the country into the tenor of what they are at.”

One could understand Government frustration over organisations distributing information outhands of people whom the Government did not want to get it But there was no definition of “traitor” in the Defence Act whereby either H.A.R.T. or C.A.R.E.

could be termed traitorous.

“In my experience. H.A.R.T. consists of a perfectly normal lot of New Zealanders, mostly young people, hut including older people, all committed over this issue and all making their own contribution, he says.

The attitude whereby members had been smeared as traitorous, and even described as a front for overseas groups, seemed to him dishonest. Before the All Blacks left New Zealand for South Africa a protest march was held in Christchurch, and protesters gathered in the Anglican Cathedral.

Bishop Pyatt was asked why the cathedral was used on this occasion. He replied by pointing out the wide number of uses to which it is put — civic services, a service marking the American bicentenary, and visits by the Queen and the GovernorGeneral.

Surely, a purpose concerned with people praying for peace and against apartheid provided a balance. If this was not done, the cathedra! could be seen as a tool of the Establishment.

Bishop Pyatt says that today it is unrealistic to look upon a bishop a* speaking for the whole church. There are some people in the church holding different views. But most committed Christians are against apartheid and the tour, and there is a concensus against it in the churches.

“From my reading of the Gospels, apartheid is evil and we must show our abhorrence of it by all peaceful means.