Big jail would be needed for tour opponents

Press, 2 April 1979, Page 6

Big jail would be needed for tour opponents

PA Auckland The Government would need big concentration camps to house all those New Zealanders opposed to apartheid sport, if jailing them were put into practice, said the Labour Party’s spokesman on Sports and Recreation, Mr E. E. Isbey, yesterday.

Mr Isbey was reacting to comments made to the “Johannesburg Star” by the chairman of the Auckland Rugby Union (Mr R. M. Don). Mr Don was quoted by the newspaper as saying that by 1981, opposition to the planned Springbok tour of New Zealand would “have shrunk even more.” The remaining opponents, he is reported to have added with a chuckle, would “hopefully be in jail." Mr Isbey said: “Once again, Mr Don in his haste to please his hosts in South Africa has dropped a real clanger when he said, whether jokingly or not, that by 1981 those in New Zealand who oppose a scheduled Springbok tour would all be in jail.” Large concentration camps would be needed to house all those in New Zealand opposed to apartheid sport, he said. "They would include the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Taiboys), all Labour Party members of Parliament, National Party members, especially Young Nationals, many leading churchmen, and all those who applauded and even signed the Gleneagles Agreement,” Mr Isbey said.

“Surely the Prime Minister (Mr Muldoon), who was a signatory on behalf of New Zealand of the Gleneagles Agreement and has .been very quick to castigate New Zealand anti-apartheid propogandists overseas, would now especially pour his vitriolic condemnation on Mr Don’s statement suggesting the imprisonment of New Zealanders who oppose racist sport. “I do not think that even those who have operated the secret slush fund of the South African Government for bribing people to become apologists for apartheid would go as far as to call for imprisonment of those in other countries who oppose visits of racially selected teams,” said Mr Isbey.