Soweto

Press, 27 September 1983, Page 16

Soweto

Sir,—Surely L. R. Wilkinson was fortunate having a friend from Johannesburg to accompany him in Soweto, and accordingly proves Bishop Tutu right about tourists needing luck. Let me tell him that to learn about life in prison I will ask someone who is there, and not the sentencing judge. So to learn about apartheid, I will ask the black people who suffer under the system and not the white politicians who make and enforce the laws. In any case, which of them could I believe, rememberong that the former Prime Minister, John Vorster, had to resign the presidency in disgrace as a proven liar? Bishop Tutu is far from alone in his condemnation of an evil system. Many black people have spoken and written in similar vein, and they do not lack white observers to support their statements.—Yours, etc., H. I. HOPKINS. September 26, 1983. Sir,-Hopefully, L. R. Wilkinson will exercise the open mindedness he expects of others when asked if during his drive around Soweto he stopped and asked of the residents of their satisfaction, or otherwise with living standards, what they thought of the pass laws and of working conditions, or did he reach his conclusions from the sanctuary of his white host’s car? L. R. Wilkinson needs to ask himself if Bishop Tutu, knowing the high stakes involved, would be so naive as to base his opposition on a tissue of lies? Tutu is the latest in the long line of Bishops from Huddlestone in 1956 through Reeves, Clayton, Scott, Chadwick, who have found apartheid incompatible with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and against whom together with other apartheid opponents the South African Government has taken every possible step to silence. — Yours, etc., ALAN MEYELL. September 26, 1983.