Boycott S.A. Products
Mauritius Times – 70 Years
By Peter Ibbotson
This is the British Labour Party’s “Africa Year”. As part of its activities to encourage the African, the Labour Party has asked its members to join in a boycott of South African produced goods.
This boycott, which the British TUC has also supported (in fact the TUC preceded the Labour Party in so doing), is being undertaken as a protest against the apartheid
policies of the South African government. It is felt that a boycott of South African products will have an effect on the prosperity of, in particular, the South African farmer; and it is among the farmers and rural-dwelling whites generally that the South
African Government has considerable support.
The United Kingdom imports over £90 million worth of goods of all kinds from South Africa. One third of this is food and food products, fruit, for example, wine, and tinned fish. The fruit is mainly tinned or fresh, particularly oranges. The Labour Party and
TUC hope that members will refrain from buying products from South Africa, and will buy similar goods which have come from other countries. For example, South African sherry can be replaced by sherry from Cyprus or Australia; tinned fruit by similar fruit from Australia: table wines by French or Australian table wines; oranges by buying extra from Israel, and so on.
The opponents of the boycott produce two arguments against. They say, first, that the boycott will harm the African himself, by causing (if successful) unemployment on the farms. To this there are two answers. First, the farmer needs a number of workers to keep his farm in working order, whether or not he sells his produce. Unemployment may result, but not total unemployment. But, more important, the boycott has been asked for by the Africans themselves. The idea of the boycott originated in South Africa; the African National Congress has sought support for it all over the world wherever South African goods are imported and there is a chance of support forthcoming. The Congress has received the support in South Africa itself of a number of liberal white organisations.
The second argument is completely opportunist. If you disapprove of the South African government’s apartheid policies so much that you are prepared to undertake trade sanctions against it, they say, why don’t you also boycott goods from other countries where there are equally detestable policies being pursued by the governments?
Some people answer, “But we do boycott other countries’ goods; we don’t, for example, ourselves buy any sherry from Spain because we dislike the Fascist bestiality of Franco’s regime.”
Others say: “But we do choose our goods very carefully — we don’t buy anything that comes from Formosa, for example.” Others, however, answer this argument on the principle involved. They say: “A trade boycott aimed at South Africa is a boycott aimed at a country where such a Commonwealth country, and a friend of the UK’s, and friends are more likely to take notice of such a boycott than a non-Commonwealth country would be.”
The South African Government has said that if the boycott assumes significant proportions, then South Africa would have to consider cutting down her imports from the UK. Already, however, UK exports to South Africa show signs of falling, and were doing so before the boycott gained prominence. But if British workers did suffer because of their support for the boycott (which, remember, has been called for as a weapon against apartheid), it would not be the first time that British workers have been prepared to suffer themselves in support of a social principle. During the American Civil War, Lancashire cotton workers had no work for nearly three years because England would not buy cotton from the slave-owning Southern States and blockaded the Southern ports to prevent the export of cotton from the South.
I have no hesitation in saying that Mauritians too, like Englishmen, in the main are opposed to racial discrimination. Apartheid stinks in the nostrils of all decent Mauritians. There are no inferior or superior races; all races are, as races, equal. All members of the human family, whatever their race, are equal as persons, equal in human dignity. Policies which derogate from the human dignity of anyone should be combated by whatever means are possible and appropriate. Papal encyclicals have thundered against racial discrimination in the past, but it still goes on. Perhaps a trade boycott, on the material plane, may be more lastingly effective!
A boycott of South African goods in Mauritius would have great repercussions in the Union. And the Union Government could not retaliate with a threat to reduce South Africa’s imports from Mauritius. Look at the figures for 1958, for example. In that year, Mauritius imported goods to the value of Rs 17.75 million; but South Africa imported from Mauritius goods valued at only Rs 220,000. Mauritius thus spent Rs 17.5 million more in South Africa than the Union spent in Mauritius.
What are Mauritius imports from South Africa which add up to this sum of Rs 17.75 million? For 1958 they were:
Food Rs 6,188,878
Beverages and tobacco 575,884
Inedible raw materials (not fuels) 21,695
Fuel, lubricants, etc. 1,417,636
Oils and fats 1,502,241
Chemicals 1,334,478
Manufactured goods 4,133,524
Machinery 1,769,770
Miscellaneous 799,023
Most of the food is produced by farmers in whom lies the greatest strength of the Nationalist Government. It is the farmers who dictate the apartheid policy. If apartheid rebounds because of the boycott, the farmers will squeal, and the Government will have to change its apartheid tune.
What happens if there is a boycott in Mauritius — as I hope there will be — of South African goods? South Africa sells live and dead poultry to Mauritius; beef, pork,
bacon, sausages, tinned meat, milk (fresh, evaporated and condensed), cheese, eggs, fish, maize, oranges, grapes, jam, fruit of all kinds, wine and many other foods.
Alternative sources of supply are available in almost every case, and at no or very little more cost. Live poultry — Australia; beef — Madagascar and Kenya; pork — Kenya; dressed poultry — Australia & Holland; bacon — Denmark; tinned meat
— Kenya and Tanganyika; meat extracts China and Hong Kong; fresh milk. development of own dairy herds; evaporated and condensed milk — Australia and UK.; cheese-Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Holland; eggs — China; fish (tinned) – many countries including the USSR and Poland; maize — Tanganyika; apples — Australia; wines — Australia and Cyprus; and so on. It should be possible to restrict the import of goods from South Africa to coal; other goods can be bought in other countries. Oranges? you ask. In 1958, half a million kilos of oranges were imported; one kilo per head during the year.
The details are irrelevant, in the main, however, what matters is that Mauritius has the chance to play a part in the boycott of South African goods, and a chance therefore to play a part in the fight against apartheid and for human dignity.
Boycott South African Products!
In the Civil Service
promotions and Appointments
The following list of promotions in and appointments to the Public Service during the week ended 21st Jan, 1960, are released from the Colonial Secretary’s Office:
Promotions
Mr I. Raghoobar, Overseer/Timekeeper, promoted Inspector Grade I, Public Works and Surveys Department.
Messrs M. Geoffroy and J. Alizart, Inspectors Grade II, promoted Inspectors Grade I, Public Works and Surveys Department.
Mr M.E. Derblay, Overseer/Timekeeper, promoted Assistant Surveyor, Public Works and Surveys Department.
Mr J. de la Roche, Guard, promoted Head Guard, Fisheries Branch.
Appointments
Messrs S. Dhoopun, S. Subramanien and F.A.T. Wang Fan appointed Clerical Officers
Mrs F. Marie, appointed Typist.
Miss J. Seeneevassen, appointed Temporary Typist.
Acting Appointments
Mr J.L. Nairac, Deputy Director, to act as Director Public Works and Surveys Department.
Mr J.L. de Marasse Enouf, Senior Engineer, to act as Deputy Director, Public Works and Surveys Department.
Mr L.A.P. Vallet, Executive Engineer, to act as Senior Engineer, Public Works and Surveys Department.
7th Year – No 284
Friday 29th January, 1960
Mauritius Times ePaper Friday 4 October 2024
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