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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, AUGUST 2, 1985
There is a supreme irony--to put it so lightly--in the spectacle
of progressive [liberal] politicians exploiting the popular tri
umphs of Live Aid.... The progressives are now simultaneously
backing two causes:
rescuing Africans from hunger in Ethiopia
and bringing hunger to them 1:_!l South Afr�
�
For that, make no mistake, is what the sanctions against South
Africa campaign means. It is not intended to be a series of mere
pinpricks, it is intended to hurt, otherwise it would be point
less. And those who would be really hurt would not be the whites
but the poorest blacks. It is humbug to pretend otherwise.
The campaign strategy, initially through disinvestment and later
through trade sanctions, is to starve South Africa first of capi
tal and then of export markets as well as imports. There would be
massive lay-offs of labour as a result. And though the South
African social security system is better than almost anywhere
else in black Africa, hunger and real poverty would soon follow.
As the situation worsened, what would the sanctions enthusiasts
do?
Would Senator Kennedy•••declare a victory because black
South Africans were starving?
Would Neil Kinnock [Britain's
Labour Party leader J, fresh from denouncing Mrs. Thatcher for
causing unemployment and deprivation, preen himself on the rising
tide of unemployment and poverty in South Africa?
Just how many South African blacks would be rendered jobless by
such sanctions is hard to say.
But just the American firms
there, who would be required to withdraw under the sanctions pro
gramme, empioy about 150,000. Including dependents that means
that 750,000 would be affected by those firms' removal alone. We
are clearly. talking about large numbers, certainly well into
seven figures, if sanctions bite. It would be interesting too,
to see how Mr. Kinnock would explain the loss of 250,000 jobs in
Britain which it is reckoned would follow a cessation of trade
with South Africa.
Sanctions campaigners usually excuse their plan by saying that
South African blacks want sanctions. It is true that a number of
the fat cats in South Africa's black political movement do favour
sanctions--they would not suffer and, anyway, they have their .._J_
e :r: es � the big houses, limousines and the backhanders ��- �
� lj:es] they reckon they would get if they could overturn wni£e
rule.
The horrors of Ethiopia stem in part from the appalling President
Mengistu using starvation as a weapon against the rebels. The
West's liberals seem ready to echo that policy in southern Afri
ca. It would be hard to sum it up better than the American jour
nalist who asked Walter Mondale if it was his policy to starve
the blacks until the whites surrendered.
At the United Nations, meanwhile, the Security Council passed by a vote of
13-0 (U.S. and U.K. abstaining) a French-sponsored resolution calling for a
series of voluntary economic sanctions against South Africa. (The American
and British indicated they would have voted against mandatory sanctions.