Craccum Throwback | Frene Ginwala at the Town Hall

Originally published 6th April 1972, in Craccum #46 No. 6

Both floors of the Concert Chamber were packed. The Friends of South Africa had arrived in force—both of them. One of them known as George—the bible packing cliche mongerer of Albert Park. He tried to stand up and was roared down. It really set a lively atmosphere.

There was silence as a Maori haka team began singing and dancing. A young girl whose voice was as clear as a forest stream led the singing. It was a tremendous start. Two of our three 'peoples ambassadors' to the UN—Tom Newnham and Pat Hohepa, were accompanied by Frene Ginwala from the African National Congress. Tom and Pat brought good news back from the UN. It seems we got ourselves into this mess partly because its election year and partly because of Nixon's trip to China. Nixon had to justify his trip to all his right wing mates back home so he coined the phrase 'building bridges to China'. Now major Marshall was sitting at home thinking he would like to cash in on some of Nixon's popularity, and he wanted to go bridge building too. We're copying American politics in every field he thought so we may as well copy American cliches as well. Unfortunately the parallel was not quite the same. A closer analogy would have been if Nixon had visited Taiwan and said he was building bridges to China because we are not building bridges to the majority of the people as Nixon did in China—we are building bridges to the minority of the people—white South Africa.

Old Mayor Robbie turned up and everyone was pleased to see him. The Rugby Union have tried to slur his stand by bringing up the fact that he's President of Auckland Rugby League and that he wasn't invited to meet the All Blacks anyway. Robbie's stand is a triumph to the city of Auckland. Good on you Robbie.

Everyone was glad that the Friends of Apartheid turned up—they're usually such invisible people its the first time anyone has seen them in public. They were actually given time on stage to present their case which was remarkably similar to Major Marshall's, and were soundly rubbished by the audience—Good.

A welcome break was the awe inspiring, brilliant, incredible, stupendous, amazing, well performed guerilla theatre troupe (I'm in it) who took the stage by storm and showed how we were building bridges over the bodies of blacks to a racist fascist minority for economic reasons. Everyone loved it and the whole hall joined in the final chorus.

Frene Ginwala is an amazing woman. She's the sort of person that could so easily be your mother—calm, helpful and loving. She talked about what went across the bridges that Major Marshall was so busy building. People like Phillip—the public relations man who sells apartheid in the NZ schools and gives lectures at character building courses of the NZ Army. (Ed, that's so they won't mind killing demonstrators during the Tour Civil War). But do the NZ consulates in South Africa go around South Africa preaching the message of racial harmony?—No. We know that people who oppose apartheid like Trevor Richards are barred from crossing that bridge. We know that the President of The South African National Congress of Students is barred from crossing the bridge. (Major Marshall's bridge is so white that you can't even get across it if you're the slightest bit pink.) Then she explained just where the bridges were heading. A lot of people were dying of suicide or falling down steps after they had been taken in for questioning by the Secret Police. There was tremendous National and International pressure—so much so that a question was asked in Parliament. The Minister of Police read out the list of names and tried to justify each case. At the bottom of the list was a man that perhaps more than any other represented the oppressed of South Africa—

NAME?-UNKNOWN
DATE OF BIRTH? -UNKNOWN
CAUSE OF DEATH ?-UNKNOWN

(Archivist's Note: No author's name was associated with this article.
Frene Ginwala's visit to New Zealand in March 1972—which became a tour—was instrumental in garnering ANC support amongst kiwis. Frene Ginwala was an important figure in establishing democracy in South Africa, and served as the first Speaker of the National Assembly of South Africa from 1994-2004.)