SOUTH AFRICA'S TRAGEDY IN COLORS

"We May Make a Few Mistakes"

AFRICA was in the midst of a cruel process called Population Registration. In informal courts a group of nameless bureaucrats pressed a nationwide inquisition that would, when completed, give every one of South Africa's 12.6 million people a racial label: black, white or Colored.

Most whites seemed not to mind: they would simply be asked to carry an identity card which the police would not ask them for anyway. Not many of the blacks cared either, for the bulk of them already are numbed from years of carrying cards, passes and permits, which the police demand to see almost daily. But for many of South Africa's 1,000,000 Coloreds, half-caste descendants of the days when Boer settlers took Bantu and Bushman mistresses and wives, Population Registration spells tragedy. Thousands are being reclassified as "natives" (i.e., blacks).

Such a "change" of legal color has violent disadvantages in Premier Strydom's South Africa. A man's color decides what part of a town he lives in, what sort of job he may hold, how much he earns and where he may spend it, what buses he may travel on and what school (if any) his children may attend. In most parts of South Africa a Colored enjoys many minor but precious advantages over the blacks. He is allowed to ride on many of the same streetcars as the whites; he may be a member of a trade union and bargain with employers; he may hold many semiskilled jobs that are forbidden to the black man. In some cities, Coloreds may buy freely at liquor stores, just like the whites. Coloreds may even move from city to city without a pass; the African native may not.

New Skins for Old. Last week that was changing. An investigating committee from the Nationalist government's Census Bureau and Native Affairs Department was cross-examining hundreds of Coloreds, and wherever they discovered enough "native blood" or "native associations," freely rescinding their privileges. The cross-examining was centered on the 30,000 Coloreds who have moved from Cape Province, their traditional home, to the hustling metropolis of Johannesburg (pop. 800,000). Their migration does not fit in with the Strydom government's apartheid (segregation) plans.

All week the Coloreds stood in line outside the Johannesburg branch of the Native Affairs Department. Most were coffee-colored, though some had fair hair. They were shopkeepers and typists, clerks and building contractors. Collectively, they are known in Johannesburg as a quiet, untroublesome and dignified lot who, prizing their semi-privileged status, have kept out of politics and instinctively sided with the white man against the black.

Skull Session. One of those in the line was Thomas Wentzel, 59, a skilled woodworker whose grandfather was a German harness maker married to a Colored woman. Wentzel's skin is the light tan of a man who has spent his lifetime working in the sun. But though he lives in a Colored suburb and is married to a Colored woman, Thomas Wentzel was reclassified as a native. "What can I do?" he asked hopelessly. The answer: very little.

Another Colored was on his way to work one morning last week when a government official stopped him. The Colored, a 20-year-old electrical machine operator, produced the "Colored certificate" he got from the government several years ago. But the certificate made no difference: five hours later the young man was hauled up before the committee.

"What color are your grandparents?" an examiner wanted to know.

"Colored," he said.

"Can you produce their birth certificates?" "No," the young man said: his grandparents are long dead and their documents hundreds of miles away.

The committee made the Colored turn his head this way and that, so they might examine his skull. They ran a comb through his hair to test 1) its woolliness and 2) its kinkiness. Eight minutes later, the young man was declared a native. A few days before, the same board had classified his brother as a Colored.

"We may make a few mistakes and classify a few real Coloreds as natives," explained one of the committeemen last week, "but that's a risk we must take if we are to sort out these people." The scrutiny did not require too fine a search for "reason" for reclassification. Under the loose definitions of the Population Registration Act, almost any are good enough. Coloreds were being reclassified because they had a native half-cousin, or were friendly with natives.

Becoming a Native. Many cases cropped up in which a man was Colored, his wife Colored, their parents and grandparents Colored, his name a "white type" name, e.g., Pieters, Solomon or Pienaar, he spoke English or Afrikaans but no native language, he mixed with no natives--and yet was reclassified as a native.

Most of the 142 Colored employees of Johannesburg's Hospital Laundries live in the neat and tidy residential district of Noordgesig, in homes that are better than those in the sprawling slums of the native locations. Last week 66 of the 142 were reclassified as native. This means each must move out of Noordgesig into a native quarter. His children must leave the better Colored schools; he must get a pass to be on the street after dark; he may no longer take a trip out of town without official permission.

The 66 laundry employees are also about to lose their jobs. "Johannesburg Hospital Laundries employ only Coloreds," shrugged one of its managers. "It is obvious that these new natives can no longer work here."

Former Friends. The reclassification program panicked Johannesburg's Coloreds. It affected Coloreds passing for whites and natives passing for Coloreds. But it also affected those who are what they are, and wondered whether they would get justice. Lawyers did a land-office business. Yet merely to apply for appeal required a fee of $28, from peo-ply whose wages seldom run more than $40 a month.

One coffee-colored youth came out of the committee room one morning last week after being reclassified as native. He had a look of shocked bewilderment on his face as he walked up to a group of his Colored friends waiting on the sidewalk for their turn before the board. But the coffee-colored youth did not get a chance to speak. "Get away from us, you filthy Kaffir [black]," spat one of his former chums, as the group walked hastily away. They knew that being seen with him might be evidence enough to reclassify them as African "natives" too.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.