"First no whites allowed to enter the accountancy Olympiad, next no whites allowed in public toilets," cried my friend Pete.
"What are you on about?" I asked.
"It's the thin edge of the wedge," claimed Pete. He was talking about the ruling that barred white pupils at 40 Free State schools from taking part in an accountancy Olympiad. The father of the only white child at Welkom High School has objected bitterly.
"Man, it's just to encourage blacks to become accountants," I explained. "Why should whites be the only little grey men who drink a boring brand of beer?"
But Pete was adamant that the "no whites" restriction would swiftly spread to other walks of life. "Do you remember the days when public toilets had notices that said 'whites only', and blacks had separate facilities?" he asked.
Continues Below ↓
I said I certainly did, though the public convenience in Queen Victoria Street, Cape Town, had separate entrances which led to the same urinal. At least you could relieve yourself there side by side with black friends, even if you left separately.
"You watch, they will start putting 'blacks only' on toilet entrances, and we'll have to use separate facilities," predicted Pete.
"I don't believe that for a moment," I said.
"And there will be white quotas at universities, like they used to have black quotas," said Pete.
"All right, I believe that," I said.
"And a lot of jobs will be reserved for blacks only."
"Well, quite a few already are," I agreed.
"We whites will also be called temporary sojourners, given permits to be migrant workers if we can find any jobs open to us, and encouraged to return to the countries of our forebears, even if they arrived here 300 years ago."
"Now you are going too far, Pete. Those countries would never have us all back."
"I wouldn't really mind having separate facilities," confessed Pete. "So long as they were equal.
Continues...
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