In a report* on white migr9,tion to Southern Africa, antiapartheid groups from six European countries suggest that white missionaries may be contributing to racial discrimination in the South African Republic by their presence.
' The nine groups which compiled the report say that white emigration to South Africa bolsters the apartheid system and white migrants generally conform to this system, many becoming ardent racists themselves.
Thereport, which marks the start of a campaign to check emigration to Southern Africa, explains that some university lecturers considering emigration to South Africa believe that they are agents for positive change.
But although a handful of academics who have gone to South Africa have become involved in activities against apartheid "the vast majority of them become integrated into the white ruling community in the same way as others."
This presents a problem to Western European churches whose missionaries feel they have a special case for migrating.
"A few priests from overseas have taken a brave stand against apartheid," states the report, "but these exceptions do not justify a general exemption: the great majority of white clergy who go to South Africa do so as members of the white community and thereby become part of the white group.
Multi-national companies play a role in recruiting white migrants for South Africa, says the report. Most Western companies operating there claim that they are helping to break down the colour bar in employment by ' providing Africans with better job opportunities.
"How is it then that the same
firms which claim to be implementing this strategy are also the ones recruiting white skilled labour from abroad, -instead of concentrating on training Africans for these posts?". the report asks.
"At a press conference in the House of Commons on March 19, 1973, the British AntiApartheid Movement called upon all firms operating in South Africa to give a public assurance that they would in future not recruit any more white migrants: so far, no company has responded positively. "Many British Churches, like those in other Western countries, refuse to withdraw their investments in companies which operate in South Africa on the grounds that their share power can be utilised to press the firms into making radical changes in South Africa.
"The British Churches were requested in 1973 to secure the same undertaking from companies in which they had shares, not to recruit white migrants, but to date not a single one is known to have secured such an assurance.. .
"None of the evidence supports the 'change through investment' thesis."
Publication of the migration study represents the first occasion on which anti-apartheid study centres and movements in Europe have combined their resources to present a detailed picture from different countries.
The authors include the AntiApartheid Movement in Britain and the International Defence and Aid Fund for Southern Africa.
• White Migration to Southern Africa. Published by Centre EuropeTiers Monde (CET1M), 37 Quai Wilson, CH-120I, Geneva. (Available at from The Anti. Apartheid Movement, 89 Charlotte Street, London W1!.' 2DQ.)