Letters To The Editor Change?

Posted: April 19, 1986

Claude Lewis' March 24 column, "South Africa shows some positive signs," demonstrates a hopeless ignorance of the struggle of South African blacks.

Mr. Lewis says, "Injustice still reigns in South Africa but there is a little less of it." He adds that "it would be a mistake to constantly harp on problems and not recognize the change in people" and "the tide of change is slowly sweeping the land."

I hardly think a "tide of change" is evident to the 22 children and elderly people gunned down by police at Winterveld, South Africa, on March 26. Would the parents of the two infants stabbed to death on that date think we are harping too much on problems of violence? Does this massacre represent ''less injustice"?

Let's not talk about a situation in terms of "less injustice." Was there less injustice in the United States when blacks were legally given the right to vote but lynch mobs and grandfather clauses kept them from voting anyway?

Wake up, Mr. Lewis. Until there is one-man, one-vote in South Africa and until all its children can walk the streets free from police violence there can be no talk of positive change.

The only thing that changes for black people in South Africa is the death toll.

Leslie Florio

Philadelphia.

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