Problems of a Multiracial Society

A Glimpse into 1961

Mauritius Times – 61 Years

By H.E.W.

Multiracial societies and their problems are among the most important ones facing the statesmen of the world today. Everywhere this problem is setting itself in an acute form and is the cause of great conflicts and upheavals which are disturbing the social, economic, and political situation. People have been conducting experiments to find applicable and practical solutions, but the chances of an early solution are very remote. Mauritius is not lagging behind in this respect and is faced with similar problems which need the serious attention of all the citizens of the island, irrespective of creed, colour, and other considerations. Plural societies are due to migration mainly through British economic encroachment and French colonialism. The problem is not one of compression but of balance.

Before dealing with local problems, it would be worthwhile to survey the situation in other parts of the world, the developments which are taking place, and the impact which the various forms of remedial measures are having on the people of other countries. You may be aware of the fact that in parts of the United Kingdom there are great numbers of coloured settlers. When they arrived during the war, several problems were created. They were people who, apart from the different colours of their skins, had different languages, different cultures, and different outlooks on life generally. They had to be assimilated socially in some way or another.

Many were keen to make the best of the circumstances prevailing in the United Kingdom. On the other hand, the workers of the United Kingdom — at least part of them — found in the immigrants undesirable competitors in the labour market. This problem was not so serious during the war when work was in abundant supply, but it assumed big proportions when the time for the return to civil life came after the end of the war. You will be interested to learn that Mr Anthony Richmond, Lecturer in Social Theory at the University of Edinburgh, investigated this problem in Liverpool and Merseyside thoroughly and published his findings in his most interesting book Colour Prejudice in Britain, which every student of society and every social reformer should make it a point to read. Mr Richmond deals at length with the social and economic problems arising out of the arrival in Britain of coloured immigrants and the reaction of the people of Britain.

His investigation revealed that the problem of assimilation in an alien society should not be treated in a wholesale manner. Some of the immigrants were educated, enlightened persons who could not by any means be dealt with in the same manner as the uneducated, untrained, and unskilled immigrants. Apart from the differences in colour — I am dealing with the colour aspect with some emphasis — there were cultural and religious differences which had to be attended to. The coloured were not received in certain dance halls, they were not served in some restaurants, and they had to put up with nasty remarks in the streets, the public places, the factories, and even in their private lives. The people of Britain resented the company of these men with white girls, and in those circumstances, there were bound to be conflicts, and conflicts there were.

Attention was given to this problem from all quarters: the Government, the political parties — and I would not suggest that the politicians dealt with this problem with a view to catching votes. They did so in earnest to find a workable solution to a thorny problem, and it can be stated without exaggeration that the size of the problem dwindled, and it is not now an alarming one. Experience in the UK has shown that such problems should be tackled from various fronts. The improvement in the situation was arrived at only after the persistent application of such a strategy. The immigrants were handled most tactfully and sympathetically. The bad ones were separated from the good ones in a very subtle manner, and special attention was given to each category.

Special organisations were set up. Amenities were created for them, and contacts between them and the white community around them were encouraged. On the other hand, the whites were encouraged to treat them as human beings, with a common and noble purpose on earth. There is always something good in every human being, and it requires proper canalisation which can only be done through tact, sympathy, and understanding; the results in the UK were gratifying. There are still some problems; there were last year’s racial riots in some parts of London, but this was not a mass movement against the coloured. Some fanatics on either side, the whites and the coloured — I was on the point of saying colourless and coloured — were responsible for those unfortunate incidents, and, as you are all aware, there have been no repetitions.

If I quote another case where the problem has been tackled in a different manner, it will show to you that the method of approach in dealing with such problems is most important. I will refer to South Africa. There, the principle of “we are we, they are they, and the two cannot meet” is applied with the utmost ferocity and fanaticism, and I need not tell you how explosive the situation is there. Something terrific is bound to happen there one day when it may be too late. Who can forget the racial riots in the suburbs of Durban in 1949? Those riots had many lessons, but the rulers turned a deaf ear. These were followed by other conflagrations, the latest ones being Sharpeville and Cato Manor.

Throughout almost the whole of Africa, a violent battle is being fought now. It is a battle of cultures, with colour playing a big part. Differences in cultures and the colour of the skin give rise to all sorts of prejudices and privileges. The white man has ruled Africa for centuries. They have done good work — this is undeniable — but it must be admitted that in the same fields their actions have been reprehensible, and today they are afraid of the reactions of the coloured. “What will happen to me if the Negroes come to power?” is a question which is uppermost in their minds. Prejudices engender fear, and fear in its turn leads to violent reactions. Prejudices often boomerang, and when this happens, small groups gain something, but the world becomes poorer.

In Africa, the supremacy of the white man has been the guiding principle of the white ruler. “We have been entrusted with the white man’s burden of civilising and educating the unsophisticated multitudes of Asia and Africa,” many would say. This had some virtue in it two centuries ago, but today such an attitude should be eradicated if harmony is to reign over the world as a whole. If only what the Belgians brought to the Congo was used to enrich the culture of the indigenous inhabitants, so that these would have been trained in modern methods of administration while retaining their national or tribal characteristics, the situation would have been different, I am sure.

We all know that in the territories forming part of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, 300,000 Europeans have more power than about 7 million Africans. The white man is afraid of the probable consequences of power passing into the hands of the majority, and his fear can be said to be genuine to some extent. Among the Africans, as among any other community or tribe, there are moderates and extremists, and power passing into the hands of the latter would no doubt have deplorable consequences. Who is to blame for this state of affairs? I think the white man to a large extent. He has power. He has used that power to his advantage in the first instance. While he has been educating the Africans, if he had been shedding his prejudices, putting aside all senses of a superiority complex, and taking the African into his confidence, there would have been sufficient goodwill between the African and himself to prevent any violent reaction on the part of the Africans leading to fear taking possession of the white man.

We all know that the Monckton Commission, which was recently sent to these territories by the United Kingdom Government, has referred in its report to the pathological hatred of Africans for the Federation. The Commission has recommended that under certain conditions, the territories forming part of the Federation should have the right to secede. The right to secede is now on the conference table. This is not a new thing created by the Commission. Africans were already clamouring and agitating for it before the appointment of the Commission. It was created by the failure of the Federation to overcome African distrust. Africans and Europeans must live side by side for the good of the country. Even at this stage, some fanatics of federation want to scotch the secession proposals of the Commission, and by so doing, they are convincing those who hate federation on irrational grounds that the Commission has driven a wedge which, if pressed hard, would bring the Federation down to ruins. If, for reasons of fear and distrust, the Federation is imposed on the people against their will, the atmosphere of racial suspicion will be perpetuated, destroying all chances for compromise proposals which would keep the various elements of the population together in harmony and inter-racial peace.

I think, after touring some parts of the world, I must now come back to our island home. We have here people coming from different parts of the world: from Europe, from Asia, from Africa. Each brought something valuable here. No one will refuse to admit that there were differences in religion, in culture, in colour, and in outlook. Those differences still exist in some form or another. No one will refuse to admit that prejudice and discrimination have been active in many fields. They still are. We know of exclusive social clubs and firms run exclusively on racial grounds. We have seen and we have felt the bad effects of such exclusive actions, but I do not think I should go into them and revive the past, painful in so many ways. We must diagnose the evils and devise in earnest ways and means of combating the bad effects to ensure a better Mauritius where all will have an equal share of the cake, equal opportunities for the development of their talents, and create such conditions as will lead to a Mauritius equally cherished by all its sons, irrespective of colour, religion, and cultural heritage.

How to achieve this? Many will ask. Many Mauritians of goodwill are already active in this field. We witnessed the movement “Entité Mauricienne” set afoot by a few voluntary workers drawn from all walks of life. We have witnessed the setting up of the Secrétariat Social de l’Île Maurice, which will be of great help towards the creation of a spirit of Mauritianism. We have seen the creation of the Stella Clavisque Club. We have seen the opening of those schools to all the inhabitants of the island — those schools which were previously reserved for specific religious groups.

And what more? Here, I venture to suggest that a psychological bridge should be built over which the various elements of our population can advance towards one another. We must create the will to advance towards each other. There must be a good deal of give and take. The man with privileges should agree to shed some of them in a spirit of goodwill towards his neighbour. We must make the underdog feel that he is not an inferior creature.

I would suggest that we should cease to call our neighbours by such names as Indian, Chinese, European, and African. We are all Mauritians, and I feel that such words should disappear from our day-to-day vocabulary and even from official documents. We must put a stop to the use of such words as Malbar, Mozambique, Lascar, and Mulâtre. There is nothing wrong with these words inherently, but with the passage of time, their meanings have changed from a harmless one to one of contempt, and they are now commonly used with a sense of an inferiority or superiority complex.

We must learn from the errors made in the past. We must learn from the lessons which the Commonwealth of Nations is everyday giving to the world. People of different origins, different cultures and religions, and different political ideologies are pooling their energies and their resources for the benefit of mankind. They have voluntarily agreed to do it without losing, for that matter, their identity or their own characteristics. If that is possible on a large scale among independent nations, it should not be impossible to do the same thing on a smaller scale here. My considered view is that if voluntary inter-community-relations organisations could be set up, there should be no difficulty in improving relations and resolving differences which are doing such great harm, in order to create a united Mauritius.

There is some real work to be done. If this is tackled in the right spirit, it will be possible to set up a fraternity similar to the Commonwealth fraternity, and afterwards, with future experience and conscious effort, it could be worked into a brotherhood in more than name. Men of goodwill are not lacking in our society, but their potential resources must be tapped to the full and pooled if we are to achieve some sort of unity in our diversity.

The overriding requirement for this unity lies in the maintenance and extension of democratic principles in all walks of life. More discussion between Ministers and civil servants, more exchanges between students, and a more conscious effort to impart information are of the greatest importance and can contribute much to understanding between men of different races and cultures. To move too fast would produce chaos; to move too slow, revolution. No society can move or grow or live without the love of man for man, which is based on the love of man for God.

May I end by quoting from the speech delivered by the then Prime Minister of Pakistan at the 1954 meeting of the Fifth Unofficial Commonwealth Relations Conference. Opening the Conference, Mr. Mohammad Ali said: “Thus today, in spite of the fact that the British infiltrated into our country and conquered it, deprived us of our independence, and meted out to us discriminatory treatment often galling to our sense of dignity and self-respect; in spite of the fact that in the external sphere they had often followed policies that were repugnant to us; in spite of our history of mutual antagonism, suspicion, and distrust — in spite of all this, we are today in partnership with them in the Commonwealth.”

If such a partnership is possible under the above circumstances, is it really impossible here? And will the above extract from the speech of the Prime Minister of Pakistan provoke you to such an extent as would lead all of you, and in fact the whole population of Mauritius, to strive ceaselessly to achieve this partnership which alone can bring the salvation of Mauritius? The success of the balance will enhance the value of our endeavours.

8th Year – No 344
Friday 7th April, 1961

Mauritius Times ePaper Friday 4 September 2026