15.
We've got a few blacks in media who have a major, an enormous responsibility. But we've got to understand that blacks in this country are diseased in the same way. We've been victimized by the same system of
no information and at best bad information. So it's not an easy problem
to solve, but clearly, organizations have to try to do that. I think there's been some improvement. You know, twenty years ago, blacks in the United States didn't identify so readily with Africa. Now I don't
think of a single national organization, NAACP, Urban League, PUSH, all
the rest of them, that don't have foreign policy workshops, that don't
have resolutions on foreign policy. Just today, for instance, I talked
with Joe Lowry, I talked with Leon Sullivan, I talked with Jesse Jackson, I asked them all to get in touch with the House Foreign Affairs Committee
regarding repeal of the Clark Amendment. They all knew about the issue,
they all sent their telegrams, and made phone calls. That would have been
much harder to do twenty years ago than it is now. So I think there has been some real improvement in the black community. You know, improvement
in our own self image and our own identification with Africa. All of
my support comes from the black community. We have at our annual dinners in Washington 2,000 people, all blacks, payitig seventy-five dollars a head
just for a lobbying organization. I think I could hold that dinner in a phone booth twenty years ago. But things have changed, and that's a
good sign, but we have an awful long way to go.
X: Do you think these racist attitudes will have to be changed before we
can expect the American Congress to provide more financial assistance?
R: Well, some things are going to change anyhow, whether the Congress changes
or not, and that's a good part of the story. You know what they did to
Mugabe. One Saturday, Mugabe was a bloodthirsty communist, and the Monday
morning he was on the front page of the New York Times, walking with his
wife and the dog on the front lawn. All of a sudden Mugabe became a
school teacher and a Catholic and a lovely person. And they can do it.
It just shows you. We're talking about propaganda in other countries,
and how people control your thinking and that sort of thing, and we think
it doesn't happen here. But, you know bow they did in China. Overnight
we were seeing Mao on television. He was on television chatting with
Nixon and all this sort of thing, and China became an alright place to
go. What Americans do understand, they understand the power of dollar
and the power of the resources that they need. This country needs Zimbabwe. It's a strategically important country. We need Nigeria. And
when blacks take South Africa, and I think that's going to happen in my
lifetime--I don't quite agree with Bishop Tutu that Botha is the last
white prime minister, I think the Bishop is talking like a Bishop when
he says that--I think that attitudes are going to change here. They
have to change. You know, people start seeing things differently. But
right now, the white South Africans are doing enormous things in this
country. They are feeding to school systems all across this country
filmstrips and booklets and slick pamphlets. Very nicely written, big full color spreads, pictures, and all that sort of stuff. Spending an
enormous amount of money on that. But I think that slowly the thing will
turn around.