The Statement from the Dock and the 1913 Natives Land Act
The 1913 Natives’ Land Act by Solomon Plaatje and The Statement from the Dock by Nelson Mandela give limelight on the real state of South Africa during the colonial era. European colonization of other people in different parts of the world was received by significance resistance due to the discriminatory nature of the colonization. For example, the Natives’ Land Act deprived the South Africans of the right to own land and forced them into providing black labor to the Whites’ plantations. On the Statement from the Dock, Nelson Mandela took the opportunity that he was given in the court to defend his innocence, to give a speech that has remained iconic in the history of South Africa. South African discrimination had a similar origin to the discrimination witnessed during the colonization of the US and was based on white supremacy.
Majority of South Africans did not own permanent pieces of land. However, the law had allowed the South Africans to live as squatters in their country. The squatter system meant that the South Africans would pay for the right to use the land for purposes of crop plantation that would be used to provide food for the people and livestock (Leman, 2015). The South Africans were used to traveling across the country in search of land to lease until the 1913 Natives’ Land Act came. The reception of the land act was a surprise to the several South Africans who came to learn from the landowners that land was no longer available for purchase. The 1913 Natives’ Land Act specified that the Whites were not allowed to buy land from the Natives and that the Natives would also not be allowed to buy land. The land that had been set aside as reserve land was limited to settlement and the reserves were overcrowded. The poor living standards in the reserve land forced the Natives to move to the settler farms for waged labor. The main objective of the 1913 Natives’ land Act has, therefore, appeared to be a move by the colonial government to provide sufficient labor in the settler farms.
Moreover, arrests were done on the South Africans who were bold enough to resist the oppressive laws by the colonial government. Nelson Mandela was among the few elites who were arrested for resisting the oppression of the Natives by the colonial masters (Willan, 2016). While in court, Nelson Mandela was allowed to provide evidence in defense following the accusations on him. However, Mandela used the chance from the dock to give a three-hour speech to express his feelings concerning colonial rule. The accusations that had been laid on Mandela included the claim that Mandela was a communist who was against the parliamentary democracy. However, Mandela refuted the accusations and instead used the Magna Carta to bring his point across. The speech by Mandela was aimed at challenging the colonial authorities during the apartheid rule.
The situation in South Africa appeared to the situation in the USA. Although several scholars have refuted comparisons between the two countries, the few who have managed to make a comparison have found concrete similarities. The idea behind the sufferings that the natives in both countries went through was motivated by white supremacy. The whites were obsessed with the desire to exploit the natives for cheap labor.
In sum, the 1913 Natives’ Land Act and the Speech from the Dock brought a limelight concerning the challenges that the South Africans went through during the colonial era. The 1913 Natives’ Land Act brought suffering to the South Africans, and waged labor was the only option. Also, the Speech from the Dock allowed Mandela to address the authorities concerning the afflictions on the natives. The similarity of the South African struggle and the USA struggle was that the cruelty of white supremacy led to both struggles.
References
Leman, P. (2015). Nelson Mandela and Civic Myths: A Law and Literature Approach to Rivonia. The Courtroom as a Space of Resistance: Reflections on the Legacy of the Rivonia Trial.
Willan, B. (2016). ” A South African’s Homage” at one hundred: revisiting Sol Plaatje’s contribution to the Book of Homage to Shakespeare (1916): 1916-2016: Sol Plaatje centenary commemoration. Shakespeare in Southern Africa, 28(1), 1-19.