Seven Days: South Africa - The White Future

For this lauded Seven Days assignment Ian Johnstone was the first NZ television reporter to travel to apartheid-era South Africa. In this episode (one of three) he finds a white minority clinging to power in the face of mounting violence and a sense of looming change. The limbo-like status of the mixed-race Coloureds stresses how untenable the regime’s policies have become; and demand for equality from black students is palpable. Interviewees include a defiant Prime Minister Vorster, author Alan Paton (Cry, the Beloved Country), journalist Donald Woods and activist Helen Suzman.

Superbly informative…At last New Zealand has seen the issue put clearly and concisely: the veil of misinformation and bigotry has been lifted. New Zealand’s choice is clear: play apartheid politics under the guise of sport — or give backing to the true sportsmen and women of South Africa by refusing to collaborate with pigmentation politics.

– June 1976 letter sent to BCNZ after the three-part special went to air, signed by 15 South Africans resident in NZ

Key Cast & Crew

Ian Johnstone

Reporter

Allison Webber

Researcher

Jan Tugwana

Reporter

Graeme Wilson

Executive Producer

John Toon

Camera

Glenn Fitzgerald

Sound