Sun City
The Glitter of Apartheid
Sun City is a $90 million pleasure resort stuck into the vast rural poverty of Bophuthatswana. It plays a significant part in the South African effort to break out of its isolation and win back foreign favor. The large complex includes an artificial lake, a casino, soft porn movies, discotheques, and scantily clad chorus girls. Near by, the Pilanesberg game reserve was created for the tourists' delight by evicting 100 families from their homes. And there is the Superbowl, a large auditorium that regularly features big name international entertainers.
The Superbowl was opened by Frank Sinatra, who was paid $1.6 million for a nine day stand. Performances by US entertainers and athletes any- where in South Africa are very controversial. Anti- apartheid organizations and the United Nations have long advocated a cultural and sports boycott of South Africa. When Ray Charles went in 1981 he was forced to cancel his performance in the black township of Soweto because of strong opposition from the community. US performers who have defied the boycott have come home to criticism and picket lines.
Artists going to Sun City justify themselves by claiming on the one hand that they are not political and on the other that they are not performing in South Africa but in an independent country. They choose to ignore the fact that Bophuthatswana's in- dependence is entirely unrecognized outside South Africa and is rejected by the majority of South Africans.
The big bucks have drawn well-known American stars to Sun City. These include Millie Jackson, Cher, The Beach Boys, Glen Campbell and Linda Ronstadt.
Audiences are not officially segregated at Sun City. But the cost of the more expensive tickets often makes this the de facto reality. Liza Minelli performed her opening night to a crowd of 4,500 people, of which about 200 were black. There was only one black face in the most expensive seatsthe rest were high up in the auditorium in seats that sold for $13.00. And Southern Sun, which owns the hotel, admitted to giving tickets to blacks free. It does this not out of generosity but so that artists do not per- form to all-white audiences. "I don't mind about anything except that I'm playing in front of mixed audiences," said Liza Minelli, ignoring the fact that by performing there she was helping apartheid score propaganda points.
Sun City, sometimes called Sin City, exists as it does largely because of the apartheid fiction of independence. Laws in South Africa which make it illegal to gamble or for a black and white to have sex together do not apply in Bophuthatswana. It is not unusual for white men to come to Bophuthatswana to do what they cannot do in Johannesburg. This has led to a growth in prostitution. Apologists for Sun City suggest that this inter-race mixing will lead to changed attitudes of whites and thus to change in South Africa. But white men can go home to Johannesburg while black women must stay in the poverty of Bophuthatswana, and to suggest that casual integrated sex and black access to slot machines will break down the structures of apartheid is an insult to the long and costly struggle blacks have waged against the oppression of minority rule. Because Sun City helps camouflage the reality of that rule, it does far more damage than good to the people of Bophuthatswana.
The fact is that Sun City is controlled by political and economic interests that are part and parcel of apartheid. The Bophuthatswana government, which would not exist if it were not for apartheid, holds a minority interest in the resort, as do a number of South African companies.
Blacks who work in Sun City have complained that they are paid less than whites who do the same jobs, and that some jobs are reserved for whites only. Seven black employees who complained to management about these conditions in March 1983 were tired and evicted from their homes which were owned by Sun City.
Not all performers have succumbed to the large sums offered to perform at Sun City. There is a growing list of those who have refused lucrative contracts, including Tony Bennett, Ben Vereen, Gladys Knight and the Pips, Eiton John, Roberta Flack, The Kool (Newport) Jazz Festival and the Harlem Globetrotters. John McEnroe has twice refused million dollar offers to play in Sun City. As protests mount against those who do go to Sun City, the ranks of those who choose conscience over dollars will also surely grow.
http://richardknight.homestead.com/bophuthatswana.html
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