South Africa Takes New Step to End Segregation

The white minority government took a step toward changing its policy of apartheid by introducing legislation Friday to end the racial segregation of public amenities such as parks, libraries and bathrooms.

The Separate Amenities Act, passed in 1953, had granted provincial governments, municipalities and privately owned entertainment establishments the right to reserve facilities for whites.

A bill that would repeal the act was published Friday and is expected to be passed in mid-June, the South African Press Assn. reported. It was the latest move by the government of President Frederik W. de Klerk to dismantle apartheid.

The Conservative Party, the largest white opposition party, is the only parliamentary group expected to oppose the bill, but the party does not have enough votes to block it. Hernus Kriel, minister of provincial affairs and planning, has called for the changes, if approved, to take effect Oct. 15.

The bill would remove local governments’ authority to racially segregate public facilities such as libraries, toilets, parks and buses. It also would remove the legal protection of individuals who want to reserve restaurants, hotels, resorts and other public facilities for whites.

In most major cities, such as Johannesburg and Cape Town, public amenities have been desegregated in recent months. But in hundreds of smaller cities, towns and villages, there are either no public facilities for blacks in the city centers, or there are inferior, separate amenities.

The Separate Amenities Act is considered one of the pillars of apartheid, the system of racial separation and white domination encoded in law by the National Party when it came to power in 1948.