JACOB M NHLAPO

Much is being said and written today about the disintegrating forces which are at work among the Bantu as a consequence of the advent of Western civilisation. The loss of some of the good Bantu customs is being justifiably deplored and the resentment by the black man of the white man's ways is receiving daily expression. But the present state of affairs amongst our people demands more from our Native leaders than a mere recital of the fact that Western civilization is the fount of the whole trouble. There are two enemies rampant among the Bantu today: there is religious indifference and there is also drunkenness which has given genesis to the present low moral standard of our people. I am firmly convinced that if these two evils are eradicated the Bantu future will be brighter. . . The Bantu future depends a great deal on their present, and if much is done now towards combating the national enemies, half the complexity which the problem may in future assume will be removed. It is more important now than it has ever been before that the Bantu, if they will rise to any respectable level at all, must refrain from all those things that may hasten their downfall and cling to ideas and practices which are uplifting and conducive to usefulness in life.

-Jacob M. Nhlapo, "The Bantu Future", Umteteli wa Bantu, September 3, 1927.