‘Wooing’ of Irish workers to apartheid countries

A MEMBER of the Irish Anti-Apartheid Movement posed as a printer for a job interview to prove that Rhodesian companies were targeting Irish workers under the pretence that they were recruiting for South Africa.

Anthony Ffrench, of Firhouse, Co Dublin, adopted the name Alex Overland when he replied to an advertisement in the Irish Press seeking lithographers for a packaging firm ostensibly in South Africa.

Replies from the company came from Rhodesia Packing Ltd, a firm in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) which said his application had been passed on to them by their associates in South Africa who had no job vacancies at present.

Rhodesia was under United Nations sanctions at the time as a result of the long-running oppression of the black population by the minority white leadership and the ensuing war.

Further correspondence between the company and Mr Overland resulted in him being offered a job in Bulawayo on a wage of £68 per week.

He was issued with instructions to book his flight to Bulawayo via Johannesburg in South Africa and his appointment letter said: “In view of the political impasse that exists between Britain and Rhodesia...No mention is, or should be made of Rhodesia, and ostensibly you will be going to South Africa.”

Anthony Ffrench passed all the correspondence on to the Department of Foreign Affairs which had been lobbied for several years by the Anti-Apartheid Movement about the wooing of Irish workers to South Africa and Rhodesia.

The British Nursing Association had held interviews in Dublin on behalf of Amalgamated Medical Services in Johannesburg, trying to attract Irish nurses with lavish brochures depicting a sunshine lifestyle with high salaries.

The Anti-Apartheid movement objected on the grounds that the recruiters operated a whites-only policy. Other recruitment agencies and companies were also advertising on RTÉ and in the newspapers, some using the somewhat vague term “Southern Africa” which, the Anti- Apartheid Movement believed, meant Rhodesia rather than South Africa.

Honorary secretary of the movement Bill Meek asked Minister for Foreign Affairs Garret FitzGerald to act to curb these activities and their lobbying paid off in newspaper publicity that led to Dáil debate.

Mr FitzGerald told the Dáil his department had contacted all the daily and evening newspapers and RTÉ to remind them of the UN resolution which called on member states to take action to prevent emigration to Rhodesia.