SI MONTHLY NEWS JULY 2005 News
From SI Exco News
People
30 Years of Service in South Africa - Gwen McLaren
The first South African main contact address to be found on a Servas key list was that of Judi Davies in 1974. In 1976 she handed over to Gwen McLaren from Cape Town, who was the national secretary until 2001 (for 25 years), then deputy and since 2002 host list coordinator. Gwen has been the soul of Servas in South Africa for 30 years; most Servas travellers to South Africa visited her and her husband Glen (they have about 30 Servas guests every year). With her help I could update the host lists of the other Southern African countries when I was General Secretary (1986-92), because Gwen reported to me which hosts had been visited by Servas travellers and which hosts she had been in touch with. For many years Gwen was assisted in her Servas work by her deputy Franz Auerback in Johannesburg until he died in 2004.
It was not easy for Gwen to be national secretary of South Africa during the time of Apartheid, because the government thought Servas was a subversive organisation. They were suspicious of Servas as a peace organisation. Government spies contacted her to become hosts to check is Servas was a subversive organisation, since several South African Servas hosts were publicly antiapartheid such as Franz Auerbach. When joining Servas they had to agree to the Servas ideas with the result that they soon disappeared from the list. Thus Gwen had to be very careful.
On the other hand, there was pressure from outside. There were complaints from some national groups because there were no black people as Servas hosts in the lists. At the 1988 conference in Montreal there was even a request from a national group to take South Africa from the key list, because there were no black Africans listed as hosts. This was refused because Gwen could convince the delegates that besides white people there were coloured people and Indians as hosts on the list. On the other hand it was (and still is) unsafe for strangers to find their way alone around black townships, where their black Servas friends lived. Some black militant groups at that time would also say that anyone staying with a white person or having a white visitor was a traitor. Gwen assured the delegates that all travellers wanting to meet black people could do so with the help of Servas hosts who could take them to their friends in the townships for a visit. Gwen informed us that she worked in a township as an occupational therapist and always took their Servas guest along with her there. Thus only the safety of the Servas travellers could be guaranteed. A young black man visiting her recently informed her that he was gland that they are now gaining some black Servas hosts and travellers.
At the age of 84 Gwen is still actively involved with Servas and other activities: e.g. she is secretary of the university of the third age. She has visited me twice in Germany and I recently visited her in Cape Town. She still likes travelling with her husband, a retired university professor, but they do not travel abroad any more. They enjoy hosting Servas people, especially those whom they visited themselves during their many trips in the past. As Gwen wrote me their international travels are now mostly done thought the adventures, ideas and plans of their Servas visitors who are always interesting and some very lovable, and they hope they are thus contributing in a small way to peace.
Antonie Fried (S.I. archivist)
A tribute to Franz Auerbach
We remember Franz Auerbach with warmth and respect.
He was a host in South African Servas from 1978 until his death in 2004 and coordinator in Johannesburg for many years. He also attended the Servas Congress in France as South African Representative.
What we remember though is his life. As Jews his family emigrated to South Africa in the 30s and had a difficult time getting work. He left school early to help support the family but continued to study by correspondence and eventually got his doctorate. He felt the injustices of the apartheid system and spoke and wrote openly about it which angered the government of the day so that he got no promotion in his position as teacher. He pioneered teacher training programmes for black teachers and continued to write about the inequalities in black and white education in many letters to newspapers.
For all that he lived modestly himself with his family and is an example to us all as one who believed in peach and justice and was fearless in supporting it.
Gwen McLaren, South Africa
