Fighting Apartheid With Words: Chinua Achebe

"How much credence can a victim of racial oppression place on the disinterestedness of any member of the oppressor group who is, or claims to be, a liberal sympathiser while enjoying the benefits conferred automatically on him by his skin colour? Is it fair that the victim should be saddled with the additional burden of sorting out this ambiguity when all his energies should be channelled into his struggle?
…I really don’t think that the awkwardness in their (the liberals) condition should be blamed on the likes of Steve Biko, but rather on those whose racial arrogance, greed and stupidity made skin colour such a red flag in the first place…In a decent , humane society, Steve Biko would have been cherished as a young man of great promise;…”


Professor Chinua Achebe at the third annual Steve Biko Memorial Lecture, 2002