The story
of the sub-continent of Africa would have been very different if – as the
majority expected – John X Merriman had been elected South Africa’s first prime
minister.
He was one of few champions fighting for
justice in the 19th century when racism was seen on all sides as more of a
virtue than a vice.
He tackled it in
its manifestations of cruel neglect and discrimination. And he failed.
He failed mainly because of the uneven
forces at large in colonial Africa, but also because his character was such a
confusion of contradictions. But what
fascinating, marvellous contradictions they were!
Merriman was the mentor and friend of Cecil Rhodes, teaching
him the ropes in diamond digging in Kimberley, in social graces in Queen
Victoria’s over-adorned era, and in the politics of the Cape, Africa and
Westminster. Rhodes thought of ‘Jack X’ as his true, but most difficult friend.
The relationship demonstrates one of Merriman’s many contradictions. He loved
Cecil Rhodes, the visionary, constantly as a friend., but despised Rhodes the
politician; his values; his methods; his cynicism and seeming dishonesty.
Other contradictions in Merriman’s
life and make-up included the facts that:
He
was born in England . . . but
was one of the first Englishmen to become a white African.
He
was the son of a prominent Anglican Bishop
. . . but had little faith in the Church, saying that it ought to
demonstrate far more Christian charity to downtrodden non-believers.
He was the
most eloquent, witty - and feared - debater in the old Cape Parliament . . . but he hated party politics,
its plots, its ‘timid caucusing’, its greed and its dishonesty.
He was a
born public administrator; a widely respected Cabinet Minister of several
portfolios and Africa’s best head of Treasury in two centuries . . .
but he was a hopeless private businessman.
His father, a co-founder of one of the earliest
‘public’ schools in South Africa (the ‘private’ school of Bishops, which his
son attended) instilled in John X a desire to dedicate his life to public
service . . . but he tried a dozen different careers, starting as a
clerk, then surveyor; diamond prospector, war correspondent, vintner, gold
miner, farmer, and an administrator who ran the Railways, the Treasury and
finally the Cape Colony.
In Blood on the Path, his role, his spirit and his political vision; his views, his style and
his values are pervasive . . . but he is by no means the central
character in this tale.
