From Our Readers

To the Editors of The Crimson:

Over the past few days, The Crimson and [Harvard Vice President Daniel] Steiner have been trying to split hairs over whether or not a list in OCS was in any way connected with the Harvard South African Internship Program as administered by the Harvard South Africa Committee chaired by Steiner. Regardless of whether or not the list in OCS is related to the committee, the real issues of the controversy over Harvard's illconceived program are being avoided.

Although the list was entitled, "temporary list of available South African Internships," although the list was in the form of a memo from one member of the committee to another, although students requesting information about the internship program were referred to the list, and although members of the committee received copies of the list in their meeting packets, Steiner contends that the list was not connected with the work of the committee. Even though SASC believes that Steiner's statement strains credibility, SASC does not want the actual purpose of the list to be the crux of the debate.

The real issue is the way the University has gone about setting up this program, and their response to our allegations of serious structural flaws in the program. Specifically, the program was conceived and planned for six months without input of Black South Africans. That Steiner now claims he can smooth over any problems during his upcoming visit to South Africa is to show a basic lack of respect and contempt for the people he is supposedly trying to help.

If Steiner is truly interested in the views of Black South Africans, he must pay them the respect of suspending the program pending their consultation. To simply ask their opinion of a program that is already committed to specific activities is to deny them any substantive input into the meaningful issues at hand.

Finally, given the serious shortcomings brought up in the SASC report, why has Steiner yet to renounce any of the programs on the OCS list? The mere fact that Steiner is still entertaining the idea of internships with Namibian organizations that are illegally sponsored by the South African Government seriously questions his commitment to use the internship for its stated goals.

The original intent of the list in OCS is no longer the issue. The fact remains that as of now Harvard has received written requests for interns from only nine organizations (the nine which appear on the list!). It is now time for Steiner and his committee to dissociate themselves from all of the organizations on the list and to suspend the program pending the consultation fo Black South Africans. Damon Silvers '86