This essay will discuss and show that apartheid was a racist cover up for exploitation. Apartheid was a system of racial discrimination and separation, originating in political measures in the previous colonies and republics on South African territory and expanded by the creation of the Union through the Nationalist Party's growing parliamentary influence. There are other important dimensions to the peculiar South African model, such as extreme class inequality and authoritarian attitudes. In the system, the people of South Africa were divided by their race and the races were forced to live apart from each other.