The government this week sought to dismiss fears of a looming outbreak in xenophobia.
There has been talk since about just before the World Cup that there were rising tensions in squatter communities where large numbers of illegal immigrants live. The talk has been that the violence would break out after the tournament had ended. One would imagine that the football is quite the tonic for lynch mobs eager on a bigoted rampage. Bizarre, no?
Of course, none of this nascent hysteria has been backed up by anything other than talk based on reports based on talk based on, well … you get the point. The past fortnight has seen reports of an exodus of immigrants from Cape Town with one newspaper commenting on dozens of foreigners hitchhiking along the N1 … which I imagine is quite disconcerting given that illegal immigrants, who tend to subsist on temporary, unprotected employment and even less permanent housing, tend to veer towards the fixed abode side of life. A smattering of foreigners on the move? Must be trouble brewing then, call in the army. It’s a national crisis. Or not.
Thing is, there is no evidence that there is a looming threat of massive nationwide violence against foreigners. Certainly, there is no more evident tension than has become normal in impoverished communities who feel the government is deaf to their plight. The security forces learned their lesson from the gruesome and shameful spilling over of tensions two years ago. The government established structures and committees at all levels to monitor and deal with xenophobic tensions. Local police and NGOs have coordinated plans and processes should matters get out of hand.
Local and national government officials and structures have gone to great lengths to educate people on xenophobia and violence. South Africa suffered a massive spate of service-delivery protests at the beginning of the year. Most were in impoverished, underserviced communities with large numbers of illegal immigrants. Those went by with barely a sign of residents venting their frustrations on foreigners en masse. There were certainly no more acts of vandalism against foreign-owned dwellings and properties than were on those owned by locals.
If there was an orchestrated plan to launch attacks on foreigners, surely the World Cup would be the perfect time? Such actions are always done to garner the most public awareness and embarrass the government into some response. What better time than when the world’s attention is on South Africa and our security forces are focused elsewhere? A local daily reported on an anti-xenophobia mission involving the army and police. Except the army and police quickly debunked the story, pointing out that it was just a regular crime-combating exercise.
I saw a story in a respected weekly tabloid bemoaning the under-utilisation of “expensive” World Cup courts and that told me that we must be doing a great job hosting the tournament if that is the biggest complaint. So with the football party going swimmingly, the rand and the JSE holding up well amid turbulent global trading conditions, wage-negotiation season being generally less disruptive than in prior years, Julius behaving and no presidential offspring coming forth into the world, and of course the Treasury’s coffers, someone needed a story. Maybe for circulation purposes, maybe for political reasons. Or both. Who knows? This morning a hijacking in Nyanga was reported as a xenophobic incident despite no evidence pointing to it being just another senseless crime. It does make one wonder, if a hijacking of a white person could be reported as a racist incident and that of a woman as sexist, do those not tie in with creating unjustified hysteria?
If there is indeed a legitimate threat of xenophobic violence, I am certain the authorities can and will deal with it effectively. The nation has learned its lesson and accepted its shame. It would be an even bigger shame for that to be used for cheap, narrow interests.
Police in Cape Town have received praise for their swift and effective handling of the outbreak of violence on Sunday night. They arrested seven men and provided shelter for fearful foreigners. Braam Hanekom, the spokesperson for the refugee rights group Passop, said: “The police response was great. The provincial government had a plan in place and people were dealt with swiftly.”
@MLM why are your “three from-over-boarder lodgers” not fluent in Zulu? Zulu, (known as Ndebele in Zimbabwe) is one of that country’s official languages. Just like most black South African’s, most black Zimbabweans speak more than one african language, and thats usually Shona and Ndebele.
I teach a class of refugees. All have official documents allowing them to be here – not “illiegal aliens” at all. All of them have been threatened in the last six weeks, two of them by police officers. Al were told the end of the World Cup was the end for them too. One chap in my class was beaten within an inch of his life two weeks ago by a small crowd chanting that he should “go home”.
This is directly from the people affected and certainly not “media hype”. Organisations working with refugees went on alert at least a full month ago because their information and verification of that information was so convincing.
So the people that are affected and people that work with the affected people are merely being misled by the media? I hardly think so.
Sunshine, these threats were widespread and known before they came out in the media. If you don’t believe me, contact any organisation that works with refugees.
@Peter Joffe. This has basically been the argument to justify the savage instinct of some South Africans. Well Joffe I have a job if you want it come and get it – but you must have a PhD and have taught at a university for at least 3 years. I have taught not less that 1000 graduates who are working in your economy and in my faculty out of 90 lecturers there are only 15 blacks of which 5 are South Africans. Universities, the public service, private companies have so many unfilled vacancies and you are complaining about us taking food out of your mouth ( no one os going to put food into your mouth either!). WHy don’t you apply for those jobs? Your president was on spot when he said that the problem of unemployment is not because there are no jobs but because there are jobs for which there are no qualified people. So instead of beating my people go to school or technical college, get qualified to do one of the millions of jobs there for the taking. If all Zimbos, legit or illegal, move out I can assure you some institutions will stop functioning or will continue to function but not sure of the efficiency. The mystery I cannot solve is why my students for the past 7yrs are so good and friendly (maybe because they are educated unlike you Peter Joffe still waiting for manna to fall from the govt)
@ Xcepting
Actually, it is not about quality of education alone, but rather that this quality is sufficiently widespread.
In Zimbabwe’s case, superior education was granted to the many, but not all, and not nearly enough.
The educated grew to despise the despotism and harmful policies of Mugabe and Zanu PF, and voted MDC. Mugabe retaliated by mobilising the uneducated rural masses, with even greater destructive tendencies employed to stay in power.
So, just like xenophobia here in good ol’ SA, black on black violence was orchestrated in Zimbabwe, excepting this was now a class war between the educated and uneducated.
It is impossible not to draw correlations with how the ANC conducts its own politicking here, as compared to Mugabe and Zanu PF
Unathi, it is also criminal for the elite to label as criminals those who have to rob to survive, while they arrogantly strip the state’s coffers empty for their luxury.
They conveniently forget that we worshipped criminals during apartheid as they were the only ones we who always had money to lend us for transport to work. Now we do not even have work to go to because all our tax must go to their deployee BEE’s,but must find ways to survive.
Siyabonga, you’re just wrong. Read the newspaper. Certainly, and very fortunately there is not the same level of ‘anti-foreigner’ violence as there was a couple of years ago, but do we need to let it reach those levels before we recognise that it exists and do something about it?
Call it xenophobia, or call it violence against foreigners, or anything else you like – it is happening. By continually trying to pretend otherwise, our government makes itself complicit with this untenable behaviour.
@Panchetta – Quite agreed. It seems, in both SA and Zim to be the case that the government is not interested in educating the masses since this will lose them voters. What I meant by “on average” was that the percentage of, especially black educated people in Zimbabwe is far higher than the percentage here. It is also true that their level of education was higher (on average). This does not mean that there are not still a percentage in Zimbabwe who’s only education was in rape, terror and how to maintain an AK47. Morgan Tsvengarai caved into the coalition idea because he is an educated man who could not continue to watch his voters be mindlessly terrorised by the uneducated or mis-educated entitled class. Terrorism training is also an education but inappropriate when one want a country to flourish.
@tottie – sorry, have to correct your first sentence so it matches reality: “it is also criminal for the elite in government to label as criminals those who survive in spite of robberies, while they arrogantly strip the tax payers money, meant for vital services to all for their luxury. I am so sick and tired of this whole “white elite gevaar nonsense”. Do yourself a favour and check who is left, without fail they would be chommies with the people in government, like Agliotti and that other fellow who is so ill he cannot go to jail.
Sorry Tottie, I should have read your second paragraph before flying off the handle. The first read like the usual “blame it on the rich white guy” without it.
That does not mean that I find poverty an excuse for crime. It never is. The poor does not rob, criminals do.
I AM STILL WAITING FOR THE BLOODBATH TO HAPPEN…
oh wait it only exists in the minds of those who feign an interest in township lives when the media screams nonsense that isnt even happen
go to townships you morons. there is xenophobia everwhere in this country but so far WHERE is the so called world cup bloodbath
and stop trusting everything you read in the damn paper
after all they also told us blacks and whites were fighting each other in ventersdorp just because some woman got cooldrink thrown on her face
go visit and township and for once stop painting black people as savages
no one can blame the foreigners for fleeing after all this damn panic has been spread and so easily believed
with the exception of a few, journalists are no longer doing any real investigations in this country