Are South Africans ashamed of the anti-migrant actions? Really?
· Citizen
You’ve got to hand it to Cupcake. 100 more days and he’ll have spent more time in office than JZ. Another 170 after that and he’ll be the longest-serving president of the democratic era.
Visit turconews.click for more information.
Gone are the days when state leadership could last the lifespan of a cow, ala JBM Hertzog, so serving for the lifespan of a sheep is a good innings.
I don’t know what it is with South African presidents and their lack of connection to the people, but if it’s not Thabo thinking crime isn’t a big deal, JZ inventing a new method of fire represent or Mandela telling striking workers not to be greedy, we still have a lot of leadership disconnect to offer.
Most recently, our Ramaphoria in Chief has told the SADC community that “as South Africans, we are deeply concerned and ashamed that people from other nations… were treated badly and were even forced to leave the country under threat of violence.”
Are we really ashamed?
Are we though? Living in South Africa, we’re typically spoiled for choice on things to be concerned about, but now that it’s August, it’s time for xenophobia to move over so that women’s issues can take centre stage.
It’s such a weird thing for the president to say. Spare him a thought; he had to address the issue and didn’t have much to work with.
It’s just that if South Africans were really and sincerely ashamed of xenophobic violence, why did it still happen?
Perhaps one feels shame in times of such desperation that you feel like you need to steal a loaf of bread to survive the week. That’s understandable and the plot of every great story from Les Mis to Aladdin.
However, it’s not really something you could say if you went to Queenstown, gunned down 20 grannies at the old age home, forged their wills to donate all their money to Charity of Faith and then opened up a company called Charity of Faith (Pty) Ltd.
Xenophonic violence kinda leans closer to one extreme there. So what does ol’ Pressy do? He finds the narrative that is palatable; sure, so many of your people were attacked, harassed, and killed, but it’s not us – it’s just some of us – very few of us in fact.
What about the police?
You just know that every African leader in that room was thinking to themselves, oh but don’t you have police? Fair question, especially if the violence and intimidation came from a few. I mean, that’s the point of having cops, right?
If the purps are so few, why can’t we just catch them?
Regardless of how few people perpetrated the violence, the president’s statement discounts all the people who enabled it, supported it, condoned it, and were happy to go along with it.
Yo, if I don’t like Rick and Ben is going to take him out, I’m not going to inconvenience myself to stop Ben. Rick’s gone and that’s fine by me. Better yet, I didn’t have to lift a finger.
March and March
You’ve heard of March and March because of all the energy around it. Its antithesis, Operation Ubuntu, seems to be something far fewer people have even heard of and will likely think it’s a South African 70s punk compilation album.
South Africans didn’t have to lift a finger to let March and March do its thing. It did its thing.
Were South Africans ashamed, Mr President? Certainly many were.
I don’t think that’s the right question to ask though. If his statement were to do the heavy lifting he requires of it, it should come from a more telling question: are enough South Africans ashamed?
I’m ashamed to admit that I don’t think so.