Speakers’ Corner: Xenophobia: an onlooker’s perspective

On Mondays, http://www.global-changemakers.net turns into Speakers’ Corner: members of the network and community have their say on their work and the issues that concern them.

 

 

My name is Lovemore J. Mafukure, 20 years old. I’m from Zimbabwe and part of a group Called the Echoes of young voices at the British Council.  I send this piece as an entry for Speakers’ Corner.

Xenophobia: an onlooker’s perspective

As the sunset on July 11, 2010, marking the finale of the world cup, dawned fears of yet another outbreak of xenophobic attacks in South Africa – the land believed to be an ocean of opportunities by many Africans and it is one of Africa’s most developed countries. Locals often want the foreigners out and at the same time the foreigners want to try their luck at getting their dream jobs but the cake isn’t just enough to go round.

Through the eyes of a common South African, it is very unfair to see people from Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Malawi and such other conflict hit nations driving the iconic Range Rovers, the classic Mercedes Benzes, the speed hungry BMWs or even the populous VW Golf Citi and living life large in some of South Africa’s up-market Suburbs or Town Houses whilst the South Africans who happen to be the ‘owners’ of the land are squatting in the shacks of SOWETO or squashing in the Flats of Hillbrow.

 

At the same time, through the eyes of a professional analyst, those who are behind the xenophobic attacks are the uneducated ones whom by a series of unfortunate events have ended up with neither a High School certificate nor a college degree thus as much as can be understood regards the root of the problem, those who are attacking the foreigners because they feel that the foreigners  are taking the jobs which are rightfully theirs have no academic basis to be managers or directors of big companies nor do they have the asset base they can use as security to apply for capital loans to finance small business projects therefore xenophobia in South Africa is to some extent an act to make known to the government that the people are not satisfied with a government that isn’t doing enough to provide adequate employment opportunities for the majority of the South African people. Xenophobia in South Africa is thus aimed at attracting the government’s attention to apparent conflicts amongst the government, business people and the general population

With the world cup coming to an end, everything has since normalized again. The spirit of an ‘Africa United’ which saw the whole of Africa supporting Ghana in the World cup as one nation seems to have just vanished into thin air and an environment permissive of violence has all of a sudden cropped up and foreigners in South Africa have seen it better to save themselves an argument which they know they will not win by leaving peacefully before the threats of xenophobic attacks become a reality. In Zimbabwe buses from Johannesburg are coming back fully packed and officials say that they are fully booked up to the end of the month at least. This just shows the rush to get back home and stay safe. The one thing that brought the continent has suddenly been removed and Africans are proving beyond doubt that there can never be a United States of Africa anytime soon.

Violence on African soil and any other continent should however be avoided at all costs because oftentimes it does not yield the desired results but rather ends where people do not please, lives are lost, infrastructure destroyed and money that could have been used to better the lives of the people is used on redoing what had been already done before i.e. rebuilding houses, roads and the like thus the apparent reason why African is taking long to progress because people waste time investing in unproductive ventures like violence and civil wars. This is just an onlooker’s perspective on xenophobia fears in South Africa.  

- Lovemore J. Mafukure, Zimbabwe

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