Thirty years later, discontent within the minority of European origin – less than 8% of the population but with great economic power – leads to terrorist initiatives and a desire for segregation that is doomed to failure
South African apartheid was eradicated in 1992 and the republic that rose from the rubble held elections two years later. The “Rainbow Nation,” a definition coined by Nelson Mandela, began with an inclusive spirit. But the colors are not mixed as the father of the country intended. A large section of whites long for their political supremacy and even a section of their representatives want to break away and create their own and independent country. The most radical do not limit themselves to dreams and resort to extreme violence to fight the black majority. Last October, Harry Knoesen, leader of the small National Christian Resistance Movement, was sentenced to two life terms and 21 years in prison for planning terrorist attacks using biological weapons. The prisoner claimed in his defense that God had asked him to restore South Africa to the descendants of the Europeans.
There is no truce for the southern giant. His own and global economic crisis, corruption and migration tensions regularly shake him. In July 2021, a wave of looting and random violence followed the capture of former President Jacob Zuma, who was implicated in numerous crimes. The regime that emerged from the end of ‘apartheid’ was then at its lowest level of credibility.
The shocks continue, despite the crisis being overcome. The proceedings opened for the disappearance of more than $4 million in the farm of Cyril Ramaphosa, the current head of the executive branch, could lead to his prosecution for alleged money laundering, as the opposition denounces. The consequences of this hypothetical process are unpredictable.
The present is troubled and the past continues to take its toll. Many of the conflicts are the result of a social and economic structure inherited from the previous era. The white minority, less than 8% of the total population – 4.6 million citizens – has lost political power, but still holds a large share of economic power. Farmers of European origin own 70% of the commercial farms and 72% of the cultivated area.
Segregation is the goal of the most radical, usually drawn from the Afrikaner or Boer collective, made up of citizens of Dutch, French and German descent, with a Calvinist faith and significant agricultural resources. Its political horizon continues through the implementation of a “People’s State” or “State of the People” similar to the republics they created in the 19th century, which were destroyed by the expansion of the English army. But the proposal is very complicated, not only because of the political opposition, but also because of the demographic impossibility; and it is that the whites do not have a majority in any of the provinces.
Culture is one of his banners when it comes to airing grievances, especially now that the education system has replaced Afrikaans, his mother tongue, with English in all universities. But here again they cannot resort to identity discrimination, at least in a strict sense, as it is used by more than 12% of South Africans, often in a vehicle role. There are more blacks and mestizos than whites who speak this Germanic language, which is derived from Dutch.
The field is the main scene of the confrontation. President Ramaphosa’s agrarian reform, one of his flagship projects, is based on the expropriation without compensation of the large estates. The ruling party has failed to get parliament to pass its measure and is seeking a constitutional revision that will facilitate the process. On the left, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EEF) party advocates strict nationalization.
The battle for land, the epicenter of many debates, has driven the Afrikaner initiative. The NGO AfriForum is the most combative in the fight against the intentions of the government. Its opponents place it on the extreme right, while the group identifies with civil rights and the defense of minorities.
The influence among whites in the interior is undeniable. In 2016 they had 170,000 members and six years later their social mass reaches 295,000 members within a group of about 3 million inhabitants. Among other initiatives, he has fought on legal issues such as affirmative action, which benefits the black majority, “fracking” or the name change of some cities. He also denounced EFF leader Julius Malema for singing the hymn ‘Dubul’ ibhunu’, which can be translated as ‘Kill the Boer’.
It’s not just an organism fighting internally. Afriforum has made its demands known in Australia and the United States, countries that have welcomed much of the Afrikaner diaspora, and has also adopted the demands of white farmers in Zimbabwe, victims of a similar initiative. The organization obtained a favorable verdict revealing that Robert Mugabe, the country’s former president, used the complicity of his colleague Jacob Zuma to sue the Court of the Southern African Development Community, an institution that recognized the rights of the litigants. dissolve. .
Crime has increased tensions. The entity denounces the killing of 59 farmers in 2020, 30% more than in 2019, and by blacks overall. His interpretation is dangerous for coexistence. The attacks on property owners spurred the white genocide theory that perpetuates the existence of some covert operation to perpetrate ethnic massacre.
Tempers flared as a result of these accusations. In 2003, the security forces arrested about thirty members of Die Boeremag, a militia that had already staged an attack in Soweto and stockpiled a ton of explosives. That same year, however, the National Police Commission refuted these arguments, denying that the attacks were directed solely against the minority. South Africa is the fifth country in the world in terms of murder rate. In the first quarter of last year alone, 6,400 people died at the hands of common criminals.
The political scene has benefited from discontent. The Liberty Plus Front has become the political tool of the nostalgic, but also of those who no longer believe in a questioned regime and of those who want a white republic in the African savannah. In the last election, held in 2019, he obtained 414,000 votes and ten MPs.
Distrust is not a recent phenomenon. Between 1995 and 2006, 20% of the population of European origin emigrated and some agricultural entrepreneurs took over farms in Anglo-Saxon countries, but also in unexpected countries such as Brazil or Georgia. Economic decline also plays a role. While their economic situation is mostly privileged, 10% of white workers are unemployed, a quarter of the national average, and a third plan to emigrate once they get the right passport.
The incidents fuel discontent and at the same time the fundamentalist factions try to make them profitable. In 2020, the murder of Brendin Horner shocked the country. The body of this young 21-year-old farmer was found tied to a post with signs of torture and numerous knife wounds.
Far-right groups wearing police uniforms from the previous apartheid regime later provoked riots in front of the court that tried the suspects, which also gathered anti-white supremacy EEF militants. There were no convictions due to lack of conclusive evidence. The theory of genocide becomes strong in the most radical of mentalities. The rainbow fades as the years go by.
Orania is the closest thing to an Afrikaner dream. This small town, on the banks of the Orange River and located in the Northern Cape province, is an artificial bastion of the culture and politics of the descendants of Dutch and French Huguenots. The 1,700 inhabitants share the same pale skin, the Afrikaans language, a common currency called ora, and their own flag, on which a boy rolls up his shirtsleeves against a blue-orange background.
It is difficult for the boy to grow up and become a leader of the masses. Although the population is in the most sparsely populated area of the country, it would take a mass displacement to give it a white majority. Relatively untouched by South African turbulence, this backward area is reminiscent of the Boer republics, but unlike previous colonisations, it has retained ethnic homogeneity. The neighbours, rich and poor, are white, in contrast to the surrounding reality, where whites, Asians and a black elite coexist with the majority of indigenous and mestizo descent, ordinary residents of the less favored suburbs.
The ideological project supported by Orania does not hide its roots, sunk in apartheid. Carel Boshoff, its promoter, is the son-in-law of Hendrik Verwoerd, one of the architects of the segregation regime. Its creation in 1990 seems like an attempt to find refuge after the collapse of an entire social and political system. The same nostalgia overwhelms the inhabitants of Kleinfontein, an urbanization located on the outskirts of the capital Pretoria, inhabited by a thousand whites and where strangers of a different skin color are not allowed to enter.
Both experiments cannot change the direction of a country of more than 60 million that mainly receives emigrants from all over Africa and mainly the Indian subcontinent. It is hard to believe in a white-only South Africa, even though they remain an extremely significant minority in relation to their numbers.
Source: La Verdad
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