Focus On South Africa

SOUTH AFRICANS CRY FOWL OVER ASYLUM POLICY

Four years ago, from May 11 to 21 in 2008, poor South Africans from mainly informal settlements and townships, in a fit of rage over their worsening standard of living, took the law into their own hands by venting their anger on the suspected cause of their rising poverty – foreigners.

Zimbabweans, Mozambicans, Malawians, Congolese and Somalis were the main victims.

The scale of the violence and destruction of property took the world by surprise. The official death toll was put at 42 - a number which some expressed some doubt over, arguing that it was much higher.

But no matter how low or high the death toll, the most important thing is that the violence against foreigners left the South African Government and the ruling African National Congress (ANC) – the party of Nelson Mandela which has always seen itself as a black  grassroot liberation movement – with egg on its face. For through this violence – which the Government, the ANC, the local and international press condemned as xenophobia – the poor black South Africans were expressing their anger at the way the Government and ANC were abandoning them in favour of foreigners.

In a country regarded as Africa’s biggest economy in which live the richest people in Africa, but ironically also live one of the poorest, social instability is poised to be the biggest challenge as the government’s illogical policies plunge the poor further down the pit of poverty. For, as the poor come more and more to realize that the government is getting out of touch with them, a new culture of protests and violence is emerging. And more worryingly with it is the viewing of crime as the only means to getting one’s national share from a corrupt and unjust political and economic system.

This is the stark reality that stared me in the face when I decided to go out and find out from the ordinary people of South Africa where they stand on xenophobia four years after the attacks on foreigners.

My friend Moses, who resides in Soweto, agreed to take me to Alexandra Township where it all began. He had been born and raised there before moving to Soweto three years ago. Aged 65, he knew a lot about the political history of the place - which the locals affectionately called "Alex". Because I was there for the time, and knew no-one there, I relied heavily on him as a guide.

 Driving around the Township on that Saturday afternoon of May 19, 2012, we came to a halt in front of a shack. There we were welcomed by a man in his thirties who went by the name of Tshepo. With him were two of his friends, who preferred I called them Ricky and Sbu.
What I found remarkable about the trio was their honesty in admitting their participation in the attacks.

“You know what, my brother; the problem with our country is that we do not have real politicians who can really dedicate their lives to the upliftment of the lives of the poor majority. What we have are opportunists who, once they get elected, fall to the temptations of the luxuries which the rich side of our vastly economically divided country offers. They immediately abandon their constituencies and immerse themselves in self-enrichment and the enjoyment of a luxurious life. Corruption becomes a part of their lives. Tell me my brother, in those circumstances, what are the poor people supposed do?”

He went on to explain that what happened with the attacks on foreigners was regrettable but unavoidable.

“Look my brother, it was not our wish to attack our brothers and sisters from the Southern African Development Community (SADC), but the attacks must be viewed in the same light as the attacks that are always taking place between South Africans, as what you see between our taxi operators – which the media refers to as taxi wars. Are they not about money? That is the same story with our SADC brothers and sisters. It is also about money. The thing is, these guys are accepting very low wages which we South Africans can’t accept because of the quality of life that we have to lead in line with our culture and the state of development of our country. So they are taking all the jobs and we are left jobless and regarded as unemployable. So when we turned on them with sticks, it was to teach them a lesson. The calling of our actions as xenophobia in this context is not proper because it is taken out of context. You can see they even use that word to criminalize any attempts by us to question this madness they call “asylum policy”. It’s a cheap way by the local media and the government to shut us up”.

Pausing for a while, he cast his eyes to the ground as he turned his golf cap over and over in his hands. He then raised his head slowly and said;

“I say it is regrettable because it is not their (the foreigners’) fault that they are here in South Africa. The fault lies with our own government which no longer implements immigration laws in order to protect its citizens from unfair competition from foreigners in the job market. Now our war is with the government. While we fight against the “asylum policy” we will at the same time be demanding to be paid unemployment benefits or else this country will become ungovernable. We will even engage in crime to take by force what is justifiably ours; for it is a shame to die of hunger, but heroic to die from the bullets of the police”.

Ricky then quipped in; “Even our sisters feel it is better to die of AIDS than of hunger. That’s why they are getting into prostitution. That’s why they are now being recruited by the foreign drug lords who are also here thanks to the so-called asylum policy. As you already know, some of them (our sisters) are in prisons in far away foreign lands. Others have been executed there. The name of South Africa has been tainted thanks to the so-called asylum policy”.

Surprisingly, the interview had all of a sudden assumed a solemn and pensive air. I raised my head to look around - since we were seated outside the shack – at the sprawling shacks. For a moment I felt like I smelt poverty in the air. I looked at the children playing near flowing sewage and wondered at their chances of dropping out of school or fall victim to the rising scourge of teenage pregnancy.

For a moment I felt like saying to the guys, “You talk sense my brothers”. But out of fear of this being interpreted as a verbal and unequivocal support for xenophobia, I could only manage to mumble; “The government must indeed own up to its mistakes”.

Yes I agreed with them. The issue of xenophobia was indeed becoming a hot potato in South Africa. No-one wanted the xenophobia tag attached to them.

Immediately the case of Maggie Maunye came into my mind. As the ANC Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs, she once raised the issue of asylum seekers some time last year, but when she was told that she was engaging in xenophobia, she chickened out of the idea.

However, for the first time since I came to South Africa, I found myself looking at the whole issue of asylum seekers from the perspective of poor ordinary South Africans. My mind started racing back to what I have been seeing and hearing for the past months as it tried to pierce them together so that they could make some sense.

Indeed, the flock of foreigners into South Africa with the introduction of the asylum seeker policy at the advent of democracy in 1994 had seen an uncontrolled movement of people into the country, not only from neighbouring countries and other African countries, but from countries as far afield as the continent of Asia, such as Pakistan and Bangladesh.

 According to the information released by the Director-General Mr. Mkhuseli Apleni, South Africa is the highest recipient of asylum seekers in the world. About three hundred thousand people were applying for asylum in South Africa per year.

All that the asylum seeker needs to do is to enter the country illegally and then go to any of what are called Refugee Reception Centres spread across the country to register oneself as an asylum seeker. No form of identity or proof as to the name and nationality of the person are required. For those who do not have the guts to enter the country illegally, they can enter legally with their passports, as long as they have managed to get the requisite visa, and then as soon as they are in the country they can then throw away the passport and go to any Refugee Reception Centre to register as an asylum seeker. They are then free to live in South Africa for as long as they want. There are no refugee camps, so they can roam the streets in search of money and can sleep anywhere, even in the open.

Once a person gets a refugee status, a process which can take even ten years, they can then apply for permanent residence after five years, and for citizenship after another five years.

The system has resulted, on one side, in the rising incidence in squatting in abandoned buildings with no water or electricity; over-crowding in rented buildings and flats as testified by the constantly blocked sewages; rising numbers of street people; rising numbers of street vendors; selling of drugs on the streets with its negative and dangerous impact on school children; rising crime; serious sanitary conditions as people relieve themselves in the open; rising incidents of vandalism, a dirty environments; and a general decline in public order.

On the other side, low-paying jobs in the farms, factories, shops and restaurants are being taken up by foreigners.

Somalis, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis move into informal settlements and townships to set up tuck-shops, thereby killing any seed of entrepreneurship that could have been geminating within the local people. The result of this is that local people have been turned into servants and the immigrants have become masters.

An organization that has been very concerned about this development is the Greater Gauteng Business Forum. Made up of black business people, one of the the organisation’s objectives is to empower the poor township dwellers with the skills and means with which to enable them to start their own shops and other cottage business ventures. In order to make that possible, they had to request all foreign business people to leave the townships to make way for local businesses. Unfortunately, the local media has attached the xenophobia tag to their activities.
Times Live, the on-line daily newssite run by South Africa's weekly newspaper The Sunday Times, made a field day of a scene in which some women who had allowed some Somali and Pakistani nationals to use part of their homes as tucksshops confronted members of the Greater Gauteng Business Forum with their grievences. In an article wrongly entitled "Xenophobia meets its march'' (2nd June 2011 00.21), the on-line newssite painted the whole incident with a xenophobia brush. It interpretted the women's actions as a stand against xenophobia, yet the old women were merely expressing their fears that if the foreigners were to leave they (the women) would be left without an income, at least in the short term. If any fair criticism was to be directed at the organisation, it would have been that the organisation should have held meetings with the owners of propreties where the whole empowerment programme should have been discussed before taking to the streets.

What is worrying on a national level is that the immigrants are building their own informal business networks, connected to each other mainly by their religion – as all Somalis, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis are Muslims – in which money circulates among themselves before it is sent unofficially to their respective countries.

The way the network operates is such that it has given the foreigners an edge over formal businesses. This is because of their ability to avoid official scrutiny. They do not use tills and receipts in the manner that they are used in formal businesses. They also employ other immigrants in an informal manner and therefore pay them less and do not issue them with official pay slips. In most cases the people who operate the tills are family members. They also deal a lot in counterfeit goods and are quick to pay a bribe when approached by a law enforcement agent. They either do not pay tax or just pay a fraction of what they are supposed to pay. According to some independent estimates, the amount of money they handle runs in the billions of rands per year.

As the networks grow, so is their need for more of their family members to join them. And they all come through the same asylum policy route. But they do not need to stand in the queues at Refugee Reception Centres because the business networks have such enormous financial muscle that they can bribe any Home Affairs official to process their refugee statuses quickly. In some cases, whole families are migrating to South Africa under such circumstances.

Acquiring South African citizenship seems to be their main goal. Those who cannot do so in a legal way take the root of marriage. Because of the abject poverty in most black families, handing their daughters to these foreigners for thousands of rands is like a dream come true. The Eastern Cape is where they find most of these poor families. It is now becoming a common sight in the streets of South Africa to see a black South African woman in Muslim dress.

I remember seeing, about two years ago when I was at the Johannesburg Park Station to catch a bus to Kimberly, four Pakistani-looking men walking with three South African girls in Muslim dresses. Finding it rather strange, I turned to the man who was helping me with my luggage; “What’s happening there? I asked him in Zulu.

“Mister, it’s very strange but we are used to it now. Those girls are from the Eastern Cape and have been given away in marriage to those makhula. That is the shame that has descended upon us black people”, he answered me in a mournful voice.

Because of their growing numbers and growing financial muscle, mosques are mushrooming all over South Africa. And local people are crying fowl!

Just recently, about two months ago, a Muslim organization offered to buy a disused church in central Johannesburg with the purpose of turning it into a Muslim school. The news sent shock-waves through both black and white South Africans. The spokesperson of the church struggled to explain that things have changed as central Johannesburg has been taken over by Muslim immigrants from Asia.

But one man went on to warn that allowing a foreign religion - whose teachings such as jihad, shariah law and the oppression of women, were contrary to the culture and constitution of South Africa – was retrogressive. It remains to be seen how the issue will end.

Such also is the growing influence of Muslim charities that they are assuming a national character. One such organization is the Gift of the Giver which is fast establishing itself as the face of South Africa by undertaking international operations. However its strategy came under scrutiny and criticism when it moved huge amounts of food from South Africa to Somalia late last year at the height of a famine in that country. Indigenous black South Africans were not amused. And so too were their white compatriots.

 But the one who came out publicly and condemned the organisation’s headline-grabbing adventures was none other than the King of Zululand, King Goodwill Zwelithini.

He (the king), summoned President Jacob Zuma to his royal palace to air his displeasure to him over the issue.

“We are not a rich country because the majority of our people cannot afford three meals a day. We have women and children who are sleeping with hunger in this county. We have people who are dying of hunger in this country. So why are you allowing these people called the Gift of the Giver to rob our people of their food and take it to Somalia?” the king is quoted as having asked President Zuma.
Coincidentally, and as if to confirm the king's words and actions, some weeks after the king’s confrontation with President Zuma, the Sowetan, a national daily tabloid, carried a grim and sad story about for children who had died of hunger in the North West Providence of South Africa. The children; Sebengu Mmupele (9), Mmapule Mmupele (7), Olebobeng (6) and Oarabetswe (2) died after Elizabeth Mmupele (27) the mother to Olebobeng and Oarabetswe and the sister to Sebengu and Mmapule, had left them to go and ask for food from her mother Martha Mmupele some kilometers away. When they realized that she had taken long to return, the children decided to follow her. However, they collapsed on the way and by the time they were found all four of them were dead.

Just as the king could not understand why the government of South Africa watched nonchalance as the Gift of the Giver was moving food out of South Africa, ordinary South Africans also do not understand why the government is bringing into the country all these immigrants. The issue is discussed everywhere where people gather in an informal way – on the train, on the buses and even in pubs.

This was illustrated by a vendor who was selling some fruits on the train from Johannesburg to the satellite town of Springs in the East Rand.

As he was about to get off the train he realised that a man, who looked like a mental patient,was sleeping across the doorway. That meant that he had to jump over the man in order to disembark. But that was not possible as he was carrying a box of fruits. Frustrated, he looked up at the people in the coach and uttered in Zulu; “My people, our country has indeed gone to the dogs. It is no wonder why all the foreigners are flocking to this country because here they can do as they like".

The laughter that followed almost turned the coach over. And amid the laughter, another man shouted; “Yebo, selibolile leli lizwe!” (Yes, this country is rotten!).

This reminded me of another incident in a toilet at the Pretoria Railway Station. After I had used the urinal I realized that I could not wash my hands because the taps were dry. I turned to the toilet cleaner and asked him why there was no water. Replying in Tshwana, he said; “How can there be water if the makhula are playing with it. It looks like they do not use tissues but use water instead. And the water messes up the floor. I cannot touch it because it is contaminated water. That’s why I have to close the taps. I don’t understand why this government is bringing all these makhula here!”

The word makhula is the local name for people from Asia, mainly Arabs, Indians, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis. It is actually from a Zulu word “ukhula”, which means the weeds that grow up in a maize field and multiplies rapidly and can suffocate the life out of the maize plant if they are not uprooted at the right time. Asians regard it as derogatory. South African musician, actor and film director, Bongeni Ngema, once composed a song called “Amakhula”. It was banned before it could reach shop shelves because of the complaints raised by South Africans of Asian origin, who regard the word as derogatory.

As the issue of foreigners is becoming a hot topic, the mocking of the Government, the ANC and its leadership is also gaining some ground.

“It is Mandela who brought us this shame. He is the one who introduced this asylum policy because he wanted to please the world but unfortunately at our expense”, said one woman in a taxi from Vereeniging to Johannesburg.

A man, who was being referred to as AK47, uttered, “We black people are not in charge of running this country. The whites are no longer in charge but neither are blacks. It is the makhula who are running this country. They have hijacked our revolution – the black revolution! Look at the Minister of Finance! Look at the President’s spokesperson! Look at the Deputy Minister of Home Affairs! What about those operating behind the scenes! There are all over in government departments.”

He went on: “The biggest mistake made by Mandela was to call this nation a rainbow nation. This is a black nation. The term rainbow nation is a disgrace to us blacks. More so when you come to think that a rainbow does not even have the colour black. I think we must ditch Mandela and embrace Steve Biko and the Black Consciousness philosophy because it restores black dignity by restoring the country and its wealth to its rightful owners – we the black people.” There was applause.

“AK47, all we need to do is to introduce black consciousness philosophy in the ANC. I have faith in the current rebel ANC Youth League. Give these boys and girls another ten years and they will be in power. And that will mark the true dawn of black freedom in South Africa” chipped in another man they called Bra Sam, as the others cheered. It appeared to me they were members of the ANC going to some meeting. Then I got a clue from their talking that they were going to Soweto for the Sharpville Massacre commemorations.

“Are you saying there is nothing we can do for now but wait for ten years for these boys and girls to take over Bra Sam?” shouted a woman at the back seat.

“Of course, Princess Lebo, in the meantime we can continue to talk to Government in the language it understands the most; toy-toying, burning tyres and burning public buildings”, answered Bra Sam, triggering more laughter.

Then all of a sudden the woman in the back seat, who had been referred to as Princess Lebo, burst into song, at which all joined in.

My final surprise came from an informal meeting I had with a diplomat from a SADC country in Pretoria. The diplomat, who requested anonymity as the meeting was not a formal one, came out in full support of ordinary South Africans.

”Yes, that’s correct! The South Africa Government is worsening the plight of its poor black majority because of its open border policy. It needs to invest a lot of money on the poor people in order to lift them out of poverty. It must provide free education and free food at school, and even clothing, as a way to fight poverty and encourage children to remain in school to the end. Some of the money worsted on the asylum policy could be diverted towards poverty alleviation in poor communities,” he said.

Even us in the SADC are very uncomfortable with the uncontrolled flow of foreigners, especially those from Asia, into South Africa, as that may pose a huge security threat in the region, especially in this era of terrorism. Besides the economic, cultural and social instability they also pose, we are also very much concerned about the risk to food security. This mass uncontrolled immigrations of people into our region has the capacity to obliterate our food reserves. Remember, Southern Africa is the most peaceful region on the continent but I am afraid that may no longer be the case if the South African Government continues to behave in the manner that it is doing. Mind you, these Asians are actually acquiring South African documents and with them attempt to move into other SADC states so that they can expand their networks”, he said as he removed his glasses to wipe his eyes with his right hand.

He said the biggest mistake the South African Government was making was to view itself as some kind of a superpower.

‘You can see how, in its pursuit of international fame and influence, it is trying to appease the Palestinians and how it is making an enemy out of Israel. It is behaving like a fundamentalist Arab state. Our position as SADC is to adopt a neutral position with regards to that age-old Jewish-Arab conflict”. He said.

He went on to blame the lack of serious intellectualism in South Africa as the main cause of the mess unraveling in the country. He said most policies pursued by the government lacked logic.

“Now Dlamini-Zuma wants the chair of the African Union. But are you aware that South Africa is the only country in Africa that does not celebrate Africa Day as a holiday. If you don’t celebrate Africa Day as a holiday it means that your ordinary citizens do not even notice the day. It means that the ordinary citizens are denied the right and privilege to celebrate the day with the rest of their fellow Africans. How then do you expect your people to understand Africa and learn to appreciate the importance of Africa and of African unity if you do not give them the opportunity to do so? Whom do you blame when your people turn against other Africans because of their ignorance? If you can’t lead your people into the family of Africa, how then can you lead the family of Africa to its promised land?” he said, staring in my eyes.

That set my mind working fast. Indeed, if they were intellectuals in South Africa how come none of them is saying anything about the real issues facing the country?

Is it not a mystery that while the poor are becoming poorer as unemployment shoots up to 25.2%, and budget deficits are becoming the order of the day as the Government is faced with a shrinking tax base at a time when there is a need for it to raise welfare spending, that the issue of asylum seekers is never raised even by such analysts as Moeletsi Mbeki, or by such a vocal opposition party as the Democratic Alliance?

It appears there are more questions than answers to the rot that is besetting South Africa. Questions which, nevertheless, must be answered if sanity is to be established in the corridors of the Union Buildings; and peace is to be established in the streets of the country’s townships.