JUST over five years ago, on May 30, 2008, I opened this column by saying “this is a sentence that I never wanted to write: I am ashamed to be South African and I am ashamed to be a Capetonian. It is a sentence that I never wrote in the worst days of apartheid.”
Today I want to say again, I am ashamed to be South African and I am ashamed to be a Capetonian.
On Wednesday, I was hosting a group of 19 students from the floating university, the MV Explorer. We began their tour in St George’s Mall, where I explained the historic nexus of Newspaper House and the old Cape Times building in Burg Street with Parliament, the High Court, St George’s Cathedral, and the old financial heart of Cape Town centred around the old Syfrets and Reserve Bank buildings.
It’s a neat way to explain the cosy alliance between mercantile capital, the legislature, the church, the judiciary and the Fourth Estate that drove Britain’s early expansion into, and colonisation of, Africa.
Outside the Provincial Legislature, a vocal but orderly crowd of some 3 000 protesters completed the 21st century picture. But it wasn’t too long before breakaway groups of protesters went on a looting spree, targeting stalls owned by a rainbow continent of vendors from all the corners of previously colonised Africa.
And the memories of the xenophobic mob violence that sparked that 2008 “I am ashamed” column came flooding back. My American guests were spared having to witness the worst of it. But there was still enough danger lurking when they later left to meet with Archbishop Desmond Tutu for me to escort them to their bus, checking as we went that the coast was clear.
Mohamad Farah, the Somali trader from whom I buy my cold Cokes, had had his stall at the entrance to our building looted and Mohamad was injured. Greenmarket Square had been trashed.
Yesterday morning I read in the Daily Voice that ANC councillor, Loyiso Nkohla, rallying supporters in KTC for the march, said “you will not have to go hungry because there are so many places you can loot in the CBD. The police can’t arrest us because there will be too many of us.”
And the Cape Argus quoted another march leader, expelled ANC city councillor, Andile Lili, as saying “once she goes to Khayelitsha, we will attack Helen Zille. Once she goes to Kraaifontein we will attack Helen Zille. We don’t want to see white Helen Zille because she is a racist. We hate her as she hates us as black and coloured communities.”
One can assume that on the basis of these statements alone, Nkohla will be charged with incitement and sedition. And one can assume that Lili will be charged with, at the very least, hate speech, incitement to violence and sedition.
No matter how much the ANC via Marius Fransman and others distance themselves from Wednesday’s despicable mob behaviour, it is now clear that the ANC is set to run a very dirty and desperate campaign to wrest control of the Western Cape back from the Democratic Alliance.
More evidence of this came yesterday when state resources were evidently used to bus in a large crowd clad in ANC T- shirts to heckle Zille as she stood to formally welcome dignitaries, Jacob Zuma among them, at the launch of the Saldanha Industrial Development Zone.
I don’t often agree with Helen Zille, but I have to agree with her response that “the ANC clearly has no respect for democracy, and has no sense of the separation between party and state. It uses state funding as its private piggybank, and will continue doing so throughout the election, unless this abuse is stopped.”
And for a worryingly muddled response to Wednesday’s mayhem, consider this extract from a statement by the SA Communist Party’s Brian Bunting District:
“As the SACP we are calling upon the DA government to take full responsibility (for the) looting and chaos that resulted from the neglect and extreme arrogance by the DA government. We believe the march was peaceful until it became clear to our people that the DA government was not interested in hearing their demands… The public will be persuaded to believe that theirs is an act of hooliganism. We have seen how leaders of our liberation movements were reduced to criminals when they were fighting for a good cause.”
So Wednesday’s looting and mayhem was part of “people’s struggles” and “fighting for a good cause”? Brian Bunting must be turning in his grave.
tonyweaver@iafrica.com