Even if all the illegal immigrants leave the country, we will remain the majority who do not own the means of production and continue living as beggars, Yolanda Mhlungu dissects some of the key issues in the growing conflicts between some nativists and migrants in South Africa.
Our country is overcome by uncertainty, fear, anxiety and growing intolerance of one another. Deep economic and social insecurity, rising unemployment, poverty, high levels of crime and failing public services are indeed the daily lived experience of the average South African.
Add pressure on public services, anger over mismanagement, overcrowded clinics and hospitals, stretched schools and failing municipalities, then you have a ticking time bomb.
Perhaps the time for that bomb to explode has come, but the irony is those who are truly responsible for the state we find ourselves in as a country will not be affected by the explosion.
It is a fallacy to view African illegal immigrants as a root cause of the crisis in the country. The common denominator in Africa remains consistent from Cape to Cairo — it is not xenophobic South Africans, nor is it millions of poor people who run away from horrific conditions at home to seek better opportunities elsewhere.
It is a lack of collective decisive leadership, or perhaps African state leaders are decisive, and they have decided to keep their people in perpetual poverty.
Poor Africans who run to South Africa only to live in precarious conditions, face exploitation, earn low wages and remain vulnerable to criminal networks. They surely cannot be the cause of our problems if the wealthy continue getting wealthier and the Gini coefficient keeps on rising.
One is tempted to compare the attack on black foreigners by South Africans who feel abandoned and forgotten in the system to a hurt married woman who attacks her cheating husband’s mistresses instead of dealing with the real villain.
The system in our country has always been designed to exploit cheap black labour for the benefit of a white-controlled economy.
The system was designed to continue creating consumers and labourers of blacks instead of empowering them to be producers and captains of industries.
The iconic protest song Stimela (The Coal Train) was composed and sang by South African jazz trumpeter Hugh Masekela in 1974. It is a poignant lament about the brutal migrant labour system of apartheid, detailing the trains that brought black men from all over Southern and Central Africa to work in Johannesburg’s gold mines under dehumanising, slave-like conditions.
Masekela described the train acting as a vessel of economic displacement, collecting contract workers from countries like Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Angola, Mozambique, Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland while highlighting the irony that these men built the modern wealth and infrastructure of South Africa while suffering the loss of land, livestock, and families.
Unfortunately, the system that was built on cheap black labour has not only persisted post-1994, but it has continued to shape contemporary South African society.
The influx of millions of poor, vulnerable, undocumented migrants has created a field day for exploiters across various sectors, including agriculture, construction, hospitality, domestic work, and informal trading.
Present-day South Africa still is one of the primary destinations for immigrants. The influx of millions of poor, vulnerable, undocumented migrants has created a field day for exploiters across various sectors, including agriculture, construction, hospitality, domestic work, and informal trading.
These migrants remain a source of cheap labour who are paid below the minimum wage; employers avoid labour regulations and deny benefits and employers continue enjoy reduced cost and increased profits.
The endurance of the South African migrant labour system demonstrates how capital structures society to maximise profit at the expense of workers.
South African blacks were not exempt from being used as cheap labour. Homelands were left economically stagnant, ensuring that their inhabitants remained dependent on employment in urban centres, particularly mines, factories, and households.
Black men worked in the mines with migrant workers, while many black women left their homes to work in factories and as domestic workers for white families.
While many economists point out that the root causes of unemployment lie in structural economic failures, policy implementation, and a lack of skills matching rather than the presence of foreign nationals, poverty remains the main driver of conflict between locals and foreigners, with many unemployed locals accusing immigrants of taking their jobs.
Grassroots organisation March and March, which has positioned itself as advocates for the strict enforcement of immigration laws in South Africa, has set June 30 as the date to host a significant protest against illegal immigration.
The date is designated as a “deadline” for undocumented foreign nationals to leave the country amid growing concerns over the issue.
The movement that has gained significant traction and visibility over the past couple of months may have been able to gain popularity by convincing economically overburdened and insecure locals to redirect all their frustrations towards immigrants. But the message that they have been spreading — that poor black foreigners are the reason black locals remain poor — is duplicitous.
Communities have every right to raise concerns about crime, exploitation, illegal unemployment practices and pressure on local services such as health care, but we should worry about reducing our conversation to mere migrants.
The real issue is post-1994: our people do not own the means of production; our people do own land; our people are not captains of industries; and we are a majority that continues to be beggars in our own land.
Our ancestors who fought for our political freedom did not fight so that black South Africans would still be fighting for breadcrumbs such as low-paying jobs in their own land.
Whenever black people fight other black people, we should always remember what Julius Nyerere warned about in his speech that he delivered at the opening of a World Assembly of Youth seminar in Dar es Salaam in 1961.
He warned about the phase of the Second Scramble for Africa where, just like in the First Scramble for Africa, one tribe was divided against another tribe to make the division of Africa easier. In the Second Scramble for Africa, one nation is going to be divided against another nation, which is going to be divided against another, to make it easier to control Africa by making it weak and divided against itself.
While we continue to fight each other for breadcrumbs and perpetuate hate that will be a legacy for generations that will follow, the east and west continue to loot our continent and our resources for their own gain.
Capital has always excelled at planning ahead while we focus on distractions. Even if all the illegal immigrants leave the country, we will remain the majority who do not own the means of production and continue living as beggars.
Whatever gains South Africans will get from the March and March-organised protest on June 30 will be a bare minimum and breadcrumbs in their own land.
- Mhlungu is the chairperson of Defined People’s Thoughts – an advocacy group working to support marginalised black rural people.
