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| A Letter [boodskap #35333] |
Tue, 10 October 2000 00:00  |
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There's more to the political transformation of South Africa than what they
show on CNN.
When a country begins sliding into oblivion it really is the little things
that get to you. You wake up in the morning and turn to see what time it is.
The clock is off. The electricity is off again. Sometimes for a few minutes,
sometimes for a few hours, but it seems to happen more regularly than
before.
You pick up the phone at work to make a call. Nothing. Your neighborhood is
without telephone service again. You breathe a sigh of relief -- at least if
all the phones are out, they'll do something relatively soon to fix it. If
it's just your own line, it can take days before they'll do anything.
After the power comes on, you turn on the television to watch a favorite
program, and hope you get the right sound with the right picture. Sometimes
you get the sound of one show with the picture of another. Sometimes it's
just the one or the other. Or a radio station instead of the soundtrack.
You've read the papers -- a large number of the "old" employees have walked
out of the broadcasting studios. They couldn't take it anymore. And since
television is an arm of the government, their replacements are appointed
politically, not because of their experience or ability.
You drive home after going out for dinner. Entire neighborhoods are without
street lights. Well, to be more accurate they are without lights that work.
And the lights have been out for months. The city has said it won't fix
them.
These are the little things in South Africa today. These are the things that
annoy. The big things are too frightening even to consider.
Kafkaburg
For two years I couldn't get a water/electricity/tax bill from the city of
Johannesburg. Water and electricity are socialist enterprises here. I didn't
have an account number, nor did I know how much to pay. I tried calling the
bureaucrats, but no help there: they said they'd get back to me, but they
didn't.
On September 25th, they showed up to turn off my electricity for failure to
pay. The city workers refused to show identification, wouldn't say whose
account they were turning off, and wouldn't show any legal authorization to
do so. In fact, they told me they didn't have to speak a language I
understood (English). I called the police. I have a videotape of these civil
servants telling me they aren't obligated to identify themselves, and that
if I refused to allow them on the property they had the right to tear down
my gate. When I asked one of them for anything that would show them to be
city workers, he replied, "This isn't America you know." I know! I know!
I told him, "It's not Nazi Germany, either." He later chastised me for
running down "Nazi Germany." "I'm sorry," I said, "I didn't realize you were
a Nazi."
I went to the city hall and waited hours for someone to see me. I was
finally told to make a plan to pay the account. I was willing. I had R7,000
(7,000 rand) cash on me. But the bureaucrats wouldn't let me pay or make a
plan. They had forgotten to transfer the account to my name, you see; it was
still in the old owner's name and the bill was going to the wrong address. I
was ordered to wait until they changed it over and sent me a statement.
I pay a R700 deposit and go. Two days later they turn on the electricity.
Two months later, and still no statement has arrived. I call and call. "I'll
call you back," they say. They don't. I keep calling. Finally I get a sour
bureaucrat who tells me I'll have to pay R9,000 immediately and the rest
over six months. I asked about the year payment plan. That was discontinued
in November. "But I wanted to pay in October and you people wouldn't let
me," I protest. "That's your problem," she says.
Back at city hall, I see another woman who spends the entire time screaming
at everyone who comes near her. She screams in the phone. She screams at the
switchboard for "bothering" her with phone calls. She informs me that it's
my obligation to pay my account whether or not the city sends me a
statement. It doesn't matter if I don't know the amount owed. It doesn't
matter if I don't have an account number to which the money is to be
credited. My obligation is to pay an unknown sum into an unknown account,
and if I don't get it right they'll turn off my electricity.
I got off relatively easy, though. Today's newspaper told of one man who
received an account for R500,000 in water use. The man owns a well and
doesn't even use city water. When he went in to talk to the bureaucrats,
they were very sympathetic. They told him to pay 50 percent now or have his
electricity cut off.
The Rise of Violence
Recently, I went into a print shop to get some flyers printed. The woman
there was quite pleasant and we talked about the short blackout that day.
She asked what I was doing in South Africa and told me that she and her
family want to flee. Her family originally immigrated from India; like some
Indians she was quite dark. Clearly she was not a member of the class
"privileged" by apartheid. But what she said surprised me.
"My husband and I decided we were better off under apartheid. Sure now we
can live next to white people and ride the same bus. But those things aren't
important."
What is important? Not being afraid.
Today, the murder rate is ten times greater in South Africa than in the
United States. One world atlas reports: "South Africa is the world's most
dangerous country (beside war zones), with 40,000 murders a year." It wasn't
this way four years ago, before the ANC took power. But the government says
the murders are a "legacy of apartheid."
That's part of the problem. Everything that goes wrong is "a legacy of
apartheid." The violence in the rest of Africa is a "legacy of colonialism."
It's a legacy that has gone on for almost 40 years. Every time something
goes wrong (and that happens constantly), the same litany of excuses are
recited. "We inherited this problem from the corrupt apartheid regime."
I lived for thirty-some years in the U.S. and never met anyone who had been
shot. I was never near a bank robbery. Never heard of a friend's car being
hijacked. Only one person I knew suffered a burglary.
In the last two years many people I know have been burglarized. In fact,
burglary is so common that people have stopped talking about it. One of my
friends was hit six times in one year. The last time I saw him I asked what
he had done that day. "I got a new TV," he said. "Oh, how generous of you,"
I replied. He has since left for England.
White farmers in particular are being targeted. Some, like Werner Weber,
president of the Agricultural Employers Organization, believe there is an
orchestrated campaign to force whites off the land so it can be
redistributed. Farm attacks rise almost every year: 92 killed in 1994, 121
in 1995, 109 in 1996 and 140 last year. In some attacks people are murdered
but nothing is stolen, indicating that robbery isn't the motive. Farmer
Dudley Leitch told an AEO meeting that while the murder rate among South
Africans in general is 13 per 100,000, it is 120 per 100,000 for farmers.
A major cellular phone company placed an anti-crime ad in a newspaper
saying, "President Mandela -- you were in prison. Now we all are." A top
official of the bureaucracy that regulates telephones called the company and
the ad was withdrawn. I guess it was too rude to state the obvious.
In America, you don't see what's happening. I know; I watch CNN. It doesn't
even come close to telling the truth about the decline and death of South
Africa. The American media can't tell the truth now -- they have invested to
o much in telling everyone what a saint Mandela is.
Meanwhile, we live in prisons. My house has a set of bars on the outside of
the windows and another set inside. I have a Rhodesian ridgeback dog
patrolling the yard. I had a big, spiked, remote-controlled gate put in the
drive. I can't afford the precautions that others are taking. You now see
individual homes with security guards. Walls over eight feet tall are
common, with barbed wire or spikes on top. Across the street, my neighbors
put an electric fence on the wall -- now a commonplace sight. People are
armed and have hired private security companies. In the U.S. following all
these precautions would be considered paranoid. Here it's average.
Police Story
On the street where my bookstore is located, a grocery has been robbed a
couple of times. So were the post office and bank.
In the last few months, four of my customers have been hijacked by armed
gangs, one of them in my parking lot. One was shot through the leg, another
was shot at but missed. Another was beaten and spent weeks in the hospital.
Well over 3,000 hijackings are reported each year. A family driving to
Durban for holiday pulled to the side of the road so the two little boys
could get out and take care of business. Several hours later the police
found the two children sitting against the bodies of their dead parents;
murdered for a car.
The new president of the ANC, Terror Lekota, told the press that the
hijackings are the fault of apartheid. He claims the "apartheid regime" gave
immunity from prosecution to hijackers in exchange for "intelligence"
gathering on the ANC. Last year, another top government official blamed the
spate of hijackings on whites. He said there was no crime wave at all, and
that whites were inventing crimes just to collect insurance.
The acting head of the Licensing Department for the Johannesburg area,
Gerrie Gerneke, issued a report in July 1997 confirming that the department
was in the control of criminal syndicates. He said that half of all cars
stolen in the Johannesburg area are "legalized" with new official documents
within 30 days of being stolen. He said that cooperation between criminal
gangs and union members has made it impossible for senior staff members or
security staff to take any action. After Gerneke's report to the government
was made, two anonymous letters accused him of being a racist. As a result
of these anonymous complaints, Gerneke was suspended for five months. A year
later Gerneke says the government has not acted on any of his
recommendations to deal with corruption. When a car theft ring was recently
exposed, five of the 16 individuals arrested were policemen. The chief
investigator said, "We found that policemen were receiving stolen cars and
then selling them to their clients."
In 1997 corruption reached such a level that Mandela appointed a Special
Investigating Unit to look into the matter. According to Judge Willem Heath,
head of the unit, there are currently more than 90,000 cases under
investigation. If Heath and his crew manage to resolve one case of
corruption per day, including weekends and holidays, it will take about 247
years to clear the current backlog. This doesn't include any new cases that
will arise. Heath thinks the cases involve a sum of around 6 billion rand.
In 1997 approximately 2,300 police officers were charged with corruption --
just about one every three hours. Almost 500 police officers have appeared
in court on charges of working with criminal gangs. In the Johannesburg area
alone 700 police officers are facing trials for committing crimes ranging
from murder to burglary. And everyone assumes this is only the tip of the
iceberg.
Over the last two years,there have been dozens of major highway robberies.
In broad daylight gangs of a dozen men armed with AK-47s and other
"military" weapons attack security trucks carrying large amounts of cash.
These robberies have netted millions for the gangs. Government officials
blame security companies, banks, and anyone else they can think of. But some
arrests have finally been made, the ringleaders have turned out to be ANC
activists. The leaders who were arrested were officials in the so-called
"armed wing" of the ANC, Umkhonto weSizwe. One gang leader had been Youth
League secretary for the Johannesburg area. A close associate of his, also a
gang leader, was arrested but "escaped" from jail. Both were recent guests
at the birthday party of Peter Mokaba, Deputy Minister of Environmental
Affairs and Tourism. There is evidence that Umkhonto weSizwe activists are
not only behind some of the robberies, but that they are working with other
armed cadres associated with so-called liberation movements from bordering
countries.
In 1997 alone, there were 465 bank robberies. In all about $40 million was
taken. Banks are raising their fees substantially to compensate for the
losses.
Crime seems to be the only thing that works in South Africa -- the risk of
being arrested, tried and convicted is minuscule. In 1997, only 14.6 percent
of murders led to arrest and conviction. Of 52,110 rapes there were only
2,532 convictions -- about 6.7 percent. For the 330,093 burglaries there
were 15,710 convictions, about 4.8 percent.
Experienced prosecutors have quit their jobs, replaced by novices who owe
their positions to affirmative action.
During the 1997 Christmas season, the police and prisons "lost" almost 300
prisoners. In one instance a policeman took two prisoners to a bar for
drinks. One of them borrowed his keys and returned to the jail to release 23
other prisoners. At another jail nine prisoners walked out, leaving behind a
note: "We are out for Christmas and will be back on January 3." (They didn't
come back.) Several prisoners left a police van when guards didn't bother
locking it.
In 1995, Sylvester Mofokeng was taken out of his cell for a soccer game.
When he was returning to prison, he simply jumped out of the truck and ran
through gates that were left unlocked. He was rearrested three months later,
but in August 1996 he escaped again. Somehow he obtained a gun from a
visitor and used it to force guards to release him.
Josiah Rabotapi is believed to be the leader of an armed robbery syndicate
involved in the theft of up to $14 million in 30 armed robberies. He is also
wanted for 16 murders. So far he has been arrested three times and escaped
every time. Jan van der Westhuizen, a convicted murderer, has escaped from
prison or police custody seven times.
When the police aren't "losing" criminals, they are killing them. A recent
government report showed that one person dies every twelve hours either
while in police custody or as a result of police action. Two-thirds of these
deaths take place during apprehension. According to one report, "an overview
of 100 shooting incidents between police and civilians" showed a heavy
"imbalance in casualties." David Bruce, a researcher for the Centre for the
Study of Violence and Reconciliation said, "In only five of the cases was a
policeman hurt, and in one case a policeman was killed."
In the northern suburbs of Johannesburg, citizens are fighting back. In some
areas they have put security guards at the entrance to a subdivision.
Entrances are closed off with gates to control who comes in and who goes
out. Criminals can no longer simply load their cars with stolen goods and
speed out when security guards stop them at the gate. These areas have seen
dramatic reductions in crime. But the ANC has ordered the gates removed. It
claims these efforts force crime away from white areas and are therefore
racist.
This is life in South Africa today.
I've lived in South Africa for six years and I've seen a lot of changes.
Even a few for the good. But the standard of living has declined. And
people's attitudes have changed: hope is gone, replaced by fear, anxiety,
even horror. There is a joke going around: Americans have Bill Clinton,
Johnny Cash and Bob Hope. South Africans have Nelson Mandela, no cash and no
hope.
The Return of Apartheid
Another popular joke is that Mickey Mouse has a watch with the picture of
our Ministers of Finance. In the six years that I have lived here the South
African rand has depreciated by 50 percent. In just the last year it has
dropped 30 percent.
The government has conducted a massive "jobs" program. But since the ANC has
taken power the number of jobs has declined, despite sanctions being lifted
and increased trade with the rest of the world. The only job increases are
in government departments.
South African workers are not particularly productive. But the government
has been pushing new labor legislation that continues to drive up the cost
of South African labor. No wonder that fewer and fewer South Africans are
employed.
The ANC is pushing a new "Equity Employment" bill through Parliament. This
bill will force all employers to reserve a number of jobs for blacks.
Businesses that don't comply with the mandatory racial quotas face heavy
fines. And so apartheid is back -- the old laws in new packaging.
Recently, ANC members of Parliament have announced that they intend to
introduce legislation applying racial quotas to sports. Specifically, the
government wants to control rugby, a sport played traditionally by whites
(unlike soccer, which is dominated by blacks). Mandela ordered a commission
to investigate racism in the South African Rugby Football Union. SARFU took
the issue to court and the court ruled against the commission. ANC officials
then proclaimed the judge an unpatriotic racist for requiring Mandela to
testify on why the commission was created.
ANC MPs, unable to get control of rugby legally, resorted to intimidation.
They announced on the floor of Parliament that unless the leadership of
SARFU resigns, ANC members will forcibly close airports to prevent other
rugby teams from entering South Africa. Major corporations, all fearful of
the ANC, threatened to remove financial support from SARFU unless the ANC
got its way. Rugby head Louis Luyt, who had defeated an ANC partisan for the
job, was forced out by the threats. After Luyt resigned, SARFU apologized to
Mandela for making him go to court.
Communists in Government
The government of South Africa is actually a coalition of three groups. The
ruling triple alliance is made up of the Congress of South African Trade
Unions (COSATU ), the South African Communist Party (SACP), and the African
National Congress (ANC), which leads the coalition. The SACP has a lot of
influence in COSATU and together they exercise a great deal of control over
the ANC. Thabo Mbeki, who just replaced Mandela as leader of the ANC, and is
pegged to be president of South Africa when Mandela steps down, was trained
in Moscow. His father, Govan, is an old line Marxist and SACP activist. At a
recent ANC conference the hard left solidified its control over the ANC by
capturing nine of its eleven top positions. Of the ANC's 240 MPs in
Parliament, 80 were appointed by the SACP. The ANC and COSATU also used some
of their quotas to appoint SACP members to Parliament.
When Chris Hani was assassinated by Janus Waluz, a Polish immigrant, CNN
called Hani, "a top ANC official" or "anti-apartheid activist." But CNN
didn't mention that Hani was the head of the Communist Party and that Waluz
was a refugee from communism. Instead, the impression was given that Hani
was another Martin Luther King.
In the same way, many facts about Mandela and the ANC are never reported by
the media. For example, Mandela awarded South Africa's equivalent of the
U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom to Libya's Muammar al-Qaddafi. Mandela
has publicly said that Cuba is a model for a free, democratic society that
is, in fact, more democratic than the United States. Castro has been here
for friendly visits. When U.S. officials complained about Mandela's cozy
relationship with dictators, Mandela said that no other nation has the right
to interfere in South African affairs -- this from the man who supported
sanctions against the old government. Curiously, Mandela dropped recognition
of Taiwan at the demand of Communist China.
The ANC's Bill of Wrongs
Gay rights are now enshrined in South Africa's Bill of Rights. Gay
publications around the world have praised the ANC for this. But in fact gay
sex remains illegal. The government has taken no practical steps to legalize
homosexuality. When a gay rights group took the sodomy laws to the
Constitutional Court, the government opposed its effort. After a world-wide
outcry, the government backed down. It appears the ANC is hoping the courts
throw out the law, thereby taking credit for being pro-gay while not being
responsible for the change. Yet the South African government continues to
deny foreign gay partners of South Africans the right to stay in the country
legally. The issue is in court, but the government is opposed to changes in
the policy.
The ruling ideology is that "there are no absolute rights," so the ANC put
"weasel" clauses into the Bill of Rights. Any right guaranteed by the
Constitution can be ignored. For instance, the right to engage in enterprise
is absolute -- unless infringed "by law." Thus the government can do what it
wants since it passes the laws. Other constitutional clauses say rights can
be limited by government consistent with the operation of an "open" and
"democratic" society. And remember, Mandela considers Cuba democratic.
The bill of rights negotiated by various political parties guaranteed
freedom of speech. Repressive censorship laws were relegated to the dustbin.
But the ANC has been pulling them back out and wiping them off.
A bill to repeal censorship was introduced in Parliament. I even testified
in favor of it. The bill was mediocre but livable. Later, the ANC rewrote it
in secret and passed it without making a written version available. The new
bill actually creates a censorship body. All videos and films must be
approved by the censorship board before they can be distributed. So-called
"x-rated" material can be sold only in licensed adult shops. Anything deemed
"hate speech" is illegal. The new "obscenity" standard is that anything
"degrading" is illegal. Another victory for clear, concise legal concepts.
Lindiwe Sisulu, deputy minister of home affairs, said the government "tries"
to balance free speech with the rights of "society, in reality, however,
there can never be an absolute balance." This means "not all speech can be
equally protected." Sisulu interprets the new censorship legislation much
more strictly than in the past. She claims that "anyone who downloads
pornography from the Internet will commit an offense." Note that she has
broadened this beyond the act which banned "degrading" pornography,
bestiality, child porn, and hate speech. Now she says that any downloaded
porn is illegal. Expanding the prior censorship of films and videos, Sisulu
says all photos must be classified by the government before distribution.
"No person may screen a film or photograph, including on a computer screen,
which has not been classified by the Publications Board. This means that
anyone placing material on the Internet must have a classification
certificate for that material." In other words the government now claims the
right to classify -- and ban -- all photographs before they are distributed
to anyone.
Yet the ANC stills finds the bill of rights too restrictive of government.
Peter Mokaba recently gave a speech in a black area demanding that all
blacks vote for the ANC so it can get two-thirds control of Parliament. He
said this would allow it to rewrite the constitution and end all
restrictions on government power. ANC secretary general Kgalema Motlanthe
said that if the ANC won two-thirds control in the next election, it could
govern "unfettered by constraints."
Supine and Pusillanimous
In the last four years, the nation's largest string of newspapers has lost
its independence from the government after being taken over by Irish press
baron Tony O'Reilly. O'Reilly's Independent group is cozy with the ANC. An
article in The Times of London says O'Reilly has been criticized for "his
unhealthily close relationship with the ANC government. He began by
appointing an advisory board stacked with ANC supporters and has been vocal
in his support for all manner of ANC causes and watchwords." Journalists
have been unhappy that O'Reilly brought in his biographer, Ivan Fallon, to
run the newspapers because Fallon "is disliked for his refusal to stand up
to Government attempts to bully the press into uncritical support."
According to The Times O'Reilly's newspapers have downplayed scandals within
the ANC government. In the Virodene scandal, ANC politicians promoted -- and
still promote -- the so-called AIDS drug. Documents show that the company
producing the drug was planning to offer a six percent share of the profits
to the ANC. O'Reilly's papers "have played down the whole matter, neglecting
to cover key press conferences."
Other newspapers, however, still manage to criticize the government, and the
ANC and Mandela don't like it. Mandela constantly attacks the press for
being "opposed" to the "transformation." In fact the press, on the whole,
was staunchly critical of apartheid. Still, Mandela says the media, with the
exception of television, are racist. In the next few years, legislation
directed against the newspapers is almost certain. Mandela's hero, Robert
Mugabe of Zimbabwe, wiped out recalcitrant newspapers by simply turning them
over to the government.
Television is exempt from Mandela's criticisms because the three main
television stations are already controlled by the government. ANC officials
run the stations and they are often deathly silent about the problems in
South Africa. But they do have time for endless documentaries on Mandela and
the ANC, with titles like "Our Heroes." One new news director is a long-time
ANC supporter with no broadcasting experience.
Two new mini-series have been produced for the coming season: one is a
glowing film about the life of communist Helen Joseph and her fight for the
ANC, and the other is about ANC partisan Bishop Tutu. A new television
series, funded by the Labour Ministry, is called "Let's Talk." A recent
episode showed the workers, all of whom are called "comrades," on strike.
The owner of the factory, who for some reason had an American accent, locked
out the strikers. But the company management didn't know how to build their
own product, houses, and built them upside down! The government and the
trade unions seem to believe that entrepreneurs and management are useless,
and that all productivity comes from labor.
The South African Broadcasting System's political allegiances are no secret:
one station's promotional commercial shows its on-air talent in "rainbow"
clothing and marching with colorful flags to triumphant music. Several flags
feature the face of Mandela. In another Stalinoid presentation, the
television producers' award show included a musical number with the chorus,
"Oh, Mandela, we sing praise to you." Not long ago, the son of the former
president of the ANC, Oliver Tambo, who hosts an SABC talk show, ran an
hour-long special praising media mogul Tony O'Reilly. No doubt the fact that
O'Reilly has cuddled up to the ANC had nothing to do with the praise heaped
upon him.
Fascism, South African Style
Civil society is being politicized. Everything must be solidified in the
hands of the State and the State must be in the hands of the ANC.
Last year the government nationalized all water resources in South Africa.
Under new legislation it will be illegal to dig a well without prior
approval from the central government. The ANC attacked critics of the
legislation as "racist whites" who want to protect their luxury swimming
pools. Meanwhile the new rulers admit they can't find 45 percent of all the
water shipped to Johannesburg. Only 55 percent of the water is metered
out -- the rest simply disappears. But considering that meters are found
almost exclusively in white areas, while black areas have unmetered taps,
this should be no surprise.
But water is only the camel's nose in the tent. The ANC Minister of Mineral
Affairs, Penuell Maduna, called for the nationalization of all minerals,
saying that "private ownership of mineral rights is unacceptable to the
government." Government spokesmen call private ownership "racist" because
not everyone owns mineral rights in a private system. Maduna previously
floated the idea that the government should also control all oil companies.
Under the current system, price competition in petrol is forbidden and all
prices are set by the government.
The hospitals in South Africa have become nightmares. Two years ago Mandela
announced free medical care for children. The hospitals are now filled with
unemployed women and their children. They sit there for hours to have a
cough or a runny nose checked.
Dr. Zuma, Minister of Health, seems determined to make health care in South
Africa equally bad everywhere. She has conscripted all medical students to
be servants. They are to give two years of their lives to the State, to do
what the State orders, anywhere the State orders. The legislation doesn't
even specify that the service has to be in South Africa. Speculation is that
at least some will be assigned to Cuba.
When it was pointed out to Zuma that huge numbers of doctors and medical
students are now emigrating, she called them "traitors," and attributed
their fleeing to "racism." Wits School of Medicine reported that 45 percent
of all students who graduated in the last 35 years have already left the
country. A recent survey of the top doctors in South Africa revealed the
almost unanimous opinion that Zuma is destroying the nation's health-care
system. The Independent wrote, "Many doctors said that Zuma's apparent
intention to introduce a communist or socialist national health system was
stifling private practice and initiative. This, coupled with excessive
control and interference, has left doctors despondent." A spokesman for Zuma
responded by saying that if the proposals are "seen as socialist, then we
will continue to do so and offer no apologies."
The destruction of health care has even affected the food supply. Vaccines
that are urgently needed to protect livestock have run out. The only legal
source for purchasing the vaccines in South Africa is through the
government, and the government labs are empty. Farmers who send in their
checks to buy the vaccines have the money returned. The top veterinary
scientists are also leaving the country. At the Onderstepoort Research
Centre only one of the original six specialists is still there.
Onderstepoort, once considered one of the best research centers in the
world, is now limping along. Scientists say there is a good chance that
mutated viruses will decimate the beef, pork, and lamb industries before new
vaccines can be developed. They warn that the public should expect a
shortage of meat and milk as a result.
Under the old apartheid regime, government schools in black areas were
woefully deficient. When the ANC took over the education system things
changed. Now all the schools are woefully deficient. -- equality has been
achieved. But the number of students graduating from high school has
declined under the ANC. Those who do well in school prosper only if they are
the right color. The student who passed more courses with distinction than
any other student in South Africa can't even get a scholarship. Each
application he has made has been rejected because he's the wrong color. He
has the best scholastic record in the country but no one cares. It isn't
wise to give money to anyone not approved by the ANC.
In the Eastern Cape, near Port Elizabeth, is the impoverished Khwezi Lomso
Comprehensive School. The principal is Cecilia Behrent. During her tenure
the school has achieved a pass rate of 84 percent, well above the national
rate of 47 percent and double that of the provincial pass rate of 42
percent. The teachers' union, in cooperation with the government, has been
trying to have a union official replace Behrent, who is white. Her ouster is
opposed by almost every one of her 1,100 students, almost all the teachers,
and over 700 parents who have signed a petition on her behalf. The
government refused to accept the petition.
Johannesburg Besieged
Johannesburg was a relatively safe and clean city when I moved here. I moved
into a racially mixed area in the city center. I left a year later. Today, I
won't drive there in broad daylight. The streets are controlled by
criminals. Some gangs sit at street corners and rob passing motorists. They
break the car window, take what they want, pile it on the curb, and then
wait for another car. They don't even run with the stolen goods. They don't
need to; no one will arrest them.
Residents of my old neighborhood, Hillbrow, have discovered a new game: take
cans of trash and throw them from 15th floor windows at pedestrians. The
streets are filthy and reek of urine. Businesses are moving out. The luxury
Carleton Hotel held on for awhile but finally gave up the ghost. No one
would stay there, so the hotel closed its 200-plus rooms, and now sits
empty.
Mayhem reigned on New Year's Eve. In the Hillbrow section of the city,
nearly 200 police officers patrolled an area of just a few square blocks --
to no apparent effect. Three people were murdered on the streets that
evening. Police who tried to stop looters were pelted from the high-rise
apartment buildings. Paramedics were attacked when they tried to aid the
injured.
So the ANC took action. Johannesburg is a massive city, and the ANC promised
to break its management into several regions. "Local control" would then be
achieved with four gerrymandered districts. Each district was drawn in the
most convoluted way possible, ensuring that each had enough blacks. The ANC
knows where its voters live.
The city hired thousands and thousands of new bureaucrats. In many cases two
people did the same job -- one black worker with the title and one white
worker to do the work. Money was redistributed to the "previously
disadvantaged." While black townships haven't improved, white areas have
declined. Now Johannesburg, once the wealthiest city in Africa, can't pay
its bills, and can't get bank loans. It went from budget surplus to bankrupt
cy in just two years. More ANC magic.
This black magic is being worked throughout South Africa. The British-based
Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy recently said that 281
municipalities in South Africa are now technically bankrupt. That's one out
of every three cities in the country.
Public parks are now squatter camps. Broken water mains gush for days before
they're fixed. Pot holes remain unrepaired. The city budget allocates less
than $100,000 for street repairs for the entire city! Inefficiency reigns.
Under questioning in Parliament, ANC officials admitted that roads in
Gauteng have deteriorated under their management. Transport Minister Mac
Maharaj admitted that only 37 percent of the roads were in good or very good
condition in 1997 where this was true of 80 percent of the roads in 1985.
The Political Struggle
In Johannesburg the opposition party to the ANC is the Democratic Party
(DP). Once a leading anti-apartheid party, it is now the only real
opposition to the ANC left, and it has become increasingly libertarian. It
supports the rights of gay people and free enterprise. It opposes
affirmative action and censorship.
The northern suburbs are now staunch DP territory. And they are in a tax
revolt. The government responds by sending in armed goons to terrorize
elderly couples. The ANC isn't happy. My area is the one area where the ANC
doesn't have a clear majority. It can't institute one party rule here, so it
intimidates, punishes, and withdraws basic city services.
To counter the opposition, the ANC now plans to make the entire Johannesburg
area a "mega city." No more regions. The DP areas will be swamped
"democratically" by ANC supporters, allowing the ANC to continue to steal
from DP voters and give to ANC bureaucrats.
Critics of the mega city were, of course, branded "racists". (Today, that
term has lost all meaning in South Africa. In fact, if you're not labeled a
"racist" one time or another, you're simply not a decent human being.)
Various community groups asked for a referendum. The ANC said that was
undemocratic, and wouldn't have it.
Local DP politician Frances Kendall called for a private referendum.
Hundreds of voting booths were established throughout the city. The ANC
ordered its supporters not to vote. In black areas voting booths were
harassed and intimidated into closing. Then the ANC said the vote didn't
count because there weren't enough voting booths in black areas. Just under
100,000 people voted. The vote was overwhelmingly against the "mega city".
The ANC said it didn't care and would ignore it. After all the poll only
expressed the views of racists.
When the ANC won power, the election was declared "free and fair" by
European Community observers. One observer admitted to a Federal Party
official that the election would be declared corrupt if judged by European
standards, "but this is Africa." For instance, more voters voted than
existed. A recent census showed the population at under 39 million, not 44
million as previously claimed. Since more than half the population consists
of children, there can't be more than 19 million voters in the country. Yet
more than 19 million cast ballots. No one seems to care that the ANC was
elected with millions of fraudulent votes.
I was receiving hourly vote tallies by fax from the Independent Electoral
Commission. I remember my amazement when I noticed that the vote total for
the Federal Party was higher at 6 p.m. than at 7 p.m. Votes were
disappearing. Vote counting went on for days when suddenly it stopped. For
two days no results were released. IEC officials met with political party
officials behind closed doors before the final results were negotiated and
announced.
For the last several years the ANC has done everything possible to
manipulate the voting system to increase its totals. First, it proposed that
the voting age be reduced to 14 years since the overwhelming majority of
youths are black. Public ridicule has quashed this proposal for the time
being. Next, the ANC tried to change the laws so that non-citizens could
vote provided they were from "neighboring," i.e. black, countries. Because
most white non-citizens are from England, Canada, the United States, etc.
the white vote wouldn't have increased. Opposition parties managed to kill
this proposal as well.
Instead, the ANC achieved the same goal through the back door. The vast
majority of "illegal" immigrants in South Africa are blacks from neighboring
countries. The ANC granted them immediate citizenship. Meanwhile, "legal"
immigrants, who are mainly whites from Western countries, find it
increasingly difficult to stay in South Africa. Permanent residency for
"legal" immigrants has become more difficult to receive, and the cost of
simply applying has increased from less than $100 to over $1,400.
The National Party (NP), once South Africa's dominant party, is fast losing
support. It has never really opposed the ANC on anything, and it has made
numerous backroom deals with the ANC to retain privileges for its leaders.
The job of standing up to the ANC is filled by the "liberal" Democratic
Party.
The DP has contested by-elections recently in several NP strongholds. In
each case the DP handily beat the NP candidate. White voters no longer trust
the NP, and with good reason. In the most recent local election the DP
garnered 90 percent of the votes. Just before the election a top NP official
said this seat was the NP's "safest" in the country. But the ANC is
launching a counter-offensive.
DP activists, many of whom were arrested for denouncing apartheid, are now
branded racists by the ANC. ANC media mouthpieces refer to the "liberal
racists" of the DP. ANC officials call liberals "bigots" and use the term
"conservative liberals" to denegrate ANC critics. Party officials regularly
give speeches denouncing critics as being "unpatriotic." And recently they
have started claiming that whites are preventing its programs from
succeeding.
Mandela openly denounces the DP as racist. His objective is to sideline the
DP. Of all the opposition parties -- outside the Inkatha Freedom Party,
which is strictly Zulu-based -- only the DP has a hope of attracting black
support. It must be destroyed if a one-party ANC state is to be constructed.
What happens depends largely on how the rest of the world views South
Africa. If there is sufficient criticism and publicity, the would-be ANC
dictators will back down. They have before and will again. But the ANC is
whittling away at the rule of law and the world isn't saying very much. The
ANC won't ban its opposition outright -- at least not in the immediate
future. Total government control of all the media isn't in the cards yet
either -- but the newspapers will be attacked in the guise of promoting
"diversity." But there is a hope. International pressure and continued
support for the DP may at least hold things off.
But the odds are against it. South Africa will most likely walk the road to
misery, corruption, despair and destruction. Give it time. It won't be any
different here than in the rest of Africa
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| Re: A letter [boodskap #35370 is 'n antwoord op boodskap #35333] |
Wed, 11 October 2000 00:00  |
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Oorspronklik gepos deur: @home.com
subie wrote:
> As I have told you, I am a police reservist.
Dis nou volgens Subie, wat in Australia sit.Die "letter" is ook in baie goeie
Engels geskryf,
nie soos die soort taal wat Subie gewoonlik
in die ou dae geskryf het nie. Ek dink hierdie
"letters" word mass produced deur verregse
Engelse maters van snare soos Clive Derby
Lewis. Weet die "Boere" in Suid-Afrika
hoe hulle gemanipuleer word deur rassistiese
bewegings uit die buiteland, veral uit Noord-
Amerika (baie van die geld kom uit Kanada,
gewoonlik uit Alberta, wat 'n nes vir hierdie
soort rassiste is. Die ou wat die leier was van
die twee wat die regeringsgebou opgeblaas
het in die Midwest, was 'n ou omie uit Kanada.)
Gloudina
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| Re: A letter [boodskap #35371 is 'n antwoord op boodskap #35333] |
Wed, 11 October 2000 00:00 |
subie
Boodskappe: 56
Geregistreer: January 1999
Karma: 0
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Volle Lid |
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Subie sit nie in Australia nie,hy skryf ook nie die artikels nie.
Subie is a common worker (uneducated)
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| Re: A letter [boodskap #35399 is 'n antwoord op boodskap #35333] |
Thu, 12 October 2000 00:00 |
Tobie
Boodskappe: 581
Geregistreer: September 2000
Karma: 0
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Senior Lid |
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Path:
ctb-nnrp2.saix.net!ctb-nntp1.saix.net!news-out.cwix.com!news
feed.cwix.com!news.tele.dk!128.230.129.106!news.maxwell.syr.
edu!newsfeed.slurp.net!not-for-mail
From: "subie"
Newsgroups: soc.culture.south-africa.afrikaans
Subject: A letter
Lines: 82
X-Priority: 3
X-MSMail-Priority: Normal
X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4133.2400
X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4133.2400
Message-ID:
Date: Wed, 11 Oct 2000 17:16:57 -0500
NNTP-Posting-Host: 216.16.85.5
X-Trace: newsfeed.slurp.net 971302044 216.16.85.5 (Wed, 11
Oct 2000 17:07:24 CDT)
NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 11 Oct 2000 17:07:24 CDT
Xref: ctb-nnrp2.saix.net
soc.culture.south-africa.afrikaans:7439
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
wrote in message
news:39E4ED4F.EE70CB42@home.com...
: subie wrote:
: ---------------knip- ------------
: Dis nou volgens Subie, wat in Australia sit.
: Gloudina
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
halfnaaitjie waar sien jy ID van Australië?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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| Re: A letter [boodskap #35414 is 'n antwoord op boodskap #35333] |
Thu, 12 October 2000 04:37 |
Jonas
Boodskappe: 1070
Geregistreer: September 2001
Karma: 0
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Senior Lid |
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Die vraag is nie of die brief in goeie of slegte ingels is nie - die vraag
is of die inhoud korrek en juis is. Ongelukkig is dit die waarheid.
"subie" skryf in boodskap news:Vb6F5.99$GQ3.730@newsfeed.slurp.net...
> Subie sit nie in Australia nie,hy skryf ook nie die artikels nie.
> Subie is a common worker (uneducated)
>
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| Re: A letter [boodskap #35445 is 'n antwoord op boodskap #35333] |
Fri, 13 October 2000 00:00 |
Thys de Wet
Boodskappe: 211
Geregistreer: December 2002
Karma: 0
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Senior Lid |
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Laat mens nou sommer hond se gedagtes kry:
As dit 'n ou omie uit Kanada was, wat van die ou tannie met jy weet wat op
haar rekenaar...
Verskil is net: Sy't dalk bedoelings om die regses op te blaas. Of hulle
ego's dan...
Thys oppie Bos
@home.com wrote in message ...
> subie wrote:
>
>> As I have told you, I am a police reservist.
>
> Die ou wat die leier was van
> die twee wat die regeringsgebou opgeblaas
> het in die Midwest, was 'n ou omie uit Kanada.)
>
> Gloudina
>
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| Re: A letter [boodskap #35446 is 'n antwoord op boodskap #35333] |
Fri, 13 October 2000 00:00 |
poppie
Boodskappe: 188
Geregistreer: September 2000
Karma: 0
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Senior Lid |
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Horrie, leer vir my ook hoe om te sien waar mense vandaan pos. Ek weet
van die properties file ens., maar ek weet nie waar mens die lys kry wat
nommers en IP adrresse gee nie.
Sê of jy weet waar ek vandaan pos?
poppie
Oitaroh Margoloh skryf in boodskap news:76KF5.1587$iY1.33522@sodalite.nbnet.nb.ca...
>
> "Tobie" wrote in message
> news:8s7phl$crq$1@ctb-nnrp2.saix.net...
>> wrote in message
>> news:39E4ED4F.EE70CB42@home.com...
>> : subie wrote:
>> : ---------------knip- ------------
>> : Dis nou volgens Subie, wat in Australia sit.
>> : Gloudina
>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>> halfnaaitjie waar sien jy ID van Australië?
>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
> Die karakter sit erens in South Dakota in die VSA. Dis hoekom ek dink
> shy is 'n regse-militante Amerikaner wat stokou artikels hier pos.
>
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| Re: A letter [boodskap #35447 is 'n antwoord op boodskap #35333] |
Fri, 13 October 2000 00:00 |
Oitaroh Margoloh
Boodskappe: 185
Geregistreer: September 2000
Karma: 0
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Senior Lid |
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"poppie" skryf in boodskap news:8s7s54$kjd$1@slb1.atl.mindspring.net...
> Horrie, leer vir my ook hoe om te sien waar mense vandaan pos. Ek weet
> van die properties file ens., maar ek weet nie waar mens die lys kry wat
> nommers en IP adrresse gee nie.
Pops, skuus man, ek ignoreer nie jou versoek nie. Ek gaan net nie al die
detail hier pos nie. As jy my email sal ek jou vertel.
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| Re: A letter [boodskap #35448 is 'n antwoord op boodskap #35333] |
Fri, 13 October 2000 00:00 |
Oitaroh Margoloh
Boodskappe: 185
Geregistreer: September 2000
Karma: 0
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Senior Lid |
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"poppie" skryf in boodskap news:8s7s54$kjd$1@slb1.atl.mindspring.net...
> Horrie, leer vir my ook hoe om te sien waar mense vandaan pos. Ek weet
> van die properties file ens., maar ek weet nie waar mens die lys kry wat
> nommers en IP adrresse gee nie.
>
> Sê of jy weet waar ek vandaan pos?
Poppie, jy sit en perskes eet in Atlanta, Georgia, VSA.
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| Re: A letter [boodskap #35449 is 'n antwoord op boodskap #35333] |
Fri, 13 October 2000 00:00 |
Oitaroh Margoloh
Boodskappe: 185
Geregistreer: September 2000
Karma: 0
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Senior Lid |
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"Tobie" skryf in boodskap news:8s7phl$crq$1@ctb-nnrp2.saix.net...
> wrote in message
> news:39E4ED4F.EE70CB42@home.com...
> : subie wrote:
> : ---------------knip- ------------
> : Dis nou volgens Subie, wat in Australia sit.
> : Gloudina
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> halfnaaitjie waar sien jy ID van Australië?
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Die karakter sit erens in South Dakota in die VSA. Dis hoekom ek dink
shy is 'n regse-militante Amerikaner wat stokou artikels hier pos.
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