Gabriel Louw
Research Associate, Focus Area: Social Transformation, Faculty of Arts,
Potchefstroom Campus, North-West University, South Africa
RESEARCH
Corresponding Author:
Prof Dr GP Louw
Focus Area Social Transformation
Faculty of Arts
Potchefstroom Campus
North-West University
South Africa
Email: profgplouw@gmail.com
Ensovoort volume 37(2017), number 11:3
ABSTRACT
Keywords
Alliance, apartheid, conflict, discrimination, dissolution, ethnicity, genocide, Herodotus curse, doctrine, minority, miscegenation, monopoly, myth, parent stock, proto-Afrikaner, race, racism, security, self-actualisation, strong-arm tactics, violence.
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- Background
“One might argue that there is almost a symbiotic interdependence between Black and White in South Africa, which makes for minority security. On the other hand, the relatively large size of the White majority gives it a substantial capacity for the fomenting dissidence, which could lead a predominantly Black government either to handle it with care so as to avoid provocation; or to use strong-arm tactics to neutralise this potential. Much would depend, of course, on how the process of sharing power had occurred and the extent to which Whites (or a majority of them) felt themselves included in the new government”, writes Welsh1, p.110 in 1988. This political view on the possible future outcomes of a Black regime’s comprehensive attitude and actions against the Whites, including Afrikaners, was not only accurately portrayed by Professor David Welsh, but become a reality 29 years later.1
Now, looking back after 23 years of Black rule in South Africa, it is clear that both of the outcomes were realized by the ANC-regime. Although, during the initial period after 1994 when the National Party (NP) led by FW de Klerk stayed on in the government of reconciliation, Afrikaners were treated with care to avoid provocation. But after the NP left the ANC-NP alliance, this intention of the ANC regime started to change gradually into a hostile one. This mild hostility against Whites was initially reflected by BEE, EE, etc., well masked under the pretext of equalizing opportunities between Blacks and Whites and promoting the mass of disadvantaged Blacks. No doubt exists that some sectors inside the Afrikaner population began to show dissidence to Black rule, although this was mostly limited to public protests and legal action, mostly via the various private enterprises which had assigned themselves as “caretakers” of Afrikaner interests.1-16
With the Zupta shenanigans and state capture gaining prominence and Jacob Zuma’s efforts to mask his dictatorial, duplicitous regime of self-enrichment, the focus was once again shifted to the Afrikaner. Ignoring the poor Black masses and the civil rights of individual Blacks, Zuma and his ilk diverted the heat to Whites as past and present oppressors of the Blacks. Afrikaners’ self-enrichment through their alleged exploitation of Blacks and the consequent “unlawful possession” of Black capital and land – which had been “stolen” from the rightful Black owners by White colonialists – was the popular refrain. The South African public were reminded of the racial division between Black and White with apartheid, colonialism, Afrikanerism, and the like wedged into the collective consciousness. Zuma and his intimate cadres utilised this momentum to promote Radical Economic Transformation (RET), which focused on nationalizing White capital (banks, property, land, pension funds, etc) and would tip the economic scales in favour of the previously disenfranchised. Disregarding Afrikaners’ civil and political rights in the work environment, crime-fighting, the murder of White farmers, parliamentarian debating, and political decision-making, are further excellent examples of the start-up of strong-arm tactics to neutralize the Whites as a political grouping as well as an indigenous South African population [The more recently emphasis also on Radical Social Transformation (RST) to equal social status between Blacks and Whites is a further example of these tactics].1-16
Mthombothi17, p.17writes that the truth behind RET and “White monopoly capital” is that it is just a cloak to cover up Zuma and the Guptas’ nefarious deeds of enduring damage by their cynical exploitation of racism and repeated regurgitation of the apartheid past. The two terms are thus not as innocent as they sound. He writes17, p. 17: “It’s got nothing to do with any desire to help or uplift the black masses, especially not on the part of a family [Guptas] who have shown no love for black people. These words have a sinister motive. They are deliberately designed to pull the wool over our eyes, to set us up against each other, to incite racial hatred. And so we fight among ourselves as they get on with the business of looting the country. We have fallen for it. Their plan is working. They have poisoned the well”. It is excellent example of “divide and rule” used worldwide by sly rulers to stay in power and to distract attention from their own wrongdoing.
Clearly the Afrikaner has become, through Zuma, the sole “enemy of the people” again as in the 1960s with the ANC’s policy of revolution and an effective method to distract especially the poor Black classes’ from the truth. This tried-and-tested trick has always been successful at obtaining votes from the poor masses: by frightening them with the return of White apartheid, the repositioning of the “racist” Afrikaners as a political power, and the theft of new-found Black richness.1,3,4,7,11,12,15,16,18-21 This RET policy does not differ from the established corrective economic policies that have been pursued since 1994. Fuelling the fire of Black-White conflict can ultimately – socially and economically – destabilize South Africa. It is in this subjective but overwhelming anti-White hostility that Afrikaners are trying to make the best of their indigenous identity and to live in the new South Africa.17
While Welsh1, p. 101postulated in 1988 that “it is perhaps not ‘inevitable’ that in fifty years’ time [2038] White control over South Africa will have disappeared…”, it took the ANC regime only 23 years to reach that goal successfully through the intensifying of well-planned strong-arm tactics. These kinds of tactics by Zuma and his supporters will strongly increase in their efforts to draw the attention away from their growing political wrongdoings as more and more Black dissenters from the middle and higher classes turn their backs on the “Zupta-ANC”.
The abovementioned propaganda and political rhetoric is exactly how the ZANU-PF regime of Robert Mugabe “won” Zimbabwe from the Whites. ANC Secretary General Gwede Mantashe himself recently provided an apt description of the dangerous implications, especially for Afrikaners, of Jacob Zuma’s populist RET policy of grabbing White-monopoly capital and land when he says22, p. 4:
As ‘n revolusionêre beweging agteruitgaan en goedkoop populariteit soek, raak dit avontuurlik en populisties.
Zanu-PF was ‘n revolusionêre party, maar om goedkoop steun te kry, het Zanu-PF grond gegryp en uitgedeel en só kosproduksievernietig. Dit was dalk gewild, maar Zimbabwe is nou ‘n voedselinvoerder.
Dit is waarheen ons ook neig. Die beweging [ANC] sal nie gered word deur kitsoplossings nie, maar deur diep besinning.
Die debat oor radikale transformasie en witmonopoliekapitaal word deur Gupta-gesinde ANC-lede gestook om ‘n voorsprong te kry met die oog op die party se nasionale konferensie in Desember.
If the secretary general of the ANC feels obligated to warn against his own party’s failing future political integrity and behaviour (which is already a reality), there can be no doubt of the seriousness of these anti-White tactics and the possibly devastating consequences awaiting Afrikaners. The plight of the Whites in Zimbabwe is well recorded and well published.
Although the South African Constitution, the Constitutional Court and other courts of law have thusfar managed to shield the Afrikaner from the ANC’s extreme strong-arm tactics, these bodies might be rendered powerless in the long run if a total ANC-takeover (67%) results in changes to the independence of the courts and the security services. Dramatic action against the Afrikaner could follow, which may even lead to genocide. The present-day cry by ultra-hot-headed ANCs and other radical Blacks for a “second revolution” via RET and RST seems more and more imminent. This revolution’s intention is far from innocent, despite claims by the present-day ANC leadership that its only aim is to obtain “economic” freedom by ending the “first revolution” of 1994 by means of RET and RST to bring “political freedom” to Blacks.1,7,11,12,15,16,20,22,23
The aggressive and militant movement known as Black First Land First (BLF), have already started putting their demands in writing and publically vocalising threats and intimidating any opponents of this “second revolution” with their anti-White motto, “to defend black people, the Guptas, from racist, land-thieving white monopoly capitalist scum,” as the journalist Peter Bruce24, p. 20summarised it. This already reflects that the presence of a “…culture of intolerance and bullying and disregard for the basic principles of free speech in our society in the new smash and grab milieu is such that lives are being put at risk”.25, p. 20 This spells disaster for Afrikaners. There is overwhelming evidence of a comprehensive readjustment around Afrikaners and their position as citizens of South Africa, and one cannot help fearing for the worst.1,7,11,12,15,16,20,22,24-26
Vilakazi warning of this extreme political, social, economic, and personal upheaval in the future of Afrikaners if they did not take the time to safeguard them against Black revenge and annulment, was already well profiled and spelled out nearly 30 years ago when he writes 15,p. 40:
The essence of revolution is the direct, active intervention of the oppressed masses of society in public affairs, in an effort to speed up and bring about long overdue changes in the fundamental structures of society. These changes are above all in the possession and control of power, first political, and, following on its heels, economic power. Revolution consists of the shifting of this power from the hands of one class to the hands of the hitherto oppressed classes. The issue in any revolution is the possession and control of the power of the State, and possession and control of property; in other words, political power, and economic power.
But what Vilakazi also failed15 to say then, but which Gwede Mantashe22 now warns us of, is that any revolution is not a bed of roses: not only for the loser, but also for the winner at the end, spelling total chaos at the end.28 (Remember the vicious cycle of the Herodotus Curse on wrongdoing that history repeats itself and that contravening the rules of justice creates→ injustice → hate→ revenge →contra-revenge, with sometimes a fast, sudden, surprising, and deadly counter revenge).22,27,28
The present day as well as potential future abuse and crushing of Afrikaners by the ANC regime and other radical Blacks are clearly pinpointed in the above remark of 30 years ago by Vilakazi’s15,p. 40: “…long overdue changes in the fundamental structures of society…”. This was a dire warning of an unavoidable South African indigenous reality of disaster to come in their near future, which the ordinary Afrikaners missed to read on the lips of F W de Klerk when he mesmerized the 1993 referendum and the post-1994 utopian South Africa into their mindsets.14,29,30
The basic aim of this article was to inform the Afrikaner of his present and future role as a citizen of the new South Africa. This contemplation should motivate the Afrikaner to do self- introspection. Afrikaners should answer the question: Have we reached self-actualisation and an optimal personal happiness in the new South Africa? Have we left our worries and fears behind so that we can participate in a good life here? If Afrikaners fail to offer a positive answer on the question, then it is time that they reread this article to see how they can address their upcoming Afrikaner dissolution the best, and how they can obtain and assure at present and in future psychological and political wellbeing for themselves. The options are there, but only they alone can make a choice. Remember: at this stage Afrikaner dissolution is a fact, not a myth.
The aim of the study is to describe 2017 as the time for thinking, planning, and deeds. The focus is on the various options and routes available for the Afrikaner to plan his immediate future and to delay or to avoid dissolution in a century’s time.
- This article is the last in a series of seven. The seven articles represent the following research topics: 1) who is the Afrikaner; 2) the historical determinants and role-players in the establishment and maintenance of racial and ethnic discrimination in the mindsets of Afrikaners; 3) present and past negative determinants and role-players in the establishment and upkeep of injustices in the mindsets of Afrikaners; 4) the Afrikaner’s failure to understand, accept and intertwine the indigenous realities of South Africa; 5) the vicious cycle of revenge and counter- revenge around apartheid; 6) The preparedness of Afrikaners to deal with the threats and challenges of the new South Africa; 7) 2017 is the time for thinking, planning, and deeds.
- The overarching intention of the entire study is to determine the position of the Afrikaner in the year 2117.
- Method
The research was done by means of a literature review. This method has the aim of building a viewpoint from the ground up, from evidence as it emerges over the course of the research. This approach is used in modern-day historical research where an established library is lacking, for instance in the case of the topic of the present and future position of the Afrikaner in South Africa. The databases used were EBSCO, Sabinet online as well as articles from 2016 to 2017, books for the period 1944 to 2016, and newspapers covering the period 2012 to 2017. This was done to reflect on the Afrikaner and to place thoughts, views, and opinions on the Afrikaner in perspective.60-62
The research findings are presented in narrative format.
- Results
Prominent to the background provided are the questions: Is it justified that Afrikaners at this stage of the New South Africa are still exposed to discriminative behaviours and maltreatment by the ANC regime?; and, What can Afrikaners do to secure a future for themselves and their descendants in or outside of South Africa?
In this context it is important to know if the ANC regime understands the concept of indigenousness of the various tribes of South Africa outside a Black-only ethnicity, as well as if they have any knowledge of the prescribed principles and rules to be followed in nation-building? Does the ANC regime really take notice of the Afrikaners’ sincere and willing efforts to become successful members of the new South Africa? There is no doubt that if the ANC regime can answer these three questions positively and practice them accordingly there will be no need for Afrikaners to reconsider their present and future positions in South Africa. So far, all hope seems to be in vain.
In the following four subdivisions the ANC’s under standing of and respect for South African peoples’ indigenousness, nation-building, as well as the ordinary Afrikaner’s sincerity and willingness to accept South African indigenous realities and to move on to greater South Africa, will be described.
3.1 South African indigenous realities missed by the ANC
For some Blacks, especially those in ANC politics, it was just too difficult after 1994 to accept that the White minority had legitimate interests in view of what, historically, had been the ‘illegitimate’ exercise of minority power over “them” as Blacks. This bitterness about their treatment as human beings during apartheid (and during colonialism, in the same breath) and outright rejection of the “illegitimate” NP-regime by the Blacks, has led to today’s hostile actions against Afrikaners. Also, the Afrikaner’s substantial dissidence to Black rule, specifically with the ANC as former revolutionary organization, aggravated the situation. The end result was the ANC regime’s disregard and disrespect of the rights of Afrikaners, despite the safeguarding of minority groups by the Constitution. The ANC regime’s obvious efforts to undo the privileged political and socio-economic position the Afrikaner previously held [and considered guaranteed after 1994 by virtue of the NP and the 1993 referendum agreement] reinforced this view.1,3.4.15.31-35
What these Blacks and the ANC have forgotten is that internalized customs, habits, and traditions do not just disappear when a new regime takes over. Rights, privileges, benefits and favours, written or unwritten, official or unofficial, also do not suddenly disappear (the present behaviour of the ANC as an ex-terrorist, ex-revolutionary organization plainly reflects these internalized dispositions). South Africa as a country developed over more than three hundred years of war and peace, good and bad. At the moment the differences between the classes, between Black and White, as well as Black and Black, are just too significant to erase overnight. The same can be said of the chasm between the “haves” and the “have-nots”. Unfortunately, targeting Whites out of racial hatred and jealousy and forcing them out of their homeland and seizing their capital and property will not solve the problem. At the end it is the country and its Black people that suffer the most. After independence, Samora Machel of Mozambique attempted (but failed) to rectify inequalities in one fell swoop by focussing exclusively on Whites as the wringers. Despite Machel’s reputed warning to Mugabe not to repeat this mistake, Mugabe blindly implemented radical racial reform measures by kicking Whites off their farms and out of Zimbabwe, but failed as Machel did and today continues to mutilate the tattered remains of his once-thriving country. The ANC has been trying to do the same in South Africa since 1994, but instead is creating more long-term problems than solving present short-term problems. It is against devastating costs to the country that Mantashe and a few wise ANC stalwarts and veterans are – seemingly in vain – warning the Zupta-led ANC elite.1,22,25,37,38
In a “peaceful transfer” from one political regime to another, like that of the NP to the ANC (a peaceful development of revolution which very seldom takes place in history), the peace of such a transfer is sometimes very short-lived. Basically, because the initial solutions to problems were often insufficient, leaving many of the role-players from both sides unfulfilled and frustrated in terms of compensation or punishment for wrongdoings (as evidenced by the hunger for revenge by victims of apartheid). To steer a regime change peacefully through its growing pains requires extraordinary leadership, characterized by foresight, courage, a sense of morality and conciliation, and the ability to act fast in times of crisis. The ANC leadership after Nelson Mandela lacks all of these. This has led to a misrepresentation in the minds of some Afrikaners that ill discipline, corruption, lethargy, unproductiveness, inefficiency, and incompetence are characteristics of Black culture in general. These traits of the current leadership and the departments under them are the primary motivation behind the commonplace reference to the new South Africa as a “banana republic”.32This is a very sad generalisation as the greater part of most Black societies do not harbour particular ill will towards their fellow South Africans, including Afrikaners. They are merely getting on with life as best they can, and suffer under the same inefficiency and incompetence of the ruling party; they are not governed by hatred or an urge for revenge.13-15, 39-45
This “African culture” which has characterized life in post-1994 South Africa is actually a “deviant ANC culture” originating from its origin as a terrorist and revolutionary organization. It is far removed from the true African culture of South Africa and shaped by outdated political thought and the actions of anti-Afrikaner Black politicians and activists with their own agendas (maintained and driven by the MKs of the late 1960s and 1970s). At present, it is aggravated by the Zuptas and their supporters. Many ANC leaders and members are nothing more than spectators, lacking wisdom or insight, who gained front seats to the political game in the post-1994 democratic elections. And then there are the many “takers” who will do anything just to satisfy their personal greed and ambitions. The reality is that these opportunistic people are in charge of the ANC and are steering its policies and actions. Any positivity on the Afrikaner’s side is blindly ignored; the same can be said about their civil rights. It seems that Afrikaners are increasingly falling prey to this system.12,32,33,39,46-52
3.2 Requirements for South African Nationhood
A lot of the present-day hostility of the ANC-regime is a direct outcome of the political immaturity of the South African Constitution and South Africa’s history as a nation, although the judges of the Constitutional and Appeal Courts act with wisdom, sincerity, and sound legal principles. South Africa as a member of BRICS can learn a lot from India’s colonial past and the successful manner in which this new nation (but old civilisation) is handling its different cultures, peoples, and tribes since obtaining independence in 1947. Whereas India was never a unified political entity, the Proclamation of Queen Victoria in 1853 unified into one country, one nation; when independence came on August 14, 1947, a democracy was created that has remained unified. What makes this achievement so great is that it brought nearly a 1 000 million people (of various cultures, tribes and levels of education, some in extreme poverty, other extreme rich) together as one political entity under conditions of freedom. “Never before in history, and nowhere else in the world today, has one-sixth of the human race existed as a single free nation. This unity of people is more than the combined population of Africa and South America”.53, p. 3
This achievement goes much further – all 12 of the great living religions in the world are flourishing in India, 16 major languages written in different alphabets and derived from different roots, while Indians express themselves in 250 dialects. Although English (the language of colonialism) is not included in the major languages listed in the Constitution, it remained the only language for the whole country. Furthermore, English is the only language in which South India is prepared to communicate with North India. British jurisprudence is the matrix of India’s non-personal laws.53, p. 3
India’s independence is based on a sound Constitution which is respected by all the role-players. Even in states of the Indian Republic where the Communist Party governs, human rights are fully respected because of the Bill of Rights being firmly ingrained in the Indian Constitution (the substance of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations on December 10, 1948, is embodied as Fundamental Rights in the Indian Constitution). What drives this democracy, freedom, and unity in India, fighting of communal hatred, linguistic fanaticism, terrorism, professional hooliganism, caste, and clan fanaticism, corruption, and creed, is India’s national integration, and integrity. The eminent Indian writer, lawyer and academic, Nani Palkhivala53, defined this totality very well (the ANC leadership and anti-Afrikaner Blacks would do well with a daily dose) when writing53 p. 11:
The most crying need of India today is to undergo catharsis, a course of emotional cleansing. We must not allow the moral bedrock of our society to turn to lava.
National integration is born in the hearts of the citizens. When it dies there, no army, no government, no constitution, can save it. States of mind precede states. Inter-faith harmony and consciousness of the essential unity of all religions is the very heart of our national integration.
The soul of India aspires to integration and assimilation. Down the ages, Indian culture – a tremendous force of power and beauty – has been made richer and deeper as a result of absorbing what is best in outside influences and integrating those various influences to grace and enrich its own identity.
Regarding Palkhivala’s reference53, p. 11 to “absorbing what is best in outside influences and then integrating those influences” (which brings us back to the ANC leadership’s distaste and hatred of British colonialism and Afrikanerism and their rejection of good influences as bad simply because it does not fit their revolutionary dogma), he writes specific about the “accidental” impact of British colonialism of 200 years on India as follows53, p. 15:
There seems to be a mystical bond which holds us together in real understanding and goodwill. There is something special, in fact providential, in the relationship between Britain and India. The crucial test is this: if the last two hundred years in India’s history were to be relived, how many thinking Indians would prefer to have them without British rule? I venture to say no one, who is not ignorant, or partial, would wish the past to be redrawn effacing all traces of the raj.
There was much that was ugly and exploitative in those years. But, on the balance, the good far outweighed the evil. The British took enormous wealth out of India, but they left behind legacies which no money could buy.
Where the Indians accepted the British as part of their future life after Indian rule, incorporated the positive of British colonialism and imperialism into their daily lives and created a brotherhood with the British that still exists today, the ANC elite did just the opposite with Afrikaners. Five years into Black rule they started to oust Afrikaners from all terrains of South African life on the basis of their association with “imperial and colonial rule”. Afrikaans as a language came under siege, work limitations followed, political isolation became prominent, White murders intensified and White bashing became a daily rhetoric, while the capture of White capital now seems to enter its final stage. It must, however, be said that, although India is a young nation (74 years), it is a country with an ancient history (5 000 years). New South Africa is not only a very young nation (23 years), but it lacks a comprehensive history: there are existing White and Afrikaner histories but a true Black history is missing. History and nationhood still come, but notwithstanding this, it is worrying that after 23 years of the existence of the new South Africa, the ANC – driven by greed and revenge – seems to be focussing on national disintegration, fighting its own past, and instigating Black-White conflict and hate, instead of following a course of action to bring about positive growth in nation-building.3,4,8,17,24,32,34,39,47,50,53,54 Palkhivala53 warns well of personal and political mischievousness that destroys nation-building.
Palkhivala’s remark that53, p.15: “…no one, who is not ignorant or partial…” points to the ANC’s political and personal immaturity as the reason for their failure, as ruling party, to think strategically and constructively about the country’s future. Or is their thinking so overrun by their negative emotional state after apartheid that it has neutralized all sound cognitive functioning? It took the Afrikaner nearly 400 years to develop from European, Black, Indian, and other indigenous people to the proto-Afrikaner and to the Afrikaner, with the latter still an identity in the process of becoming another. Possible are the present-day peoples of South Africa, including Afrikaners, in a great haste to become true South Africans. To obtain this status, it is necessary for them to live through the present political, social, economical, and personal upheavals for at least another 300 years before the ordinary South Africans can say, as the Indians after 5 000 years of growth: WE ARE A NATION. The ANC as a political party, its tailstock leaders and the hot-headed guild of anti-Afrikaners, are seemingly only a temporary nuisance in this long process of nation-building in which the Afrikaner has unfortunately become an innocent victim.8,14,53,55,56
Apartheid, driven by Afrikanerism from 1910, was – like British colonialism in India –ugly and exploitative until 1994. But, on the balance – as with colonialism in India and most African countries – the good of apartheid far outweighed the evil. Afrikaners enriched themselves at the cost of Blacks and degraded them, but they brought and left behind legacies for Black South Africa which no money could buy. As in India with British colonialism, apartheid and British colonialism was needed to bring South Africa and all its populations to its present stage of Black rule. Many Black South Africans reject the legacies of apartheid, although the positive evidence is all over the country and in Black present-day lifestyles.32,53 The arguments against the Europeans/colonists in South Africa, Africa, and worldwide – that they grew rich and powerful by robbing their colonies,– do not hold true because there was not much to take, writes D’Souza57, p. 60 in response to the often heard retort: “The Europeans stole the raw material to build their civilization, they stole rubber from Malaya, and cocoa from West Africa, and tea from India”. D’Souza points out that before British colonialism57, p. 60: “…there were no rubber trees in Malaya, nor cocoa trees in West Africa, nor tea in India. The British brought the rubber tree to Malaya from South America, they brought tea to India from China. And they taught the Africans to grow cocoa, a crop the native people had previously never heard of ”. There was a total lack of infrastructure and to make the countries effective, the British built roads, shipping docks, railway tracks, irrigation systems, government buildings, introduced education and healthcare, and introduced them to new words and new ideas unknown to their ancestral culture, like “liberty”, “sovereignty”, “rights”, etc., concepts that still affect their present-day thoughts and actions.57 “Despite the corrupt and self-serving motives of their practitioners, the institutions of colonialism and slavery proved to be the mechanism that brought millions of non-White people into the orbit of Western freedom”, D’Souza57, p. 60 continues. The doctrine of oppression ignores these facts and goes on to fuel anti-Western resentment around the world and in nations of the West. D’Souza concludes57, p.67: “I think we can now conclude that the doctrine is false, and the animus that is based on it is misplaced”. In fact, the ANC elite have adopted many of the actions condemned as evil habits of Afrikanerism and apartheid. Apartheid and Afrikanerism are, together with Afrikaners, a permanent part of Black history and South African history.32,53
Black insecurity about an own identity, masked behind their false bravado and arrogance of “self-made” and “independence” as well as their focused aggression towards Afrikaners, confirms the cemented impact of the positivity of apartheid and Afrikanerism in their psyche. This “inferiority complex” as the result of under-development in a complex and dynamic world easily gets a grip on people. (This also happened to the poorer proto-Afrikaners and later Afrikaners under British colonialism and was strongly reflected in their behaviour in the Union). Blacks reference to themselves as32, p.2: “verbeeldinglose primitiewe barbare”, supported by: “… kolonialiste ‘het ons sommige van die ergste leuens laat glo.’ Deur brute krag, deur ons hulpbronne te plunder en deur ons verstand en liggaam gevange te hou, (is) Afrikane van hul menslikheid en waardigheid ontneem”, are excellent examples of this illusion and underestimation, not only of themselves as full citizens, but also of the roles of Afrikaners in their lives during apartheid. Rationalization and projection are lifestyle-mechanisms often used for the wrong reasons, to relay attention from own much deeper personal-shortcomings, dysfunctions, and needs. Afrikaners are part of the South African nation-building process and have a valuable contribution to make.
If the ANC leadership and its members doubt the wise words of Palkhivala53on nation-building and the importance of every piece of history because it is related from an Indian context, they may turn to the writings of South African entrepreneur and White African, Mike Boon39 in The African Way: The power of interactive leadership. Maybe Boon’s simple guidelines on the South African peoples and their leaders will appeal to the palate of the ANC leadership (and change their present failure to succeed as leaders). Boon writes39, p. 15:
Africa is a place of many peoples, many tribes, and many beliefs. It is a place of terrible horror and great compassion; one of foolishness and great wisdom. But there is a vision of Africa, based on the nobility, and tragedy of the past. This is a land of strong cultures that survive and grow together with the ever-increasing education of proud people, secure in the knowledge that they are the future mentors of the world. The world is beginning to realize that happiness is a state of being and not something we work towards or buy. It is a vision of harmony, prosperity, and success; of productive, powerful work teams; of true democracy; of cooperation and interdependence; and of trust and pride in humanity and in each other.
We are different people with different cultures. We have our own ways, our own languages, customs, philosophies, and beliefs. We have our own history and our own heroes. More importantly, we have our African humanity and our noble cultures. Woe to the world if we all pursue a singular, grey, and boring sameness. Our differences and traditions make us interesting and proud.
The ANC regime of today, as the NP-AB (Afrikaner-Broederbond) alliance of the past, is misjudging the South African diversity of cultures and peoples and their stubborn will to survive under immense hardship. It seems that the ANC of today are destined to suffer the same humiliating failure the NP and ordinary nationalist Afrikaners suffered after 46 years of rule (1948 –1994); although it may be after the relatively short time of 25 years in government (1994 – 2019). Both failures were as a result of unwise, racist, authoritarian, and greedy leaderships. Not only did the leaders of both dispensations abuse their positions for their own gains, but they lacked insight into the needs of individual citizens on grassroots level.
3.3 The Afrikaner is an identity in becoming another▼
The opportunistic and authorial leaders of the nationalist Afrikaners doctrine into their mindset the belief of themselves as the anointed Afrikaner nation, sent to Africa by God to convert the Blacks and make them better people. A group granted “everlasting supremacy” over Blacks and the right to be “forever the rulers” of South Africa, as established by Verwoerd and his First Republic. Under the sly leadership of the NP and the AB, ordinary Afrikaners were somehow pacified into believing that the political rule of the Afrikaner in South Africa – with its immense military and political might – was infallible. When the unholy alliance between the NP and the AB suddenly collapsed in 1994, ordinary Afrikaners were still too naive to understand that they, with the approval of a newly combined leadership, were going to be gradually sacrificed within ten years: the proverbial lamb to the slaughter on the ANC’s altar of revenge from 2017 and onwards. From the beginning of 1994, ordinary Afrikaners were naive about what to expect in the new South Africa. They were unprepared for the immense political, social, economic, and personal changes awaiting them. They were totally confused about what their positions in the new dispensation were and the appropriate behaviour required in this new environment.8,14,29,41,55,56,58,59
It is not a surprise that this confusion and loss of identity suffered by the ordinary Afrikaner after 1994 culminated in total desolation, and in the words of Breytenbach55, p. 83:
Actually I’d ceased being an Afrikaner. My sense of that entity, and even the language, was but nostalgia encapsulated in an irrevocable lost past. Maybe I’d made up that past, coloring it in the glowing tones of innocence, contextualizing its dark and bleeding violence to make it seem part of the woof of being human”, and, ‘“I?” What “I?” The language, if I still used it, had become private and personal. Some words were left, moving like maggots through the dead meat of redundant arguments. But now I am no longer identified in any way. What am I saying? It is already dead. I was talking to dead people. I am talking of a passed away “self”.
Thankfully, the Afrikaner is not yet “ceased,” neither is he dead in the new South Africa, but the smell of death is present in his existence and he must know it. What is indeed true, is that the basic issue of an all-over political empowerment of a specific group in South Africa, namely who is going to rule South Africa from now on1, p.108: “‘them’ or ‘us?’” has been successfully phased out of the mindsets of most Afrikaners after 1994. The final acceptance is clear: the Blacks are ruling and that is absolute and final in 2017. What is also clear is that the new rulers are going to apply more and more pressure to impoverish, isolate, and – where possible – nullify the Afrikaner as citizen.
It does not matter today whether the55, p. 78: “…Afrikaner is only an identity in becoming another,” or if he is “rightfully still a legitimate member of an independent indigenous South African tribe been stripped of his previous ruler’s status”. The hard fact is that he still exists as a South African reality and the new rulers should mark that he is a human being with legitimate civil rights as a citizen. It is thus of utmost importance for Afrikaners to find solutions to secure their existence to avoid the danger of dissolution in the future. However, there is evidence that Afrikaners have already begun to think outside their doctrine of Afrikaner nationalism and are starting to try out solutions to adapt to their political dilemmas in the new South Africa.
▲Cross-references: see Part 5, subdivision 4.2.7 and Part 6, subdivision 4.1.6.
3.4 Afrikaner Sincerity and Willingness to Political Change
To change political and cultural mindsets to fit into the South African indigenous realities – the cake of customs as the historian J M Roberts14, p. 986describes it – formed sometimes by almost unrecognized assumptions and attitudes over long stretches of time – is no easy feat. But it can be done, as in 1994 when Afrikaners were forced to accept a Black regime and the ANC as ruling party. Although this change was initially seen as a conditional transfer by the outsider, it turned out to be unconditional, leading to today’s serious consequences for the continued existence of Afrikaners in this country. At the time, very few Afrikaners saw the “end … coming”, also because they were never warned of such a possibility by their leaders.
Afrikaner leaders showed their sincerity and willingness by releasing Nelson Mandela from jail, and repealing the various apartheid laws in 1991. In 1994, the South African government was technically handed over to an immature, inexperienced, and unprepared ANC regime driven by revolutionary ideas. It already seemed at the time that the same political willingness and sincerity was lacking on the Black side. The ANC and other Black political parties showed an inability to control some of their more radical followers from the beginning and signs of anti-White sentiment were clear from day one of Mandela’s era. These were some of the signs of the stormy path that lay ahead for post-1994 South Africa. It is this stormy path that Afrikaners are now travelling, exposed to the ANC’s deviant politics. Most of Afrikaners still harbour the spirit of sincerity and willingness to make South Africa a better place for themselves as well as the Blacks. All it requires is an equally sincere and willing ANC regime.14
- Discussion
4.1 Possible escape and survival routes for the Afrikaner to survive the next century as an individual, subgroup or tribe
Both Boon39 and Palkhivala53illustrated that rigid customs can be changed, although it could take time; also, that South Africa is not a country with “grey people”, but a rainbow nation of many cultures and peoples requiring wise and effective leaders to respect and steer them into the future as a true nation. If Afrikaners could willingly and freely resign their political rule and become subordinate to an ANC government after 46 years of political power, the ANC regime should also show at least the same sincerity towards nation-building. It was under the pretence of democracy for all South Africans, something they argued Afrikaners had failed to institute, that they came into power. If they had stayed true to their political promises and guarantees of 1994, it would have been unnecessary for Afrikaners to seek safeguards and rescue in the new South Africa.
Thus far, sadly, the ANC leadership has failed to make a significant positive contribution to better South Africa for its citizens, black or white. There were no reasons or grounds for the ANC to have allowed the hotheads and extremists in its leadership to change the accepted policy of 1994 – to handle Afrikaners with care – to the present-day strong-arm tactics, which seems to have gained momentum in the last two years. The only logical explanation is that the ANC is still locked in its revolution stage of the 1960s, driven by a “cake of customs” which is cemented in outdated and inappropriate assumptions, attitudes, traditions, and beliefs. It seems that they still do not understand, 23 years after demilitarization as freedom fighters, the differences between democratic or authoritarian governing, or how to promote the greater society without discriminating on the basis of race or creed, self-enrichment versus uplifting the poor, and the simple difference between naked hatred from the past versus present-day forgiveness for injustices done. With this the unfortunate status quo, Afrikaners in 2017 are left with no other choice than to prepare themselves for surviving the growing onslaught against them.
There are four main options available for the present-day Afrikaner to survive another century as individual, subgroup, or tribe. They are:
- An armed struggle to obtain an independent or autonomous Afrikaner state inside the greater South African region;
- Extensive migration to Europe and other white-dominated friendly countries;
- Self-isolation and withdrawal as a tribe in a semi-dependent Afrikaner homeland in the new South Africa;
- Full social integration and miscegenation with the rest of the South African population.
All of these alternatives have been tried and tested, with various outcomes, across the world and throughout history. Of particular interest here are events that occurred in the 1900s, up to the 1950s, in Central, Eastern, and Western Europe as well as in Asia and in the Middle East. These outcomes are well-documented and could guide the Afrikaner in terms of a decision. What must be taken into consideration is that every situation is unique: what could fail in one case could prove successful in another. The Afrikaner’s future lies in this context.14,63
4.1.1 An armed struggle to obtain an independent or autonomous Afrikaner state inside the greater South African region
The Afrikaner’s history is littered with efforts to obtain independent territories; there was the short-lived earlier Republics of Swellendam and Graaff-Reinet in the Cape Colony, the doomed Natal, Free State, and Transvaal Republics, the failed 1914 Afrikaner Rebellion, the Union of South Africa from 1902 until 1961 and the nationalist Afrikaner Republic of South Africa from 1961 to 1994; all of them came to an end. Those up to the early 1900s were military crushed. South Africa of 1961 to 1994 seems to be the last Afrikaner sovereignty in its history.59,64,65
The Afrikaner’s drive to create a mini empire of multinations (Union of South Africa with various provinces), followed by his mini empire of multination-states (South African Republic with various semi-independent Black homelands under a central White homeland), had all failed for various obvious reasons, like the Afrikaner political and financial incompetence after 1990, an underestimation of the ANC’s political and thinking power, and a Black majority as upcoming political role-players, etc.8,68
The 1994 political dispensation in South Africa was a reorientation, specifically in terms of redressing the imbalance between Whites and non-Whites that had existed for nearly 350 years, since the official establishment of White rule in the Cape of Good Hope. It is common for such reorientation to be accompanied by severe conflict and loss of lives, as evidenced in various multination states, like Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Turkey. Fortunately, South Africa was spared this bloodshed in 1994 due to a sudden and a full collapse of the NP government and their surrender of the leadership without military resistance (or as it is seen today by some as a well-planed bloodless coup d’ état orchestrated by insiders of the nationalist Afrikaners’ leadership). This collapse was swiftly followed by a successful capture of the government in five years by the ANC. The occupation of an initial mini empire of multinations in South Africa between 1910 and 1961, a political system once again changed to a mini empire with multiple states by the NP between 1961 and 1994, shifted into the hands of the ANC without a shot being fired by the Afrikaner tribe to attempt to reclaim leadership of South Africa.63,67
This annulment of Afrikaner-power afforded the ANC regime the opportunity to undo a number of decisions implemented by the “Afrikaner executive empire” by dissolving and collapsing the various independent “Bantu-homelands” back into the new South Africa. Through this return to a “mini-empire of multinations” for South Africa, the ANC obtained total military and security power, nipping any possible large-scale revolt by nationalist Afrikaners in the bud. This new ANC state also had a strong inclination to decolonize from day one, with the primary aim of preventing further Afrikaner political aspirations of independence or autonomy.8,15
The establishment of a totally independent homeland, like the Jews did in Palestine to create a New Israel, is out in South Africa. The price of this present-day Jewish state was extreme bloodshed, war, and embitterment in the minds of the Arabs. The daily existence and functioning of Israel today still requires massive military overruling and suppressing of the Arabs in the occupied areas, with outcomes of conflict so atrocious it is considered crimes against humanity, and even genocide. Running Israel is an expensive and complicated exercise, and its maintenance is possible only by the backing of Western powers (especially the USA) in money and arms; this is not viable in the Afrikaner context. And then there is the extraordinary Jewish unity and belief system that equally motivates Israelis and Jews; a nation-component that is sorely missing with Afrikaners after 1994.68-71
Also, there would be no place for the Afrikaner’s political aspirations (even less for revolt) in an Afrikaner homeland (a nation-state, or even just an ethnic society) inside the ANC and Black majority’s mini-empire of multi-nations of the new South Africa, is. Thus any notion of a future “Afrikaner autonomy” or even of “Afrikaner self-reliance” is wishful thinking and is as nonsensical as offering the modern-day Khoi-San an independent state in the new South Africa. This propaganda is only maintained by a small nationalist-Afrikaner portion of society with very little support from ordinary Afrikaners.63,72
Even if the Afrikaner had tried in 1994 to hang on to full political and military power, he would have failed the ruler test: his resources and security for maintaining power were overstretched and the NP was basically bankrupt in 1994: peaceful capitulation was unavoidable. The fact that its population had decreased over the years from more than 4 million to less than 3 million in 2016, emphasizes this dilemma of a declined empowerment. This “cruel” reality has at last been recognized by some of the hard-line nationalist Afrikaners in South Africa, who acknowledged that an own independent state was no longer viable, but that an Afrikaner (ethnic) society inside the new South Africa might still be possible. However, this option is also nothing but a pipe dream.73-79
In the end, multi-ethnic mini-empires of multi-nations, together with multi-empires of multi-states that overruled their citizens like the Union government, and later the NP government, had only a shadowy concept of what they were doing and what the outcome of their empowerment or planning would one day be. They mostly collapsed in a short amount of time. Their shelf-life is indeed limited, as confirmed by the various Empire states of the 20th century: the duration of the Bolsheviks’ Social Union lasted from 1922 to 1991 (69 years); Bismarck’s German Reich 1871 to 1918 (47 years); Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich 1938 to 1944 (12 years); Japan’s Colonial Empire 1905 to 1945 (40 years). The People’s Republic of China was established in 1949 and is still functioning in 2017, but is only 58 years old. For these five states, the average is 45 years.14,63
It is thus not a surprise that the NP and its nationalist Afrikaner style mini-empire of multi-nations (or the unofficial managed “NP Union”) only lasted from 1948 to 1961 (13 years), and its mini-empire for multi-states (Republic) only from 1961 to 1994 (33 years), while the Union of South Africa (exclusively British-oriented) under strong British influence lasted from 1910 to 1948 (38 years). This reflects an average of 24 years for the three regimes.56,58,64
The ambition of Afrikaners up to 1994 (with a population of less than 3 million) to rule a majority of Blacks (approximately 40 million) displayed the same flawed thinking as that of 66 million Germans in the 1940s to rule over more than 300 million other Europeans in an area stretching from the Channel Islands to the Caucasus, or 70 million Japanese to rule over 400 million other Asians in Greater East Asia from Manchuria to Mandalay. This kind of rule is and was impossible to maintain indefinitely.63
In terms of a military takeover it should also be borne in mind that Afrikaners don’t have a capable defence force at their disposal. The well-oiled army of the 1990s made up of well-trained White soldiers was phased out. The training of new White soldiers had stopped in the 1990s and the 18-year-olds of 1994 are now middle-aged men of 40 years and over. Undoubtedly not the preferred combat troops to win a war!
Strive among different groups of Afrikaners since 1902 also makes the possibility of a unified front less. Afrikaners, old and young, are currently grappling with their individual futures to find and map such futures in their thoughts. The Afrikaner’s powerful hyper-Nationalism of 1994 had been replaced by an undefined hypo-Nationalism 20 years later; a nationalism that is still further dwindling.80-83
History also shows that support for hard-core terrorist-oriented Afrikaner and other politically obstructive groups like the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB) and the Boeremag (BM), is zero amongst present-day Afrikaners. These revolutionary influences faded out in the early 2000s. It also seems as if the Afrikaner has just lost interest in ruling South Africa after centuries of struggling to do so. The lessons Afrikaners have learned about the devastating effects of revolts and uprisings by minorities to themselves clearly stopped any notions of planning organized armed action against the ANC government.68-71They know very well that such action would give the government sound justification to annul them in a racial war without any hope of rescue from Europe or the USA. The treacherous Dingaan and his Hloma Amabutho are still not forgotten by many Afrikaners.59Also, the ANC partners in BRICS will not allow military intervention from the West if such outside assistance were available. The African Union’s support of the ANC in resisting any Afrikaner uprising or outside military support for them would also make any such initiative very unwise indeed.
■A well-organized armed struggle is out forever. Even their deep belief (and trust) in the prophet Siener van Rensburg’s vague predictions that the ANC and the Black rulers are going to collapse, putting Afrikaners back in power, is only a small memory of the past in the present-day Afrikaner’s bewildered mindset.84,85
Armed responses to secure his survival as a nation, is clearly the last option for the Afrikaner. Other, more constructive, and less risky options must thus be considered.
4.1.2 Extensive migration to Europe and other white-dominated friendly countries
Since 1994, migration has become a popular option for Afrikaners; apparently to retain their identity, language, freedom, and rights; as much as 1.2 million people have already left, with a further 1.5 thinking or planning to do so the next decade or two. The most popular destinations at present are Australia and New Zealand.73-79
Migration is a worldwide manifestation in times of political unrest, racial, and ethnic discrimination as well as economical hardship. Aspects that drove people to migration in the past have been limitated or lack of employment, high criminality, poor governance, and lack of national identity and threats/acts of genocide by the local population. Aggravating circumstances worldwide were that these types of pervasive grievances had grown on a daily basis and had gone unaddressed by the authorities in charge. There was also a constant rise in expectations of a better and a secure lifestyle and living conditions worldwide, especially promoted by the opportunities that globalization had brought since the 1900s.There is also no disloyalty in migration; that is how the ancestors of the Whites and the Blacks of South Africa arrived here. The fact that between 1850 and 1914 nearly 34 million, and between 1901, and 1910 nearly 12 million Europeans emigrated, confirms this as an acceptable and normal process of economical, personal, and social survival.63
Most of such worldwide migration was geographical, basically because of economic, social, and ethnic discrimination and not so much a social transplant into a same-nation setup. It happened for instance during the Irish famine, which the English authorities in London totally ignored in an effort to annul the “Irish Problem”. This led to a massive migration to the United States of America. Also, no less than 6 million Germans moved to South America in the 1900s, fleeing from negative political and economical circumstances at home.63
This kind of migration also happened in Britain between 1891 and 1900 when no fewer than 726 000 citizens emigrated from the UK, with a 72% of them moving to the foreign USA (geographical migration) in contrast to a mere 28% to other British regions (social/nation-migration).63
In the 1900s as many as 5 million Germans emigrated to the American mid-West; at the time, there were already 13 million Germans living beyond the Bismarck-Reich Eastern frontier, a further 9 million Germans in Austria, and another 4 million Germans in Eastern Europe in places like Hungary, Romania, and Russia. There were also substantial numbers of Germans in Poland, Galicia, Bukovina, Bohemia, Moravia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary, Transylvania, and in Russian territory, seeking better life-conditions.63
But, these German migrants did not always find a better life and secure German nationhood in Greater Europe. As their economic position improved and they became prosperous, ethnic hostility born from masked economical jealousy led to intense discrimination from nationals in their adopted countries, deportation, and even mass murder of migrant Germans during World War Two (WW2). This was one of Hitler’s reasons for not only occupying some of these countries for the German people, but to wipe out their indigenous populations to make living space.14,63
It was not only the Germans who migrated to other countries – fleeing political, economical, racial, or discriminative circumstances in their own homeland – that fell prey to new discrimination and murder in their adopted homelands; it also happened to Blacks in South Africa in the early 1800s and Jews, Greeks, Hungarians, and Turks in the 1900s.63
It was especially the Jews who fall prey: of the 10.6 million Jews living in Europe up to Russian territory in the 1930s, 6 million were murdered in their new adopted homelands before 1948. In South Africa, between one and two million people from the tribes that had moved here from Central Africa were murdered by other tribes, like the Zulus and the Matabele, also settlers from Central Africa, between 1810 and 1840.39,63
It is evident that migration to a new homeland is not always a guarantee of a better life; in the long term (even in 50 years and more after migration), the outcome can be the tragic opposite. However, for the impoverished and landless Jews moving to the New Israel and the Zulus and Matabele moving to South Africa from Central Africa, migration was worthwhile.39
Where could Afrikaners go as a group? This was the same question the Jews were asking themselves in the 1940s in Europe when the tide turned against them. Most of the European and Western countries already had quotas on Jews in place: from South Africa, the UK, all the way to the USA, where other discriminative legislation against them barred them from entering. There was a new Israeli homeland in Palestine, but only for those who could afford the travelling costs. The British authorities further limited the entrance of Jewish settlers so as not to offend the Palestinians.56,63,64
For the Afrikaner, as the last White colonist in Africa to be pushed out, it seems that not only political but also economic asylum is urgently needed if the negative politics of the ANC continues.
Europe seems a viable choice for the Afrikaner, but for the average Afrikaner the language barriers of Germany, France, etc, could pose severe obstacles. Also, the costs of migrating to and living in Europe are just too steep for the average Afrikaner (initially, poverty also stunted the migration of Jews to Israel). The Netherlands, Belgium, Ireland, and the UK seem to be the only applicable destinations for a large-scale transplant, but these countries are clearly not financially or politically geared for such a large influx of Afrikaners.67,86,87
The present chaos in Europe, created by the massive inflow of Islamic migrants from the Middle East and North Africa, would act as additional deterrent against mass migration of Afrikaners to Europe. Firstly, these countries are already bursting at the seams with the additional demand on existing employment and living space; secondly, the racial and ethnic differences between Europeans and Muslim migrants have already given rise to conflict. This situation leaves very little space for a large influx of Afrikaners to any country in Greater Europe. In light of deteriorating global political scenarios in Greater Europe, the Middle East, and Russia and its surrounding countries, migration northwards could cause more trauma then relief.86,87
Although it is a very attractive new homeland, the United States of America (USA) has not been immune to financial, racial, and political upheavals, which renders it far from ideal for a massive migration. Poverty in South Africa is colour-blind, which means that the number of Whites affected by this scourge is also increasing, which automatically bars them from emigrating anywhere, including the US.88-91
To put the Afrikaners’ future for instance in the USA (and in all European countries) in perspective, it must be remembered that pre- as well as post-1994 South Africa was and is still a small power (and its people also) in the international society. The most obvious fact about small powers is that their interests and lots are governed by the policy of the great powers. In the pre-1994 South African governing it was mostly by Europe, Britain and the USA, while in post-1994 the chief-masters are China and Russia. Inside this belittled setup the Afrikaners were in the past and are at present never regard as important by international powers. This includes migration, especially on a large scale.91 In 1965 (more than 50 years ago) Spence writes about the doomed view of the USA of the Afrikaners91, p. 24: “…in the American view ‘the cultural and spiritual interests of a paltry 21/2million whites…or even their vital interests and survival…count for very little. In the pattern of post-war world politics, the truth [is that] the survival and the rights of the small Afrikaner people have no place’”. Today, with still only a population of nearly 2.5 million, but financially and politically in a far more diminished position as in 1965, large scale migration opportunities for the Afrikaners to the USA and a warm welcome there, seems zero. The present US racial developments around the “Federal Statues Must Fall” and so called “New Black-liberation” give a further good indication that the “White”-Afrikaners, still saddled with apartheid, are not welcome. (This zero stand on future mass migration of Afrikaners to Europe seems the same, as the present refugees from “small” countries, like Syria, Iraqi and Libya, to Europe and the USA, confirm it well).
The Afrikaner should also remember that a new country poses challenges in terms of lifestyles, customs, habits, and traditions: there will be no Afrikaans at work, and if it is not deliberately spoken at home, the language of the adopted country will become the new home language. Afrikaners who migrated to Argentina and the USA after the Anglo-Boer War were fully assimilated and intermixed with the locals within two generations. They surrendered their Afrikaner identity and today their descendants are Argentineans and Americans, not Afrikaners.59
South Africans seem to prefer Australia and New Zealand as peaceful and secure countries to expatriate to. But are these countries really the best calls? It is important to note the Chinese factor of growing imperialism and world domination, especially with their focus on Australia and New Zealand.
4.1.2.1 Australia, New Zealand and the Chinese Dragon
The ambition of some countries to achieve global empire status is still relevant today as it was before WW2. China’s development as a world power with should not be ignored, especially not with the period after 2030 in mind; China is not only looking to expand its economy, but the living space of its population. The Western World’s present concern over China’s gradual dominance of world trade is missing the point; Chinese citizens are the main export product. By gradually populating politically and economically unstable and vulnerable countries with Chinese people, China is winning the war without firing a single shot. Australia and New Zealand are centrally situated, economically valuable, relatively isolated from Europe and the USA, incapable of defending themselves against a world power like China. From the Chinese perspective, these countries are obvious targets for takeover in the next 20 to 40 years. (Chinas’ annually population growth is equal to the total population of Australia. It’s thus understandable that Australia’s and New Zealand’s inherent potentials in space and richness make them very attractive future destinies of expansion for the over-populated China).63
It would be myopic for the Afrikaner to downplay these possibilities in considering a permanent relocation to Australia and New Zealand. In Japan’s Global Policy of the 1940s, aspirations to occupy Australia and New Zealand were clearly articulated. The main aim was to establish a Japanese Empire up to Japanese Asia, with the Yamato Race as nucleus, consisting of 2 million permanent Japanese settlers in Australia and New Zealand.63
Regarding China’s possible military entrance to Australia and New Zealand as enclaves for Chinese settlers, the numbers can be phenomenal calculated in terms of the Japanese planning of 1940. Of a total Japanese population of 70 million (in 1940), 2 million Japanese settlers equate to 46 million Chinese settlers in terms of the modern-day Chinese population of 1 600 million. With China’s notorious human rights record, this spells trauma for the democracies of Australia and New Zealand. Who could forget Deng Xiaoping of China or Pol Pot of Cambodia and their murderous gangs who killed thousands upon thousands of other Chinese? Also the cold-blooded annexation of Tibet by China and the diminishing of the indigenous Tibetans in the 1960s is a clear warning for Australia and New Zealand in waiting. Surely these are fates could very well be awaiting Afrikaner migrants in Australia and New Zealand. 63,86,92
Above possible negative future outcomes internationally for Afrikaner migrants are well-reflected on by Friedman86, p. 79 when he writes: “The First World War was essentially European [with more than 16 million deaths]. The Second World War was truly global, with the Pacific as well as the Atlantic basin involved. But most important, the war was more intense. No one can be certain of exactly how many died in Europe in World War II, but a reasonable number is 51 million soldiers and civilians, from genocide, bombing, and the normal cost of war. In 1939, Europeans numbered about 550 million, including neutral countries. A staggering 10 percent of all Europeans perished during the six years from 1939 to 1945”. But Friedman86shows the global war-death-outcome for the period 1914 to 1945 was much more devastating, leaving approximately 71 million Europeans dead in general warfare and when adding the 20 million killed under Stalin, the number rises to 91 million. “Add in the Russian and Spanish civil wars, and sundry other conflicts hardly worth mentioning, such as Turkey’s war with Greece and Armenia, and the number of 100 million is conservative”, states Friedman86, p. 81further. Theoretically did approximately 3 million people died globally per annum in war-related outcomes for the period 1914 to 1945; this is 300 000 more than the total present-day Afrikaner-population. The warfare of the period 1946 up too today, with the seemingly fast incoming Third Wold War III, are going to take not less than 500 million lives and can devastating permanently much more life space, freedom and richness than ever.86, p. 81
■Migration seems a very attractive solution for wealthy Afrikaners and the younger generation of Afrikaners away from of their seemingly present financial-, political, racial- and ethnic-problems in South Africa, but there are many unpredictable, unexpected and negative outcomes that can await them in any promising new homeland. Migration as a choice needs thus a well-thought-through.
4.1.3 Self-isolation and withdrawal as a tribe in a semi-dependent Afrikaner homeland in the new South Africa▼
The Afrikaner is used to self-isolation, starting in the early days of the European settlers at the Cape of Good Hope, far away from their motherland without family, friends, or the comforts of Europe. This isolated state was exacerbated by negative political and personal treatment by the authorities at the Cape, forcing them to live in the undeveloped and the isolated country-side.58,59,64,93
Their later involvement in the Great Trek, founding themselves in the thinly populated Free State and Transvaal further cemented the lifestyle of self-isolation. It was only after the founding of the Union of South Africa and the impoverishment of the Transvaal and Free State burghers (Afrikaners), that they were forced to earn a living away from the farm and amongst other people. The Afrikaner slowly moved into urban areas and became exposed again to the foreign world of his European ancestors. But isolation still exists: the events leading up to and the dawn of apartheid led to many countries, including the Europeans, distancing themselves even today from the South African great-grandchildren of the original European settlers.56,59,64,93,94
The Afrikaner’s longing for an own, exclusive homeland was a constant companion for centuries. The NP government under the FW de Klerk did not see this as practical solution; factors like economic interdependence between the different races, the lack of a suitable region to allocate legally to Afrikaners, and an absence of national unity among Afrikaners were some of the arguments against such a move. Most of these arguments were true. Afrikaners relinquished the notion, also because in 1994 the ANC had made it clear that it objected to any Afrikaner homelands. This set in motion moves to nullify any separate Afrikaner identity, action, or organization even vaguely reminiscent of apartheid or Afrikanerism, including schools, universities, businesses, political organizations, etc.72,95-112
There was strong call by Afrikaner nationalists of the 1930s for an independent republic with clear borders and unique Afrikaner character in South Africa, but as a result of infighting between themselves and their short-term political opportunism in terms of obtaining power at the time, the whole effort faded away until 1960. By that time it was too late for such an Afrikaner homeland, especially in view of the economic interdependence of all South Africans and their scattering to all corners of the country.56,58,64
This immense failure by nationalist Afrikaner leaders to establish a nationalist Afrikaner republic on their homeland model was because they lacked understanding and acceptance of global changes in thought regarding African and Black Nationalism and Uhuru, as well as the development and protection of human rights by populations and individuals in general. Also, there were insufficient numbers of Afrikaners on the African continent and their geographic isolation from Europe and the USA to support their rights as a White group, disempowered them as a role-player. Afrikaners also underestimated the strength of the ANC in 1994 and put too much faith in a future conciliation between Afrikaners and the ANC. It not only left Afrikaners ill-prepared for the consequences of 1994, but cost them political credibility and respect. This result of poor planning and strategic thinking left them paralyzed, as was the case with the two conquered Boer republics after the Second Anglo-Boer War.67,94
Efforts today by Afrikaner leaders to locate Afrikaners within a greater African context by arguing that Afrikaners are also “Africans” and “South Africans”, but with a unique Afrikaner identity, is considered foolish by the Black majority. It is seen as a disregard for the indigenous realities of South Africa. The ANC considers any attempts of Afrikaners to isolate themselves as a parallel government, to polarize the races and call into being a “Boer volkstaat”, as hostile and outside the indigenous unity of a nation18,30,72,113,114
The failure of Orania is a good illustration of why an Afrikaner homeland is not a viable solution. This enclave could not attract the massive amount of Afrikaners as expected, neither does it have the infrastructure to make it a viable or sustainable state for 100 000 Afrikaners, let alone 3 million! The same can be said of the other dubious enclaves that had sprung up over time.73,101,107,110,112,115-117
A similar kind of separate state in the 1920s for Russian-Jews, the Jewish Autonomous Region of Birobidzhan in Siberia, failed for a number of reasons, mostly the same associated with the failure of Orania as a true homeland. It serves as a good example as warning of the failure in waiting of an Afrikaner homeland. It must be noted.
4.1.3.1 The failed Jewish Autonomous Region of Birobidzhan in Siberia
The pogroms, the chaos of the Civil War in Russia and the breakup of the Pale, made Russian Jews a thorn in the side of Russia. In the 1920s it became so chronic that a quick solution was needed. For the Russian authorities in Moscow it offered the opportunity to force communism on its Jewish subordinates through its model of nominal autonomy and to deal a blow to Zionism in Russia. On the other hand the Russian authorities believed that a Jewish homeland would attract Jewish capital from the West and at the same time relegate jobless and unskilled Jews of European Russia as farmers in a conventional Soviet cast.118
Both the Ukraine and the Crimea were mooted as Jewish homelands, but the initiatives were dropped as result of resistance by the local people. As a solution, the area of Birobidzhan in the Siberia wilderness along the borders of China was allocated as a Jewish homeland in 1928. It was a derelict land of mosquito-plagued marshes, wild forests, and mud tracks. Government support for establishing the Jewish enclave was minimal; often nothing was prepared for them and implements, livestock, and houses were absent. The area was run on Leninist principles from start and not religious ones, and the first settlers held their prayer meetings in secret. The promises of a rich and waiting land drew only a trickle of Jewish settlers. Religious and integrated Jews distrusted it and it was seen as just another ghetto. From 1928 to 1938 only 43 000 Jews, including outsiders from America, Europe, Argentina, and even Palestine, immigrated. Many of the immigrants were urban artisans with no experience of planting crops or draining soil. More than half of the initial immigrants returned home or moved back into their old occupations in Siberian cities. Notwithstanding all the obstacles in the beginning, the rest of Jews went on to establish the city of Birobidzhan and in 1934 their province became the Jewish Autonomous Region of Birobidzhan. The income of the area moved from agriculture to industry. Textile factories sprung up, furniture cartels, Jewish newspapers, and schools followed. At this stage the Jewish population had already declined drastically and the Russians were the majority, with the Jews making up only 23%. In the 1936 Stalin purges, which affected the whole Soviet Union, the leaders of Birobidzhan and its committees were also liquidated. Despite the negative events of 1936, the post-war years brought a revival with the arrival of another 10 000 Jews from the Ukraine. This positive turn was dashed by the persecutions in 1948, and the majority of the Jews left the region for good. One by one the Jewish leaders disappeared, accused of obscure conspiracies. All Jewish institutes, schools, theatres and newspapers were closed down.118
The only Jews coming in after 1948 were convicted exiles and only Stalin’s death prevented the region from becoming a zone of mass deportation and even mass murder. A tentative synagogue was burned down in 1956 and the region was left without a rabbi permanently. Migration out of the area escalated from there onwards, especially to the USA. In 1990 less than 10 000 Jews were still living in Birobidzhan (representing 6% of the total inhabitants) and Yiddish had disappeared from the streets. Very few true Jews remain today apart from the few who became Russians, while the last poor Jews are being assisted by Israel to move there. Today the businesses are monopolized by the Chinese and Jewish faces are missing from the streets. Even the older street facades show no trace of the early Jewish immigrants. All that remains of the Jewish state of Birobidzhan is a bizarre dream.118
The above reflects well what is taking place in the new, integrated South Africa with the Afrikaner population: the loss of their schools, universities, street and city names, jobs, etc. and their out-numbering in traditional (although not by law) Afrikaner areas. Further can RET and RST change dramatically in future the Afrikaners’ position in South Africa for the worst. But these are all realities that are comprehensive in their destroying which the Afrikaner homeland-dreamers must take serious note of –the discrimination and crushing of the Jews took place outside in motherland Russia as well as inside their Russian homeland Birobidzhan. There was no difference at the end, making Birobidzhan as a bizarre dream. It reflects well that to survive as a separate state, even as a subordinate homeland is difficult, even impossible. An Afrikaner homeland in greater South Africa means just another failed Birobidzhan.
4.1.3.2 Its time for republic-minded Afrikaners to face the failures of Orania, Kleinfontein and Birobidzhan as true homelands
One of the main requirements for the establishment and upkeep of a new state is the availability of motivated young people to develop and to promote it. The young Afrikaners are currently grappling with their own identity in a multi-racial and cultural milieu. At the moment Afrikaners can perhaps only rely on middle age and older people to steer its agendas and interests.83,119 There is today much more cooperation between the urban White youth and urban Black youth than between the urban White youth and the rural White youth. This outcome not only undermines the Afrikaner brotherhood doctrine and volk’s ideology, but also nullifies strong youth support for the exclusive White homeland dream. Today many Afrikaners, in their disorientation and desperation, knowing the Afrikaner homeland idea is something of the past, are instead trying to absorb the “Afrikaanses” (Coloured or Brown Afrikaners and other Afrikaans speakers, including Blacks) as members into their group as part of greater South Africa’s variety of many groups. This kind of overall disintegration of Afrikaners as a tribe and their open acknowledge of this fact, is on the increase.119,120
Viewing the aims and intentions of Afrikaner enclaves like Orania and Kleinfontein as the same as that of modern-day Israel is foolished, short-sighted and irresponsible. They are totally different and opposing entities. Israel is supported by world powers like the USA and financially by many rich Jews from all over the world. Also the European/White support element is prominent. There is consensus among the Israelis about their future and being a Jew. The villagers of Orania and Kleinfontein are not like that.
Very few Jews believed initially that they would be better off by establishing a Jewish state in Palestine. In the 1930s about 82 000 Polish Jews immigrated to Palestine. The majority of Jews in Poland and other European countries were initially more interested in what could be achieved in their motherlands. It was only after Hitler, Stalin, the Polish and other European peoples started to murder Jews and the genocide of as many as 6 million Jews followed, mostly Ashkenazim Jews, that the Jews were forced to change their minds in favour of emigration to an independent Israel. However, in the case of the Jews, there was a secure territory awaiting them. 115,116,121-124
However, Afrikaners do not have an identified piece of land that they can emigrate to, neither are they welcome to establish such a state inside the new South African territory and under the ANC authority. There is no global support for such an endeavour either. Orania and Kleinfontein are far from secure. In addition to the above, an Afrikaner state would be too small to be a trade partner of Europe and the USA. China and many African countries will be reluctant to trade with the Afrikaners as their sympathies lie with the Blacks and the ANC. As such a state would not form part of South Africa as a financial hub they will struggle to generate income. The infrastructure of South Africa is crucial. Ultimately, such a state would be forced to join South Africa again under Black rule.
The overall position of the Afrikaner is also significantly different from the genocide of the Jews in the 1940s and their need to escape from Europe to a homeland. There is no genocide of Afrikaners. The financial and living circumstances of Afrikaners in the new South Africa are still favourable and far better than in the 1830s in the Cape Colony or in the Union after the 1930s, even in the 1960s under Afrikaner rule. Yes, there are immense political problems for Afrikaners as a tribe, but South Africa has not yet declined beyond redemption and can only be described as a partially failed state, although there is some red lights.121-123
■H F Verwoerd’s political power play in 1960 to establish again an “Afrikaner/Boer” republic after the two failures of the 1900s and his obtaining then of a strong mandate for this impossible NP dream from the Afrikaner electorate on the “Black-danger” issue, when he said 91, p. 34: “Your choice is more sharply defined than at any previous election, namely between a White republic, with non-white neighbours, and a multi-racial fatherland with, first a multi-racial and, later, a Black government”, is today only a vague memory in the minds of the elderly nationalist Afrikaners. Afrikaner power plays and -visions on future “Boers states” can still be reflected in talks, but the physical establishment again of a “White republic” is only a dream in the illogical mindset of some Afrikaners. This is a South African indigenous reality that all Afrikaners must make peace with.
▲Cross-references: see Part 6, subdivision 4.1.5, as well as subdivision 4.1.1 of this Part.
4.1.4 Full social assimilation and racial miscegenation with the other races of South Africa
Assimilation and miscegenation between different races and ethnic groups is a global phenomenon. The Afrikaner’s own mixed heredity from early horizontal miscegenation between other races and the White matrilineal family stock, confirms this.
Intensive and large-scale assimilation and miscegenation between Afrikaners and Blacks and other races to root out ethnic and racial discrimination in South Africa, is one practical approach to the problem. The questions are:
- Has such assimilation and miscegenation really worked elsewhere in the world? and
- Can the Afrikaners change their resistance to large-scale assimilation and miscegenation with Black South Africans?
The first question is answered by analysing the outcomes on assimilation and miscegenation between different races and ethnic groups in Greater Europe for the period 1900 to 1950 as a guideline for the Afrikaner. Strong focus is on the experiences and treatment of the Jews who were assimilated and married non-Jews in adopted countries.
4.1.4.1 Examples of assimilation and miscegenation worldwide▼
The Jews, driven from their homeland in Palestine as early as 300 AC, spread over the Greater Europe to countries like Germany, Hungary, Belgium, Denmark, France, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Prussia, Russia, Romania, Poland, Estonia, Czechoslovakia and Austria. In 1901, 70% (7.42million) of the world’s total Jewish population of 10.6 million were Ashkenazim in Eastern and Central Europe. Of this 7.42 million Jews, as much as 30% (2.23 million) were living in Russian territory.14,63
The process of assimilation of the Jews with the Germans and other nationals was well advanced by the start of the 1900s, leading to the establishment of mixed communities and settlements. In Germany, the various legal obstacles to marriages between Jews and non-Jews were removed in 1875, aligning them with the legislation of Belgium, Britain, Denmark, France, The Netherlands, Switzerland and the USA. It was still illegal in Russia. This assimilation led to miscegenation with the local peoples. In 1876 5% of the Prussian Jews were already married to non-Jews. These marriages rose to 8.5% in the 1890s. In Germany the 7.8% of mixed marriages in 1870s rose to 20.4% in 1914.14,63
Racial integration, assimilation and miscegenation of Jews with the citizens of their adopted homelands were thus quite well advanced in Central and Eastern Europe by the 1920s. The rates of intermarriage across ethnic barriers for Jews rose to new heights from 1920. In the late 1920s, nearly one in every three marriages involving a German Jew was to a Gentile, while the rate rose as high as two out of three in some German cities. This trend was more or less similar in Austria, Czechoslovakia, Estonia, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Russia.63,86
This assimilation was so normal in the Jewish community that the Jews did not hesitate to be active in the political landscape of their adopted homelands, especially in the revolutionary politics of the 1900s. Jews like Trotsky and others were part of the various left-wing parties and revolutionary organizations that spearheaded the 1905 revolution in Russia. Their numbers accounted for 11% of the Bolshevik delegates and 23% of the Menshevik delegates at the fifth Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Party in 1907. Together with other parties attending the Congress, as much as 29% of the delegates were Jews.63
This assimilation and miscegenation are also evident from by the acceptance of the Jews into the financial systems of their adopted homelands and the extraordinary economical contribution of the Jewish population to the economies of their homelands. By the 1900s some Jews living under Russian and other rulers had already had great financial success: in 1897 Jews accounted for 73% of all merchants and manufacturers in Poland. In Kiev specifically they accounted for 44% of the city’s merchants and handled more than 66% of the city’s commerce while making up only 13% of the city’s population.63
Despite this positive state of affairs, it was precisely in Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Estonia, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Russia, all regions with established mixed settlements, some of the worst ethnic violence and mass murders of Jews (and of other foreigners who had intermixed with the locals) occurred during WW2 in the 1940s.63,86,118
In Auschwitz the Nazis killed 1.8 million Jews and the further 4.4 million were murdered at places like Majdanek, Belzec, Chelmno, Sobibor and Treblinka. Assimilation and miscegenation did not save mixed villages and settlements from genocide, sometimes death came by the hands of their own half-brothers and -sisters.14,63,118
The German occupation of Poland resulted in the seizing of Jewish property, the closure of their schools, expulsion of Jewish professionals like medical doctors and professors, the closing of Jewish organizations, followed by a well-managed genocide. The result was that of the more than 9 million Jews living in Greater Europe in 1938, only 3 million still remained by the end of 1948.63,86
This genocide by the Germans was not limited to the Jews, but was applied to the citizens of Poland during the German occupation – a country where the Germans and the Polish intermixed freely for many years. As many as 6 million people died in Poland under Hitler’s occupation. Here, it was especially the Polish intelligentsia and leadership, like priests, lawyers, businessmen, teachers, doctors, mostly people with strong intermixed relations with the locals who were murdered.14,63
In Czechoslovakia, where there was assimilation and miscegenation between Jews, Germans and the Polish in the 1920s, the state capture of Jewish and German property with wide-spread economical reform and land reform by the government (better known as the “selective expropriation and redistribution of German and Jewish property”), as well as the nationalization of their industries and the closing of their schools, followed.63
The same processes of racial and ethnic discrimination followed against Ukrainians in Poland, Hungary and Romania, also well-established regions of mixed settlements. Romanian authorities drove German-speaking teachers and lecturers at universities out of the country. Even in Italy did discrimination, especially against German and Jewish organizations, follow.63
The Turkish treatment of Armenians also proves that genocide can occur in well-functioning mixed settlements with high rates of intermarriage between races and ethnic groups and mixed descendants. It is often regarded as the first modern genocide, dated 1915-1918, as it led to the extermination of 1.8 million Armenians. (The methods of the Turks were later used in the mass executions of the Jews in the 1930s to 1940s by the Nazis at Auschwitz and other murder camps).14,63,86,125
The persecution of Greeks in Turkey in 1923, also in well-functioning mixed settlements with intermarriages between ethnic groups and mixed descendants, also led to mass murdering and more than 1.2 million Greeks being forced from their ancestral homes.14,63,125
The staggering scale of murder of other races, ethnic groups and even dissident Russians by Stalin in his Siberian murder camps – all people who lived in harmony with strong assimilation and miscegenation over long periods – become evident when considering that there were at least 25 million Soviet deaths during WW2. Of these 25 million, only 7.8 million were military deaths, the other 13.7 million deaths were victims of the German occupation. About 7.4 million were executed. The rest was Stalin’s work.14,63,118
Although the Germans played the dominant role in the genocide of the Jews, the atrocities during WW2 were not limited to Germany alone, but genocide was committed in many other European countries. It was a general phenomenon, mainly committed by the “superior, developed, intellectually and cultured Caucasian.” Genocide was not led by “a few local ruffians” in these European countries. It was executed on Jews by their neighbours of good standing and personal friends; all people with whom the Jews had lived together within stable mixed settlements. They were often people with the same mixed blood as the Jews.14,63,118
As much as roughly half of the male population in certain towns in Russia, Poland, Ukraine, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Italy, Norway, Denmark, The Netherlands, Belgium, and France were involved in murdering people based on ethnicity.63,118
The above clearly shows that assimilation, even intermixed marriages, is not enough to safeguard a specific racial or an ethnic group’s future in a mixed settlement or in an assumed stable, cultural and educated new homeland against crimes of humanity and genocide. Afrikaner numbers are significantly less that the Jewish numbers before the start up of the genocide, making them much more identifiable and targetable.
Genocide is also not always committed by the uneducated and pre-modern human, but also by well-educated people. The Germans’ behaviour towards the Jews (and others) confirms this. Up to 1933 Germany had by far the best universities in the world, more than a quarter of all Nobel prizes awarded in sciences between 1901 and 1940 were awarded to Germans, compared to only 11% to the USA. It had one of most advanced educational system in the world and a political system that brought to power Adolf Hitler primarily by democratic means. Still, they failed the test of humanity.63,86
▲Cross-references: see subdivision 4.1.2 of this Part.
4.1.4.2 Afrikaners acceptance and willingness to assimilation and miscegenation with Blacks
Regarding the second question on the Afrikaner’s resistance to assimilation, it important to mention that assimilation between Whites and Blacks occurred by the 1830s, if not earlier. Some miscegenation surely took place at the Cape between settlers and Black slave women from Madagascar. Assimilation and miscegenation with the Malayans and Coloured People already started in 1652.8,30,41,57,58,59,64,87
Many Afrikaners still think of the differences between the different races as enormous, even though 90% of the country’s population share Christianity. Differences centre on class, customs, habits, traditions. These differences between Afrikaners and Blacks slowly start to diminish. The post-1994 political dispensation very successfully helped to erase it.4,126-129
A true hegemony of a United Rainbow Nation for the RSA, how tactfully we are ignoring and side-stepping a discussion of this daring issue is absent. Intensive racial assimilation or miscegenation by the Afrikaner with non-Whites, notwithstanding the Afrikaner’s own “contaminated blood-line” by his non-White parent stock, was just not reachable before 1994 and will not, it seems, depending on certain positive political outcomes, be obtained easily for many decades to come. Especially the present-day older Afrikaners are not acceptable for it; their indoctrination by the NP, AB and DRC was just too long and too successful to make their mindsets changeable and acceptable. The South African History, starting in 1652, confirms this rigidity.42,86,127-129
On the other side is racial discrimination against the Whites by Blacks also prominent in the RSA and is been up-kept and is strength by certain prominent Blacks. Indeed, it is restarted every time before an election or when the ANC-regime fails the test of a responsible and trustworthy government. The end-result is the blocking of better relations between Afrikaners and Blacks.42,86,127-129
The present-day financial insecurity which the Afrikaners are experiencing in new South Africa is seen many times exclusively as a direct result of Black aggression and their alleged dislike and hatred for Afrikaners. It is argued that it activates counter-revenge from Afrikaners, resulting in the obstructing since 1994 of their assimilation and miscegenation with Blacks. This is not always a correct observation. Afrikaners experienced similar, if not more extreme, financial insecurity after the Second Anglo Boer War and during their Anglisation immediatedly after 1910 in the Union. Poverty characterised the Afrikaners existence for a long time in the Union. The Poor White Problem in South Africa: Report by the Carnegie Commission in 1929/30 shows roughly 300 000 (16%) Afrikaners out of a total White South African population of 1.8 million were classified as “very poor”.130These outcomes were totally unrelated to Blacks actions (Indeed, the Black population suffered at that time three to for times more under “very poverty”). Blacks are surely not the primary reason for the financial insecurity of Afrikaner before or after 1994 and thus far not contributed to the Afrikaners reluctance to assimilate and misgenenate with Blacks. This reluctance seems to be must deeper seated in the psyche of the Afrikaners.130
The present-day political, social and personal insecurities which the Afrikaners are experiencing in new South Africa is also attributed many times to be the outcome of Black dislike and hatred for Afrikaners which are steered as planned hostile actions against Afrikaners. This alleged behaviour by Blacks, as with the Afrikaners financial insecurity, is argued to activate counter hostility in the mindsets of Afrikaners, leading to their withdrawing from direct informal Black contact and cooperation. The end-result is argued, is the absence of assimilation and miscegenation with Blacks. Again, this is not always the full truth. In the past, as with the Afrikaners’ financial suffering, there were many non-Black determinants also as primary role-players contributing to the political, social and personal insecurities of Afrikaners, coming over many years up to 1994, like the internalised disposition of racial discrimination and White supremacy in the mindsets of Afrikaners. On the other side it must be acknowledged that Black hatred and dislike for Afrikaners can play a role in some cases. Hostilities are undoubtedly driven and executed sometimes by ANC political delinquents. But this seemingly racial overture not seated in a general dislike or hatred for Afrikaners: it is a direct outcome of the ANC’s present-day internal power struggles and its slow dismantling as a liberation movement cum political party. This phenomenon of conflict is not new for Afrikaners and is indeed part of their own history. The Afrikaners’ internal politics in the 1930s and 1940s, especially when H F Verwoerd arrived on the scene and contaminated even the internal relations of pro-Nazi Afrikaners, reflected the same extreme instable characteristics inside the leadership of the Afrikaners for as a certain time before calming down. This 1940s internal hostile energy as reflected by Afrikaners, spilled over not only to the Afrikaners in general, but also unasked to the other ethnic groups (Jews) as well as the Blacks, doing serious harm to racial relations. The Second World War strengthened the nationalist Afrikaners internal conflicts (precisely as conflict and hostility are now manifested inside the ANC by its instability as movement for all Blacks). As with the internal conflicts now inside the ANC, the Afrikaners hostile conflicts were not driven by political ideological differences but purely by Afrikaner leaders’ personal ambitions, corruptions and strive for self-empowerment, turning on each other. This was especially extra-activated in the 1940s by the founding of extreme pro-Nazi Afrikaner groups like the Grey Shirts, the New Order, the Ossewabrandwag (OB) and the Stormjaers (A phenomenon in line with the actions of many in-house groups fighting, even murdering each other, in the present-day ANC). Verwoerd’s conflict with the pro-Nazi groups (notwithstanding his juridical declared status by Judge P A Mullin of the Supreme Court in 1941 as a propagandist for Nazism and thus partner to the same pro-Nazi thinking as the radical Stormjaers and other pro-Nazis groups) even led to two attempts to kidnap him (with the possibility to kill him) in 1941 and 1944 by his radical comrades.130 As said, these in-house Afrikaner conflicts in the 1940s generated hostile energy, comprehensive enough, to negatively effected at that time on a broad base racial relations. The ANC’s present hostile energy towards them is not a new experience for many of the older nationalist Afrikaners, it is much less serious than the Afrikaner press tries to portray it and is temporary..
The ANC, after 23 years of reign, shows serious signs of collapsing. This collapse and insecurity are not only presently prominent reflected in their extreme internal political behaviour by in fights around leadership and members, but is to a great extent also responsible for the temporary over spilling of this extraordinary hostile energy to the Afrikaners, making their social assimilation and racial miscegenation with Blacks undoubtedly very difficult. However, after the 2019 General Election, the selecting of new ANC leaders in harmony with each other and possible constructive new Black political directions on government, the situation can normalised, neutralising this hostile energy, as had happened with the Afrikaners in 1940s. To assume thus that the present-day political, social and personal insecurity which the Afrikaners are experiencing in new South Africa is a new experience for them or is a direct Black dislike and hate for Afrikaners and is of a permanent kind, is not always correct. This insecurity is much related to the nationalists Afrikaners loss of their bullying rights of Blacks before 1994.The Black public has very much goodwill towards Afrikaners and most of the hostility against Afrikaners is activated by a small group of extremists inside the ANC who lost very fast their position as soon as the ANC’s internal politics stabilised and common sense triumph. In such a case the opportunity for better relations between the ANC’s elite and the Afrikaners will surely follows. Depending of the 2019 General Election’s outcomes can the general political, personal and financial circumstances of Afrikaners dramatically bettered from 2020 , helping to activate the long overdue social assimilation and racial miscegenation between Blacks and Afrikaners.130
■Assimilation as well as miscegenation took place at the Cape between White settlers and Black slave women from Madagascar, Malayans and Coloured People and is ongoing till today, although sometimes on a reserved level. The 1994 dispensation and the freeing of Blacks and Afrikaners from the apartheid’s shackles gives immense support to much deeper assimilation between the South African races while miscegenation seems also to gain field. With the Afrikaner’s growth in independence from his previous nationalist volks capturing and “pure White blood” ideology, as well as his today’s more willingness to accept South African indigenous realities, it can be expected that his assimilation and miscegenation with Blacks will undoubtedly increase. How much it can be denied by the NP-AB inner circle today, were assimilation and miscegenation not two of the main intentions of their 1994 bloodless coup d’ état ?8,30,4144,,57,58,59,64,87,126-129
In Brazil, the majority of the population was Black and still in slavery at the time of independence (To a certain extent very much in line with the suppression of the apartheid system). As citizens socialized, racial classification diminished fast. Intermarriage was not frowned upon Today the result is a Brazilian population that may well be the most successfully integrated ethnic mix in the world.14,126-129
The same path of success as in Brazil can follows in South Africa. It is possible that full assimilation and miscegenation of Afrikaners with Blacks may occur in 100 years or less. But in this assimilation and miscegenation there are many risks for the Afrikaners if the country decays politically and financially. Fast and dramatic changes in ethnic and racial tolerance, as happened with the Jews in Europe in the 1940s, can bring immense suffering to the Afrikaner’s mixed-race descendants, notwithstanding that they are natives of South Africa.
- Conclusion
For the political scientist interested in the Afrikaner as a human being, especially his thinking and entrenched ideas on apartheid, is it important to look at both their past and present. The eminent historian, JM Roberts, says14, p.xi: “Historical inertia is easily under-rated. This is not just a matter of what we see. Ruins and beefeaters are picturesque, but for the most part less important than much mental and institutional history lost to sight in the welter of day-to-day events”. The aim of the series of seven articles was to offer an overview of that part of Afrikaner history that is hidden from plain sight.
This study reveals that many Afrikaners have shown much goodwill and have sincerely attempted to accept Black rule since 1994. These Afrikaners show great willingness to become part of the greater indigenous South Africa, leaving behind racial discrimination. Although most Black citizens have been willing to forgive the Afrikaners for apartheid, the ANC elite clearly intends to implement a policy of discrimination against Afrikaners. This has started to intensify in the last few years, possibly with grave consequences for Afrikaners as citizens.
Efforts at reconciliation in 1994 failed all South Africans, reawakening racial conflict with Afrikaners as the focal point. At the moment, Afrikaners being targeted for revenge. Central to this is the Afrikaner’s unforgiveable history: “The past hangs around longer and is more difficult to keep peacefully buried, even by strenuous efforts, than we believe”, warns Roberts14,p.1109 with respect to this hidden danger. Afrikaners are not free from a negative memory of their experiences with Blacks, pre-1994 and post-1994. A re-emerging of a negative Afrikaner-memory spells disaster for Afrikaners as well as Blacks, especially in the activating of revenge and counter-revenge.
The Afrikaner has insufficient knowledge of his own past. The doctrine of Afrikaner nationalism left very little space for the recognition of the many faults in their past. It is time for the Afrikaner to confront the good as well as the bad in their history, not only to understand their past and present behaviour, but also as guideline for the future. Good can come from knowing the bad of the past, but this requires an honest and comprehensive analysis and valuation of history. Only a true and objective evaluation of their history can reveal their identity and place in the future South Africa.8,27,94
The “Afrikaner question” is a complex issue that rests on fact as much as on myth, hidden determinants and dark dispositions. Anti-Afrikaners offer many over-simplifications of these determinants and dispositions. It is a “problem” as complex as that of the Jewish Palestinian. No one scholar, historian, sociologist, theologian or politician can give a simple and final summary or solution. Opinions on the Afrikaner matter must be treated with a good measure of scepticism. The ANC elite is tragically relying on spreading misinformation on Afrikaners, while treating them the same as the Palestinians are being treated and the Jews were treated.63,68-71
Statistics show that in 30 to 60 years there may only be between 100 000 and one million “pure” Afrikaners left in South Africa and in 2117 possible less than 20 000. The small number of 20 000 will not be the result of genocide or even migration, but of the normal process of natural extinction.
Will the descendants of today’s Afrikaners really care about being Afrikaners two to three generations from now? Would they perhaps preferred to be happy Australian-, Chinese-Creole-, half-caste-, hybrid, mulatto-, or simply South African bastards? Are the constant political efforts and fights for rights and existence and the worries and fears about Afrikaners and their future in South Africa really justified and worthwhile? Will the Afrikaners of 2117 know what a “koeksister” or “volkspele” are or will they hear about it for the first time when they read of it in an old article of the year 2017?There seems to be an overall doubt, meaning the answer is an undisputed NO. Very few of the Afrikaner’s descendants are going to care about their Afrikaner heredity.
Afrikaners must urgently consider how they want to address their present personal and political threats, dangers and challenges under the ANC regime and as citizens of South Africa. Several options are available. Constructive and wise individually thought and action are pertinent. Some Afrikaners will find the selection of an option easy, for other it will be difficult, while some will never decide in their lifetimes. Every Afrikaner’s needs and visions are unique: each individual has to journey into the future. Time is running out. As reflected from this study the year 2017 is the time for thinking, planning, and deeds for Afrikaners, but their actions must be extraordinary and correct. There have been too many mistakes in their past to expect leniency or a chance if they fail again. Palkhivala53, p.129 warns: “In the affairs of nations, as in the affairs of men, there is a providential margin of error; you may take wrong turns at the crossroads, misuse time, take gold for dross and dross for gold, and yet somehow stumble along to your destination. But the margin and period of permissible error need to be carefully watched. You overstep them at your peril”.
The human rights author Raoul Martinez131, p.381 emphasises that South African Blacks and Afrikaners must remember that social and personal changes are not: “… something that we get done ‘out there’ simply by changing laws and procedures. Whatever rights are granted whatever procedures are in place, social systems are brought to life by the people who participate in them. The attempt to increase control over our lives and produce outcomes we value is inextricable from the attempt to deepen our understanding and develop our character. Ultimately, this is a moral challenge. We are the timber from which the future will be constructed – the stronger the timber, the more solid the construction.” Martinez131, pp. 381-382brings Blacks and Afrikaners before an easily challenge in this context: “Every human being inevitably suffers hardship, loses loved ones and, some day, passes away. Life is rare, delicate and short. Given all this, why would we not join together to do what we can, for the brief time we have air in our lungs and strength in our bodies, to transform this world into a place of joy and wonder for all those passing through – a place where all can flourish, contribute and create? After all, it is only through the creation of what we deeply value that we find the fullest expression of our freedom. And what could be more valuable than that?”
Every Afrikaner should decide on their own an immediate path as an individual. Each must decide on lifestyle changes and strategies, but to postpone a final decision can be fatal. No one else can take this decision. The author of this article can only point out the various options and risks, nothing more.
The only consolation for Afrikaners in their present visitation is that if dissolution sweeps away the last Afrikaner, the Herodotus curse on the Afrikaner will also be broken. It will then be time for their conquerors and executors to inherit the curse and to be ravaged. Only time will tell if the ill fate of dissolution awaits the Afrikaner.
The year 2017 is the time for options, deeds and more deeds by the Afrikaners about their future. But they must remember that the virtue of deeds lies in completing them (Arabian Proverb).
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PEER REVIEW
Not commissioned. Externally peer reviewed.
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
The author declares that he has no competing interest.
FUNDING
The research was funded by the Focus Area Social Transformation, Faculty of Arts, Potchefstroom Campus, North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa.