Thirty years after the end of Apartheid, what remains of Nelson Mandela’s ‘Rainbow Nation’? Record levels of insecurity, mass youth unemployment, and a public services sector in crisis are fueling profound social unease and racial divisions are widening.
On one side, radical Black leader Julius Malema is calling for the redistribution of white farmers’ land, to the chant of “Kill the Boers”, meaning “Kill the white farmers.” On the other, Afrikaner communities are arming themselves and retreating into identity-based enclaves, such as the town of Orania, isolated in the middle of the desert.
The country is in the midst of a post-apartheid transformation. White people have begun appearing in the shantytowns for the first time, poor families who say they are victims of affirmative action laws. They denounce a “reverse apartheid”, blaming the newly wealthy Black elite known as the “Black Diamonds.”
In South Africa, more than ever, the battles of yesterday are feeding the resentments of today.