So Much For Pan-Africanism, or, THEY TOOK OUR JOBS!

As I mentioned before, African teams, as a whole, were totally underwhelming in this World Cup. Only Ghana escaped from the group stage. This led the people of South Africa to rally behind their fellow Africans. While the USA supposedly brought more fans than any other nation except maybe England, the stadium at the USA vs. Ghana game was solidly pro-Ghana. The South Africans I talked to seemed disappointed when they were eliminated at the hand (literally) of Luis Suarez.

Then I saw this article:

South Africa Braces for New Attacks on Immigrants

"For months, threats have coursed through virtually every township and squatter camp, with warnings that once the final whistle blows, the tourists leave and the world looks away, vuvuzelas and banners will be replaced by torches and panga knives as attacks begin against Zimbabweans, Mozambicans and others."

Yikes. This actually meshes somewhat with my experiences here. Taxi drivers would point to an area and say "That's where Nigerians sell drugs" or "This is where all the Somalians hang out." As we were taking a taxi to the bus depot, we saw police with assault rifles drawn pull over a car and haul the passengers out, all the while shouting "WHERE ARE YOU FROM?!" Today while I was having lunch at the nearby shopping center, two men were angrily yelling and cursing at each other; one was saying "Get out of my country!"

I was in a taxi when I heard a curious program on the radio. Callers were basically confessing bad behavior to friends or family on the air. One man admitted to his sister that he didn't like her Mozambican husband, and in fact broke into her house in an effort to frame him. My driver said that he had married a Zimbabwean woman, and his sister did not approve of this.

This really isn't surprising. I mean the United States is, relatively, ridiculously affluent and we still have tensions over immigration. In a country where roughly one third of the people are unemployed and living conditions have in many cases barely improved since apartheid, the tensions are going to be infinitely higher. There's a paradox here I think, since the South Africans fought for decades to overthrow a system that treated some people as second-class citizens; to now treat foreigners as second-class citizens seems hypocritical in the extreme. Still, as I discussed before, Mandela's dedication to making a "Rainbow Nation" is the major reason that South Africa is more prosperous than its neighbors. It's not fair to say South Africans should suffer from economic competition because Mugabe's Zimbabwe followed a different policy that subsequently led to economic disaster and a mass exodus.

There are perhaps lessons in perspective here for people on both sides of the immigration debate in the United States. For people who think that immigrants will take American jobs, compare the economic situation in South Africa to the one in California and thank your lucky stars that you have a good job to worry about losing. For those who want to brand supporters of Arizona's new immigration law as "racists," go to a mall and see how many Mexicans are being told to "go home" or are having their shops looted. In short, it could be a lot worse for everyone in the States.

What is perhaps most disturbing about the article is the idea that somehow it's OK to attack immigrants and raid their property after the World Cup is over. Like obeying the law only counts when the world is watching. I hope everybody remembers that a major goal of this World Cup was to encourage repeat tourist business. This was supposed to be the platform to convince everyone that South Africa wasn't as dangerous or as dire as was often perceived. Beating up a bunch of immigrants might bring a short term economic benefit in terms of lowering competition, but the reduction in tourism and international business that widespread rioting would bring about would render all the money spent on this World Cup completely pointless.

At any rate, I'm not sad I'm leaving today. I'd rather watch developments from afar, thanks very much.