Nhlanhla Lux and the others who lead organisations like Operation Dudula have carved out a disturbing niche in which they’ve misdiagnosed the origins of SA’s problems as originating across our borders.
The organisation, led by a firebrand Soweto resident, has spread from the streets of the South Western Townships to Hillbrow and Diepsloot and most recently manifested in a splinter group threatening raids on Durban-based businesses owned by migrants who have sought to make a living in this country.
The statistics on employment and economic growth in part explain the Dudula story. High levels of poverty and accompanying hopelessness are the remainder of the story. As large sections of the youth population languish at home, not out of choice, they also see communities of migrant businessmen succeeding where they can only dream – by putting food on their tables.
However, the Dudula Movement’s misdiagnosis of SA’s economic and social problems is not the first of its kind.
In 2008, hot on the heels of the global financial crisis, SA experienced its first outbreak of “xenophobic violence”. In 2010, just as the lights of the various soccer World Cup stadiums were being turned off, the country was once again gripped by this unique kind of looting in which residents stripped the very shops that would feed them daily. The bright lights of the World Cup also shone an inescapable spotlight on the high levels of inequality in the country, with many watching the largesse of the event on empty and angry bellies. In 2015 again, migrant workers and businesspeople were the target of anger. But when one scratched the surface of so-called xenophobic violence it became clear economic and social conditions had more to do with these attacks than an unwillingness to live with other Africans. Simple evidence of this was the fact that the same communities lived with migrant shop owners once the tension subsided.
In 2021, the Dudula organisations have reared their heads, promising to rid townships of “illegal” foreigners. Knowing our history, one has to ask how we’ve repeated this cycle so many times. The 2008 report by the Human Rights Commission went some way to diagnosing the problem, pointing at a need for various government departments to look at the societal concerns. It recommended the development of “a national-level evaluation and action plan to address obstacles to local, provincial and national responses to social conflict disasters” through the National Disaster Management Centre. The SAHRC imagined this social conflict plan would extend to provincial and community structures and would be implemented in conjunction with improved border control and a social cohesion working group that would holistically look at the causes of these conflicts.
Instead of seriously considering and acting on these recommendations, government has relied on reactionary police presence and the occasional utterances by the labour minister Thulas Nxesi to resolve what is neither purely a labour nor crime concern. The SAHRC’s broader 2008 diagnosis, that xenophobia is a symptom of myriad societal issues, remains relevant to this day. One wonders whether Pretoria will dust it off before the blood of migrants runs in the streets again.
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