We must resist, and in fact reject, the temptation to allow racists to re-traumatise, patronise and provoke us, especially on issues that wreaked havoc in the pace of our self-actualisation and advancement.
Where racism is confronted with the limitation of physical harm to its victims, it tends to resort to provocation and psychosomatic assault. This was demonstrated by none other than apartheid right-wing extremist Janusz Walus, who said killing Chris Hani was something he would repeat. This is a declaration that can only be seen as incongruous, given the impact his actions as an assassin had on the history of this country.
Just as black people, to a certain degree, remain entrapped in an imposed inferiority complex, white racists remain slaves to their superiority complex. So blinded by their prejudice they are often not aware when they are spewing malicious and at times small-minded rhetoric that is against good morals and basic human decency. But then again, racists do not see others as humans.
Walus also said that he does not believe in the ability of black people to run their country. “I have nothing against black people, but I may have something against black majority rule. I knew that when it comes to black majority government, that would be the end of a properly working country, the end of peace and the end of security,” adding that it has been “proven” that white people are better leaders, “while most black people can't. They have no capacity.”
Proven by who? The ones who for four decades subjugated and asset-stripped the natives of this country while denying them the right to participate in decent education, economic development programmes and political life?
I realise now that I could have gone my whole life without knowing what he thinks of black people or whether he has remorse for killing Hani. But here we are, with a racist unrepentant murderer justifying his heinous actions with bold conviction. This is the nature of racists, they do not care about the wrong or right of the matter, they only care about destroying the race they hate and playing the victim when those they once oppressed are in a better position as a race, regardless of what facts, statistics and common sense prove.
At the back of this, I’m moved to lean on Aimé Césaire’s words when he said: “No race holds a monopoly of beauty, of intelligence, of strength, and there is a place for all at the rendezvous of victory.” Not that I intend to affirm or comfort the perpetrator, but if he were smart he would have learnt something from prison, not just humility, but to come to terms with the fact that it is the very hatred that landed him there, not his broad mind and limitless abilities. But the mind of a racist is like that of a mentally underdeveloped and imaginatively limited person who can only see the few white lies they tell themselves, a fanatic and blind belief in the “swart gevaar” that lives in his head. And so Janusz Walus remains unreformed and not rehabilitated by the system and jail term he served for his crimes.
The idea that there is somehow a race that is better than the other is as outdated as it is foolish. If I were to channel you I would go as far as saying “it has been proven” that black people are fully capable of taking care of the affairs of their country. Still, I guess we will never know for sure since your people, the inherently racist bigots, have made sure to cause a distraction to the full realisation of this. I guess years of prison taught you nothing. If we never hear from Janusz Walus and his racist ilk again, we should probably slaughter a cow and thank our African ancestors and the Almighty for keeping us away from such evil.
Don’t undermine us. Don't ever patronise us!
To harass us into subtle provocation and silencing the significance of our abilities in the name of truth-telling is not how you demonstrate you have reformed. The next time you think of black people, I implore you to repeat these words by Winston Churchill: “In the absence of anything good, the worst is considered the best.”
Ponder that, and let that be the conversation at the table!
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