There is a fine line between righteous condemnation of xenophobia and the wilful blindness to the cries that fertilise its soil. The Sunday World newspaper remains unequivocal: we oppose all forms of violence, especially the brutal attacks that recently erupted in KuGompo in the Eastern Cape. No grievance, no matter how legitimate, justifies the smashing of a skull or the looting of a foreign national’s livelihood. That is non-negotiable.
Yet, to stop at condemnation would be intellectually lazy. It would be to treat a fever without naming the infection.
The violence in KuGompo, as horrific as it was, is not just the work of mindless thugs. It is a symptom – an ugly, festering symptom – of a deeper malady: the unheard, belittled and simmering frustrations of ordinary South Africans who feel abandoned by their own leadership.
The cries are the same. Men and women who cannot find work watch as informal businesses run by undocumented migrants mushroom in their communities, in inner cities and other locales.
Hospital beds and clinic dispensaries often get overrun by undocumented migrants. Yet, we act surprised when vigilante groups block entrances to these facilities, demanding they prioritise care for South Africans.
The elites – the politicians, policymakers, the business executives, and the pundits living in gated estates surrounded by high walls protected by private security – sit in their ivory towers, wagging fingers at the poor. They preach the gospel of pan-Africanism while shielding themselves and their loved ones from the consequences of uncontrolled migration. They scream “xenophobia” but propose no tangible solutions. They refuse to hear the daily lament: “We are tired of the flood of illegal immigration.”
That sentence is not inherently hateful.
Every functional state manages its borders. South Africa, with its crumbling Home Affairs and porous borders, has abdicated that duty. Interestingly, the ministers of finance and health have both publicly acknowledged that undocumented migrants are unaffordable for the fiscus and a burden on public healthcare.
The circumstances surrounding the so-called coronation of an Igbo king – a Nigerian traditional ruler – on South African soil still remain murky. The West African state’s high commission in Pretoria has sought to clarify that the ceremony, which resulted in Solomon Ogbonna Eziko crowning himself the “Igwe of KuGompo City”, was not an installation of a monarch but merely the celebration of an Igbo Association.
Olajide Ognmadeji, Nigeria’s deputy high commissioner, offered his apology over the actions of his countrymen.
Sunday World will never justify a stone thrown through a window or a life taken by fire. But we refuse to pretend that the KuGompo violence was born from nothing. It was born from decades of elite neglect, from a government that refuses to enforce its own immigration laws, and from a tone-deaf cultural arrogance that believes inaugurating an Igbo traditional leader in a South African town is a celebration rather than a provocation.
Sometimes we must listen to the angry instead of firing rubber bullets at them. Not to validate their violence, but to validate their voice.
- There is a fine line between righteous condemnation of xenophobia and the wilful blindness to the cries that fertilise its soil.
- The Sunday World newspaper remains unequivocal: we oppose all forms of violence, especially the brutal attacks that recently erupted in KuGompo in the Eastern Cape.
- No grievance, no matter how legitimate, justifies the smashing of a skull or the looting of a foreign national’s livelihood.
- That is non-negotiable.
- Yet, to stop at condemnation would be intellectually lazy.
