XENOPHOBIA MUST FALL

Sir,

Xenophobia is a disease, it is a mental illness that affects mostly people who have failed or ignored the realities of facing the harsh conditions of life in general. Xenophobia is a catalyst of poverty to societies who do not want to understand human evolution.

It is a virus that belongs to short-minded people who do not understand their true identities. From the days of slavery, xenophobia never existed.  Africans of different originalities were shipped to far away lands and they lived together as brothers and sisters with one common goal-Freedom.
It is difficult to identify the origin of xenophobia but colonialism played a bigger role in developing xenophobia. During colonialism, the colonialists were interested in sharing the African mineral resources, they decided to install borders to promote a divide and rule tactic.

This brought about different identities to a once ‘one big family’. And when Africans were fighting against colonialism, they concentrated only on political power, ignoring economic and social powers, and this was evidenced by the events that took place after colonialism when African leaders took power.

The African society had to adapt to the capitalist system of survival, and the leaders who had the political power excessively owned the economies of the countries living the ordinary citizens, who contributed immensely to that freedom in abject poverty. 

This created an inherent leadership system similar to kingdoms, and thus autocratic rule emerged, and as survival is part of human nature, people were forced to immigrate for survival.
Xenophobia is not an isolated case in South Africa, if we look back during the Mozambican civil war, many Mozambicans immigrated to Swaziland and they experienced a similar fate to that taking place in South Africa today. Maybe what makes a difference is that the one in South Africa is getting a lot of media coverage as compared to the one that took place in Swaziland.

Ridding our society of xenophobia in my opinion is not a difficult task. First we need to have mental freedom that will give us self-respect which is vital to psychological balance. Self-hatred creates a lack of self-esteem, and makes one feel impotent and worthless, driving that person to vent that anger on others.

Secondly, people in Africa have been for centuries deprived of political, economical and social freedom by the autocratic rulers who are protected by organisations like SADC and AU, whose major interest is not to liberate Africans from autocratic rulers but to protect them. We need our leaders to review the policies of such organisations ensuring that autocratic rulers are completely removed from a developing society.

I strongly believe that leaders like King Goodwill Zwelithini and others, who regard us as their subjects not citizens, have no place in our society; they belong to the dustbin of hell. We need to cherish the ideals of African leaders like Khwameh Nkrumah, Julius Mwalimu Nyerere, Kenneth Kaunda, Haile Selassie, Nelson Mandela, OR Tambo and others in their quest for building a United Africa.

GARVEY

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