It has been 19 years now since the ex-European South Africans voluntarily handed over power to the black majority, and still there is no end in sight to the moral criminalization of all things white.
And there will never be!
The revisionist feel-good perception has been created that the “evil” whites stole the innocence of the cherubic blacks who were living in eternal beatitude in a pre-colonial Eden called Afro-Atlantis. Asking Beelzebub’s brood (the Afrikaner) to commit collective suicide would be counter-productive because who will be at hand to accept blame when things go awry in Mandelatopia.
The only viable solution for restoring purity to paradise would be for the white devils to build a huge Noah’s Ark, and leave the country for good. And just before they embark for heaven-knows-where, they should all kneel down and pray for forgiveness for all the times they’ve raped South Africa and, to wipe the slate completely clean, take their satanic legacy with them – like, inter alia, building up a superb infrastructure, a world-class health-care system, exceptional retail and banking sectors, and – their ultimate sin – foisting a Written Language and the Wheel on angelic Southern Africa.
To be fair, apartheid was morally warped, but didn’t the Americans, Australians and Kiwis take it one step further in history – by all but wiping out the indigenous peoples who stood in their way!?
How many Native American Indians, Aborigines and Maoris really control their own destinies in these three so-called paragons of civilization? Mind you, how many Africans in Africa can claim they live on Cloud Nine?
To drop the political correctness for one day: Africa is a bloody mess, and no civilized human being can live here anymore! How much bla bla (blame it on slavery, colonialism and apartheid) is still pending before people like Desmond Tutu finally realize that sucking on the worn-out tit of Western penance will not guarantee Africa’s survival anymore – as has been the case since the post-colonial 70s!?
And (ab)using Mandela’s legacy as a moral soap to cleanse their hands of all stains of corruption, rape, murder and mayhem will never suffice as an acceptable excuse for the 500 000 (mostly black) South Africans who have been slaughtered since the supposed champions of 21-century morality came into power in 1994.
The holier-than-thou West should take heed: the fate of the whites in South Africa will be the ultimate fate of the rest of the West – be it in 50 or 500 years.
And that will be the time when all whites will have to prostrate themselves and ask for absolution from all their sins throughout the ages… even Socrates, Einstein, Shakespeare, Gutenberg, Da Vinci and Mozart!
A complaint calling for the impeachment of Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng is an attack on the transformation of the judiciary, the Black Lawyers’ Association said on Thursday.
“There are clearly well-orchestrated campaigns which are galvanised and aimed at bringing down the Constitution’s clearly articulated imperatives,” spokeswoman Hlaleleni Kathleen Dlepu said in a statement.
On Tuesday, the Institute for Accountability said its director Paul Hoffman SC laid the complaint in response to a speech Mogoeng made to Advocates for Transformation last month.
The complaint included allegations of contempt of court and attempting to defeat the ends of justice, which could be construed as gross misconduct.
The institute said this could be grounds to justify Mogoeng’s impeachment.
In his speech, Mogoeng questioned critics who complained when a white male candidate was not recommended for appointment to the Bench, while those who were appointed were described as “executive toys”.
Dlepu said the organisations which wanted Mogoeng removed were intent on undermining the judicial system, which could create a negative international perception of South Africa.
“The barrage of criticism against the person of the office and person of the chief justice are baseless, unfounded, without merit and falls to be rejected.”
The Judicial Service Commission said on Tuesday that it had received the complaint against Mogoeng.
“The complaint will be dealt with by the judicial conduct committee,” spokesman Sello Chiloane said.
“The chief justice is one of those judges on the committee, and because the matter involves him, they will have to consider how to deal with it. They will handle it in terms of their own processes.” – Sapa
The Citizen reports that the South African minister of police will have to cough up for the damages sustained by a Nelspruit man when he was arrested for no reason, shot with rubber bullets, assaulted and belittled as a “white bastard”
In terms of a settlement agreement in the North Gauteng High Court the minister of police accepted full liability for the damages sustained by Jan Lodewyk Coetzee, 39.
Coetzee is claiming over R870 000 for his ordeal at the hands of the police in February 2011, but the amount that must be paid will only be determined later.
Coetzee said in a statement the incident started when a fellow employee at a towing service parked one of the tow-trucks in front of his house without permission.
After repeatedly asking colleagues to remove the tow-truck, Coetzee and his father-in-law dragged the truck into the garage and locked it up.
When his colleague later arrived to fetch the truck, Coetzee’s father-in-law jokingly said he first had to pay R4 000 for storage, resulting in a huge argument.
Coetzee said he was busy with a birthday braai and wasn’t part of the discussion.
Later that night his boss and colleague arrived with about 12 heavily armed policemen dressed in combat clothing and bulletproof vests.
When the police wanted to force the garage open Coetzee asked if they had a warrant, where upon pepper spray was sprayed into his eyes.
His boss told him he was going to get hurt that night. Two policemen then opened fire on him with shotguns.
They kept on firing at him even when he turned around. They then sprayed pepper spray into his face again before throwing him into the police van, despite the fact that he was bleeding profusely.
At the police station he was hit and kicked by policemen who kept on shouting that he was a “white bastard”.
He was later taken to hospital, where he was handcuffed to his bed and guarded by nine policemen for four days, but no charges were ever laid against him.
Coetzee said he had been shot nine times. Some of the wounds never healed, he couldn’t straighten his left leg and he suffered from chronic headaches.
He battled to sleep, was nervous the whole time and became so aggressive after the incident that his wife insisted he needed counselling. – The Citizen.co.za
“It is scientifically proven that we belong to one family. That is why ubuntu is so important. Ubuntu started here.”
Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu left his decidedly unscientific mark during a ceremony at Maropeng Visitor’s Centre in the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site.
Maropeng, Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site, as the grand title suggests, is a political entertainment park where vistors are fed “scientific facts” on why there are no differences between races and cultures.
Archbishop Tutu, together with a slew of politically implicated academics, his family and friends, and members of the media all gathered to witness yet another propaganda effort.
After a gushing welcome from the CEO of Gauteng Tourism, Dawn Robertson, Archbishop Tutu was asked to take off his shoe and sock to leave his footprint.
“This spectacular journey of a species was all done on two feet. So no matter what complexion and physique your recent ancestors had, you ultimately are an African. What incredible feet!” Robertson screeched in adulation.
The Archbishop, who was full of jokes during the ceremony, entertained the media and others with his usual antics. His child-like excitement was clearly infectious to those who were part of the event.
Attendees could not help but feel that they were all part of history – their own – in the making. Most could barely hide their incessant obsequious flattery.
After leaving his footprint in a block of concrete and also signing his name, the Archbishop loudly reminded everyone why he was left-handed, bringing forth yet more merriment: “God made perfect people, and the rest He made right-handed.”
Other footprints outside the Tumulus building at the centre include those of former president Thabo Mbeki and former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, all resolute One Worlders.
The 1984 Nobel Peace Prize laureate and former head of the South African Anglican Church described the event as a “huge privilege”, but did not disclose the amount of money he received to be part of it.
Italy’s first black minister, a target of racist slurs since her appointment in April, has condemned a spectator who threw bananas towards her while she was making a speech at a party rally.
Integration minister Cecile Kyenge, who was born in Democratic Republic of Congo, has angered far-right groups with her campaign to make it easier for immigrants to gain Italian citizenship.
Shortly before the incident on Friday, members of the right-wing Forza Nuova group left mannequins covered in fake blood at the site of the rally in Cervia, central Italy, in protest against Kyenge’s proposal to make anyone born on Italian soil a citizen.
“Immigration kills,” was written on leaflets accompanying the dummies – a slogan Forza Nuova has previously used when referring to murders committed by immigrants in Italy.
Although the bananas missed the stage where Kyenge was speaking, she responded to the gesture on Twitter, calling it “sad” and a waste of food, considering the economic crisis.
“The courage and optimism to change things has to come above all from the bottom up to reach the institutions,” she added.
Kyenge has faced regular insults since becoming minister, often from other politicians. Earlier this month a senior parliamentarian in the anti-immigration Northern League party likened her to an orangutan and only apologized after a storm of criticism. – Reuters
Mr. Zolile Prusente is the curriculum specialist with the regional education department in Upington. Recently, he sent a complaint to the South African Human Rights Commission regarding a problematic shift in language policy in the past year.
He alleges that the school principal and the school management team implemented a language policy that designated English as the first language of instruction for all subjects against the advice of the law or parental preference. Afrikaans, isiXhosa and Setswana were set aside and offered as alternative languages. The decision was an abrupt change from the former policy which provided for instruction in the students’ first languages rather than English.
For Prusente, the shift in policy is most harmful for the students. “[This situation] clearly shows that the SGB [school governing board] is not in control of language policy and that language policy is dictated by educators to suit their needs,” he wrote in his statement to the Human Rights Commision. Prusente believes that the students’ constitutional rights are violated by the “one-way” decision to teach primarily in English. Those responsible, he said, acted “without… taking cognisance of the additive bilingual approach promoted by the language-in-education policy.” In his statement, he refers to the Northern Cape Education Department circular 37 which also highlights “the importance of mother tongue instruction in the Foundation phase.” In their response, the principal, Ms. AB Silwana, and the chairperson of the SGB, Mr. Themba Smith, denied Prusente’s claims and said that the “overwhelming majority of parents” voted for their children to be taught in English.
While most teachers have agreed to the change, there are some who doubt the validity of the vote and who have consequently received “warning letters” from Silwana. Mrs. Thembisa Magodi, who is an SGB member and one of the two grade two teachers who refused to implement the English-only medium, said she and her colleague were not aware of any parents meeting or voting. They have refused to acknowledge Silwana’s warnings and stated that any policy “that [asks] us to teach in a foreign language [English] is not reasonable [and] unlawful because the Law encourages mother tongue teaching.”
Magodi and her colleague point to the 2007 whole school evaluation report that “has shown that learners do not understand English” as further proof that the new policy is not beneficial to students. Both teachers have announced that, ignoring the new policy, they “will continue in the third quarter to teach in the home language of learners and English only as an additional language.”
Silwana and Smith contend that the South African schools act No. 84 of 1996 gives the SGB the power to determine the language policy. They state that, since 2009, the SGB has engaged in thoughtful deliberations regarding “the complexity of formulating a language policy” for a “multi-cultural and multi-lingual learner population.” Furthermore, they maintain that the adoption of English-only policy is based on a “research/survey” taken during the 2011-2012 year that demonstrated that “parents preferred English as the language of learning and teaching.”
Prusente believes that the policy change is rooted in the SGB’s biased aversion to multi-lingual education. He claims that the boards sees “many languages spoken by learners as a problem instead of a resource.” This leads them to favor English instruction, he explained, and makes them “guilty of killing [the home] languages of the learners and community.” He challenges the SGB to provide evidence of the minutes and attendance register where the language policy was decided upon.
Mrs. Miriam Gatyeni (54) is the grandmother of a grade two and grade three learner. She remembers the survey looking into language preferences, but denies that English was the overwhelming favorite. She, for one, chose Afrikaans. “Another parent chose isiXhosa and another man preferred English,” Gatyeni recalled.
The new language policy has forced her to consider different options for her grandchildren’s schooling. If the mother tongue of her grandchildren is not used to teach them, she will be forced to take them to an Afrikaans school in Blikkies, known as Progress, which is “far” from her home. “Home language is the best. It is [the] language [in which] I talk to them at home, just like it was with my mother,” said Gatyeni.
When asked for a copy of the language policy, Silvana referred this writer to Smith who said that while the policy “is not closed or classified information”, it has to be handled “carefully”. He also said that only the documents guiding the policy formulation process can be availed.
The site steward at Vela-Langa, Mr. Daniel Mokopi, said they reported the language policy chaos to the South African Democratic Teachers Union and decided that they “don’t want to interfere in individual school matters.”
The South African Human Rights Commission will hold a meeting regarding the matter today. – groundup.org.za
Black footballer Balotelli on the cover of the Italian VanityFair
by Michele Leridon, Davide Lerner
From monkey chants in football stadiums to threats against the first black minister, racial outbursts in Italy reflect the profound social change taking place in a country relatively new to immigration.
Shocking episodes of racism have multiplied over the past few months, from hooligans taunting star striker Mario Balotelli with inflatable bananas to crude and vicious insults against the country’s Immigration Minister Cecile Kyenge, an Italian citizen born in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Kyenge, who refuses to write Italy off as racist, has taken the brunt of the abuse since her election in April, shrugging off derogatory nicknames or photograph montages online in which her head is superimposed onto the bodies of indigenous African women.
“Why does no one rape her, so she can understand what the victims of atrocious crime feel?” a party official with Italy’s anti-immigrant Northern League party wrote of her last month in a Facebook post, while last week the vice-president of the Senate compared her to an orangutan.
The former was given a 13-month suspended sentence and was banned from public office for three years, while senator Roberto Calderoli is being investigated for inciting racial hatred — though he refuses to resign, insisting he has done enough by apologising to Kyenge with a bunch of flowers.
Bizarrely, the probe against him was only opened after a consumers association, Condacons, launched a complaint. And despite a petition signed by 200,000 people calling for Calderoli’s removal, the League member has so far managed to hold on to his prestigious Senate post.
“Italy is no more racist than other European countries, but sensitivity to the issue is not as developed here,” Italian historian Marco Fossati told AFP.
Michela Marzano, a philosopher and deputy from the centre-left Democratic Party (PD), said: “there is an extreme tolerance towards intolerance.”
“Italy has not had many opportunities to enter into contact with ‘the Other’, because it has always been a country of emigration rather than immigration,” she said.
While millions of Italian fleeing poverty emigrated to the United States, Latin America and other parts of Europe throughout the Twentieth century, the Mediterranean country has only had to absorb large numbers of immigrants over the past 20 years or so.
“We have remained very provincial, and the Calderoli affair has sparked a lot of indignation but no concrete action,” said Fossati, adding: “anyone who reacts with indignance is seen as a moralist, someone who is infected with the ‘politically correct’ virus.”
Luigi Manconi, head of the civil rights commission in the Senate, dates the ‘legitimisation’ of racial abuse back to an episode in 2007, when an Italian woman was raped by a Romanian man ahead of municipal elections, kicking off a fear-based campaign equating Romanians to rapists.
From that point, Manconi says, the Northern League — and Calderoli in particular — have felt increasingly free to be racist and “have played a fundamental role in the legitimation of xenophobia.”
Adriano Prosperi, modern history professor at Pisa University, compares Italians’ apathy in the face of racism today with the introduction of racial laws in 1938 which were “passively absorbed by Italian society” under dictator Benito Mussolini’s Fascist regime.
Centre-right former premier Silvio Berlusconi, renowned for off-colour comments, sparked a backlash in January when he stated during the inauguration of a Holocaust museum that the regime “in many ways did good things” for Italy — before retracting his comment.
Despite such incidents, Prosperi said he does not think Italy is “profoundly racist at heart”. While the League may generate shock headlines — its former leader Umberto Bossi once said immigrants arriving by boat should be shot at with cannons — it won just four percent in the last elections.
The real reason Calderoli has not been forced out, Prosperi says, is that the current government “has sacrificed values for the sake of realpolitik.” – AFP
Thousands protested in US cities overnight as President Barack Obama appealed for calm following the acquittal in Florida of a man who gunned down an unarmed black teenager.
The angry protests highlight simmering racial tensions after a jury found volunteer watchman George Zimmerman not guilty of murdering 17 year-old Trayvon Martin.
Demonstrators held noisy rallies in US cities including New York, San Francisco, Boston, Detroit and Chicago.
At least six people were arrested in Los Angeles early Monday when riot police broke up an “unlawful assembly” in Hollywood near the CNN building.
To the chants of “No justice, no peace!” a separate crowd blocked traffic on an important freeway elsewhere in the giant metropolis, local media reported.
Memories are still fresh of the deadly April 1992 riots in Los Angeles, which broke out after a similar racially-tinged trial.
The most numerous rally Sunday was in New York City, where several thousand — including families with children — marched to Times Square under the watchful eye of police.
Zimmerman protest in Washington, DC
Many in the multi-racial crowd brandished signs bearing a portrait of Martin, while some, despite sweltering July heat, wore “hoodie” sweatshirts as the teen did the night he was killed.
“I am appalled,” said Carli VanVoorhis, a 21-year-old hairdresser.
“The man was armed, the kid was not, and the man with the gun got away,” she said. “If we say it was not a racial issue, we would be lying.”
“We have a big problem with race, and another problem is guns,” said protester Rodney Rodriguez. “If Zimmerman didn’t have a gun, he couldn’t have killed Trayvon Martin.”
Fellow protester Derreck Wilson, 46, said the group had come “to say in a peaceful way why we are angry. We are angry, scared and anxious.”
“It’s cathartic,” he said.
“We all have the same desires. I want to be able to have my son to come home,” added Wilson, who came to the protest from the traditionally African-American neighborhood of Harlem.
The case has pitted those who belive that Zimmerman, a 29-year-old Hispanic neighborhood watchman, killed Martin in self-defense, and those who believe it was a murder sparked by racist assumptions.
Obama, the first black US president, urged Americans to step back and accept the trial verdict.
“We are a nation of laws, and a jury has spoken,” the president said in a statement. “I now ask every American to respect the call for calm reflection from two parents who lost their young son.”
Zimmerman was accused of pursuing Martin through a gated community in the town of Sanford and shooting him during an altercation on the rainy night of February 26, 2012.
The defense successfully argued that Zimmerman fired his handgun in self-defense after the teen wrestled him to the ground and was slamming his head against the pavement.
According to Florida’s controversial “Stand Your Ground” law, people who fear for their lives can use deadly force to defend themselves without having to flee a confrontation.
“We should ask ourselves, as individuals and as a society, how we can prevent future tragedies like this,” Obama said. “As citizens, that’s a job for all of us. That’s the way to honor Trayvon Martin.”
Obama last year spoke emotionally about the case, noting that if he had a son he would “look like Trayvon.”
The racial divide was evident in Sanford pastor Valerie Houston’s Sunday sermon.
“Dr (Martin Luther) King (Jr) stated, the daily life of the Negro is still in the basement of the Great Society,” she said. “And today I state, the daily life of my people is still enslaved to a white supremacist society.”
Martin’s parents — father, Tracy, and mother Sybrina Fulton — asked the public before the verdict to respect the trial outcome, and afterwards gave thanks for the outpouring of support they received over the past year.
Martin family attorney Benjamin Crump declined to say whether they would file a civil lawsuit against Zimmerman, but said “they are going to certainly look at that as an option.”
“They deeply want a sense of justice. They deeply don’t want their son’s death to be in vain,” he told ABC News’s “This Week.”
The US Justice Department said Sunday it will resume its probe into whether hate crime charges can be brought against Zimmerman. The probe was put on hold until after the Florida trial.
Federal prosecutors “will determine whether the evidence reveals a prosecutable violation of any of the limited federal criminal civil rights statutes within our jurisdiction,” it said in a statement.
With the acquital, Zimmerman’s lawyers told the Washington Post that they will immediately resume a defamation lawsuit against NBC News for selectively editing a phone call to police which made their client seem like a racist. That case was also put on hold pending the trial results. – AFP
George Zimmerman was acquitted of all charges on Saturday for the fatal shooting of unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin in this central Florida town in February of last year.
If he had been convicted, the 29-year-old former neighborhood watch volunteer, who claimed he acted in self-defense, could have been sentenced to life in prison for second-degree murder or up to 30 years for manslaughter.
A panel of six women jurors rendered its verdict in the case, which sparked a national debate on issues including race and profiling, after a trial that began in Seminole County court on June 10. Reuters
I miss journalist Andrew Breitbart. Although he was not a libertarian, he was at least interesting, and certainly courageous. “Go to hell” was the late Mr. Breitbart’s message to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, as its bullies prepared to cow the tea party into racial submission by accusing its members of, what else but, racism.
Interesting or courageous is not something your average conservative commentator can be accused of. (Settle down: Using a preposition at the end of a sentence is perfectly fine, not that debates about grammar matter any longer. They’re so white.) This a senior editor at a conservative magazine proved in spades. (No apologies will be forthcoming in the event that the reader construes the last turn-of-phrase to be racially unkosher.)
Celebrity chef Paula Deen has transgressed against America’s many Orwellian Ministries of Truth. While being deposed by a disgruntled employee, in May of 2013, Deen was forced to confess to using the “N-word” decades ago, upon which the Paula Deen Enterprises began to lose revenue.
Now the poor woman is on that familiar, modern-day Via Dolorosa: the apology tour.
To the typical invertebrate conservative pundit, Deen’s sins are self-evident and indisputable. Thus does the aforementioned editor – who simply typifies conservatism’s rigor mortis – noodle on, not about the abject folly, if not sheer wickedness, of waging economic warfare against an upright individual for her infelicitous speech. No! Marching with the media Mafiosi, our editor’s mission here is to contextualize Deen’s transgressions, rather than to dispute their gravity.
Contextualizing Deen’s sins is achieved by alluding to her age, as racism trumps ageism on the pyramid of politically dictated Thou shalt Nots. Deen’s tainted upbringing in the Deep South forms another context. You see, Deen is a 66-year-old white woman who “grew up in a small Georgia town in the Jim Crow South.” Says our author: “If a Southern white person of Deen’s age told me they had never used the N-word, I wouldn’t believe them. The word had not the slightest element of taboo at the time.”
In belaboring the context of Deen’s use of naughty words, the writer has implicitly and unintentionally justified the histrionic reaction to such speech. It is part of “the daintiness of our popular culture in some areas,” a “depressing aspect of modern life,” he demurs meekly.
There is nothing dainty or merely depressing about tyrannical speech codes, whose enforcement by the centrifugal forces in our culture and politics is meant to make malleable clones of each one of us, on pain of boycotts, bankruptcy and excommunication.
Political authority depends on this sort of ritual sacrifice, reflexively coordinated by the country’s Ministries of Truth – the self-anointed “intellectuals” (who aren’t intelligent) in education, academia, the entertainment industry and the churches; among the ruling duopoly and everywhere in the malpracticing media.
A national, media-fanned contagion over bad words is perverse. It must be resisted, not contextualized.
Blaming Old-South culture – as the prototypical knaves of conservatism are doing – is, moreover, unlikely to help exculpate Ms. Deen in the minds of the morons who judge her for her words, rather than for her deeds. The bad Old South macro-narrative is as ineffective in mitigation as is pointing out that Deen misspoke because of a near-death experience. “A black man [once] burst into the bank that I was working at and put a gun to my head,” recounted Deen. “I didn’t feel real favorable towards him.”
It is for the same reason that the young mother, seen here in a video gone viral being kicked and punched repetitively and mercilessly by a burly black man, should watch her words in the future. The home of the mom was invaded by the man, who delighted in brutalizing her in front of her toddler.
Instead of sticks and stones that break bones, there can be no doubt that the mother from Millburn, N.J., would have settled during that terrifying attack for the kind of cuss words that “will never hurt me” – “cracker,” to quote Trayvon Martin, RIP.
But those who watched the persecution of the mom from Millburn and the tycoon from Georgia took away a different lesson than the one implied by that wise old adage.
Mind your mouth, mom! The hate crime you endured will not mitigate or explain any future slip-of-the-tongue. You may stereotype an elderly, highly successful white woman, based on her tribe’s past wrongdoing; but you dare not attach statistical significance to the misdeeds of a black man, because of his group’s considerable contribution to crime.
Ms. Deen appears to be a productive person who works hard and leads a good life. The Food Network, Wal-Mart and Caesars Entertainment have purged Paula, but her fans – hungry for the treacle of her voice and cooking – are packing into the “Paula Deen Cruise” liner and buying up her latest cookbook from Amazon.
“Go to hell” is what Ms. Deen should tell her detractors and wishy-washy, condescending defenders alike. The latter, it would seem, are offering up in her defense nothing but mitigating circumstances, the kind that attach to a crime.
The hopeful story President Barack Obama wants to tell about Africa is represented in the first stop of his weeklong trip to re-engage the continent, in a country where democracy recently overcame an impending electoral crisis.
During his visit to Senegal on Thursday, Obama also will reflect on the ties many African-Americans share with the continent as he takes a tour of Goree Island, Africa’s westernmost point. By some accounts, millions of Africans were shipped off into slavery across the Atlantic Ocean through the island’s “Door of No Return.”
It’s the first of two island visits Obama planned to highlight racial atrocities of the past. The second was scheduled for Sunday at South Africa’s Robben Island, where anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for 18 years.
But Mandela’s condition could affect Obama’s plans. The former South African president is gravely ill, and Obama foreign policy adviser Ben Rhodes said it would be left to the Mandela family to decide whether he is up for a visit from Obama this weekend.
Mandela’s legacy hangs over the entire trip, with Senegal among many African countries that have benefited from his example of a peaceful transition to power. “So much of the democratic progress that we see across the continent I think can be tied in some way to the inspiration that Nelson Mandela set,” Rhodes said.
Obama’s focus in Senegal will be on the modern-day achievements of the former French colony after half a century of independence. He planned to meet with Senegalese President Macky Sall, who ousted an incumbent president who attempted to change the constitution to make it easier for him to be re-elected and pave the way for his son to succeed him. The power grab sparked protests, fueled by hip-hop music and social media, that led to Sall’s election.
But such people-powered democratic transitions are not always the story of the African experience. Fighting and human rights abuses limited Obama’s options for stops in his first major tour of sub-Saharan Africa since he took office more than four years ago. Obama is avoiding his father’s homeland, Kenya, whose president has been charged with war crimes, and Nigeria, the country with the continent’s most dominant economy. Nigeria is enveloped in an Islamist insurgency and military crackdown.
Obama’s itinerary in Senegal was designed to send a message, purposefully delivered in a French-speaking, Muslim-majority nation, to other Africans in countries that have not made the strides toward democracy that Senegal has. Obama plans to meet with civil society leaders at the Goree Institute and visit the Supreme Court to speak about the importance of an independent judiciary and the rule of law in Africa’s development.
“It’s not enough to have elections, it’s not enough to have democratically elected leaders,” Rhodes said. “You need to have independent judiciaries. You need to have confidence in the rule of law. You need to have efforts to combat corruption. Because, frankly, not only is that good for democracy and respect for human rights, but it’s critical to Africa’s economic growth, because where you have clear rules of the road and efforts to combat corruption, businesses will invest, and jobs will be created and growth will take off. And that’s what we want to see.” – AP
“The international legal definition of the crime of genocide is found in Articles II and III of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide.
Article II describes two elements of the crime of genocide:
the mental element, meaning the “intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such”, and
the physical element which includes five acts described in sections a, b, c, d and e. A crime must include both elements to be called “genocide.”
Killing members of the group;
Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
includes inflicting trauma on members of the group through widespread torture, rape, sexual violence, forced or coerced use of drugs, and mutilation.
Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
Protected Groups
A national group means a set of individuals whose identity is defined by a common country of nationality or national origin.
An ethnical group is a set of individuals whose identity is defined by common cultural traditions, language or heritage.
A racial group means a set of individuals whose identity is defined by physical characteristics.
A religious group is a set of individuals whose identity is defined by common religious creeds, beliefs, doctrines, practices, or rituals.
Key Terms
The crime of genocide has two elements: intent and action. “Intentional” means purposeful. Intent can be proven directly from statements or orders. But more often, it must be inferred from a systematic pattern of coordinated acts.
Intent is different from motive. Whatever may be the motive for the crime (land expropriation, national security, territorial integrity, etc.), if the perpetrators commit acts intended to destroy a group, even part of a group, it is genocide.
The phrase “in whole or in part” is important. Perpetrators need not intend to destroy the entire group. Destruction of only part of a group (such as its educated members, or members living in one region) is also genocide. Most authorities require intent to destroy a substantial number of group members – mass murder. But an individual criminal may be guilty of genocide even if he kills only one person, so long as he knew he was participating in a larger plan to destroy the group.”
Size does not matter
The author starts off by saying “If 70 000 whites were murdered by blacks since 1994, it could have indeed been close to a genocide”. He then goes on to dispute this number, however size is irrelevant.
According to the definition of genocide, “an individual criminal may be guilty of genocide even if he kills only one person, so long as he knew he was participating in a larger plan to destroy the group [or part of a group]”
Intention to commit genocide
The definition clearly states that there are two ways to prove intent: “from statements or orders” or “inferred from a systematic pattern of coordinated acts”.
The question of whether there is a presence of a systematic pattern of coordinated acts to commit genocide is highly debatable and difficult to prove. Perpetrators of genocide are more likely to commit this crime covertly. In a country like South Africa, the most violent country on earth, it is easy to hide the intent of committing genocide, xenophobia and homophobia under the cover of normal crime because of our high crime rates. And if a genocidal plan was proven without a shadow of a doubt, the country would surely and immediately enter a stage of civil war and the economy would collapse, something which the perpetrators would strive to avoid.
On the other hand, proving intent from statement or orders is far less debatable. High-ranking public officials making statements like “Kill the Boer”, “Shoot the Boer” or “One Bullet, One Farmer” can easily be interpreted as an order to commit genocide. “Shoot the Boer” was found by the courts to be hate speech. Hate speech incites violence. According to the international definition of genocide:
“Article III: The following acts shall be punishable:
Genocide;
Conspiracy to commit genocide;
Direct and public incitement to commit genocide;
Attempt to commit genocide;
Complicity in genocide. “
Firstly, put your objective hat on. Now consider the following: A public figure making a public statement to “Shoot the Boer” or “Kill the Boer” sounds very much like a direct and public incitement to commit genocide. You don’t need to commit genocide to be guilty of genocide and punishable under the 1948 convention. But, however factual my findings are or no matter how much sense it makes, I’m a million percent sure that I will get responses like: “That song is a cultural thing”, “Nobody takes these people seriously”, “Those phrases are misunderstood.” etc. Hypothetically, let’s say you are right and these statements were not deliberately made to incite genocide and there is no organised plan to commit genocide. Let’s go back to the definition of genocide:
“an individual criminal may be guilty of genocide even if he kills only one person, so long as he knew he was participating in a larger plan to destroy the group”
It only takes ONE individual to kill ONE person, if that individual knew he was participating in a larger plan to destroy the people. That means that if only ONE individual interprets a statement like “Shoot the Boer” by his commander and chief for instance, to be an order to commit genocide and acts on it, that individual will be guilty of committing genocide, plain and simple. Let’s look at a case study:
Case study – Helen and Alice Lotter
Free State farmers protesting against the gruesome ethnic murder on Helen and Alice Lotter
Mrs Helen Lotter, 57, and her bedridden mother Alice, 76. Tortured to death with broken beer bottles in their anuses and vaginas – the attack had been so horrendous that the post-mortem examiner was unable to find any of Helen Lotter’s sexual organs at all; her breasts were partially cut off and broken bottle-shards were inserted in her vagina and anus as part of the hours of torture she and her mother Alice had endured –her cervix and uterus were completely shredded. The mother’s front teeth were bashed out; her entire body was ‘covered in bruises, chafing and stabbing wounds. Her sexual parts were mutilated extensively also internally. The old farm woman had died due to ‘asphyxiation after breathing in blood from penetrating stabbing wounds in her neck and throat’. They were then both left to die. Mrs Helen Lotter’s death-bed confession identified the killers as a gardener, Joseph Hlongwane, 22 who had only started working for them a few months earlier, and an associate Joseph Khumalo, 21. The forensic DNA and fingerprint evidence confirmed Helen Lotter’s death-bed confession. “Kill the Boer” had been daubed in the women’s blood on the farmhouse walls.
ANC mayor, Mrs Mataba Leeto led an anti-Boer protest at the law court where the trial was held. They chanted genocidal hate-speech songs such as ‘Kill the Boer, kill the Farmer’ in support of the two killers’ getting bail. Mrs Leeto has not been put on public record as expressing any kind of sympathy nor outrage over the way the two Lotter women had been tortured to death. Instead, she led a group which was protesting against the ‘racism’ of local Afrikaner residents who had held a ‘re-enactment’ of the way in which the women were tortured to death to illustrate the community’s deep anger. Both men were found guilty and sent to prison.
According to the definition of genocide, a crime can only be called genocide if both elements of Article II are present:
the mental element, meaning the “intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such”, and
the physical element which includes five acts described in sections a, b, c, d and e.
Mental element
Intent to destroy can be proven directly from statements or orders. In this case the statement “Kill the Boer” can be linked directly to the crime and can be interpreted as an order.
In whole or in part: perpetrators need not intend to destroy the entire group, an individual criminal may be guilty of genocide even if he kills only one person, so long as he knew he was participating in a larger plan to destroy the group. In this case two individuals killed two people, and by providing evidence for intention, “Kill the Boer”, their actions infer that in their minds, they were acting out on a larger plan to destroy a group.
A national, ethnical, racial or religious group: In this case the perpetrators acted on the Afrikaner ethnic group specifically, as proven with their words “Kill the Boer”.
Physical element
In this case we had the killing members of the group. On top of that, the crime included torture, rape, sexual violence and mutilation which are synonymous with genocide.
Conclusion
There are indicators that genocide could be happening on a larger scale, for example, widespread rape, torture and executions of Afrikaners on their farms, with perpetrators stealing few or no valuables. However the existence of an organised plan to commit genocide is unknown and will be extremely difficult to prove. Regardless, individuals can be perpetrators of genocide by definition. In the above case study, the evidence provided is clear. If you debate me on this case, at best you prove that this case is a racist hate crime, which I’m afraid is not much worse than genocide. And before I’m accused of being right-winged, let me make myself clear – There are racists in every race on earth, racist hate crimes are committed by all races and genocide can be committed by any race upon another race, even if it’s done by individuals.
Understanding each other’s anger
As described in Stephen Covey ‘7 Habits’, “Seek first to understand, before seeking to be understood.”
We as human beings get angry when we are victims of crime, even more so when we are specifically targeted because of our race, sexuality, gender etc. In South Africa we know this all too well. We understand the great atrocities committed during Apartheid, the racial discrimination inflicted upon groups and the anger it produced. Well the exact same anger is felt when individuals are targeted today, as seen in the case study, solely because of their race. Understand why other members of the victim’s group would feel threatened, angry and perceive there to be a possible genocide occurring. And when they speak out they are insulted. Please, just a little understanding goes a long way in building this country.
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court today issued its long-awaited ruling on affirmative action — but didn’t offer a definitive opinion on whether colleges may consider the use of race in admissions.
Ruling 7-1, the court found that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit erred in not applying “strict scrutiny” to the policies of the University of Texas at Austin. The case is Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin, in which Abigail Fisher, a white woman rejected for admission by the university, said that her rights were violated by UT-Austin’s consideration of race and ethnicity in admissions decisions. Fisher’s lawyers argued that the University of Texas need not consider race because it has found another way to assure diversity in the student body.
The decision said that “good faith” by the university would not be enough to justify the consideration of race. But the decision — by Justice Anthony Kennedy — does not offer an opinion on whether the University of Texas can produce sufficient evidence. Rather, it faults the appeals court for not reviewing that question using the high bar of “strict scrutiny” for the consideration of race.
The Supreme Court did not — as some thought it might — reverse past decisions that allowed colleges to consider race. In fact, the conclusion of the decision states that colleges must meet the requirements previously given by the court to justify the use of race. Quoting from the landmark 1978 Bakke decision, today’s ruling says: “In order for judicial review to be meaningful, a university must make a showing that its plan is narrowly tailored to achieve the only interest that this Court has approved in this context: the benefits of a student body diversity that ‘encompasses a . . . broa[d] array of qualifications and characteristics of which racial or ethnic origin is but a single though important element.'”
It is likely that today’s ruling could mean that — after another round at the Fifth Circuit — the case could return to the Supreme Court.
Moments after the decision was handed down, Michael Olivas, an expert on higher education law (and a defender of affirmative action) e-mailed: “Affirmative action lives on by a thread, and demography will start to assert itself.” Olivas is director of the Institute for Higher Education Law and Governance at the University of Houston and author of Suing Alma Mater: Higher Education and the Courts (Johns Hopkins University Press).
The Record So Far
This website, maintained by the University of Texas at Austin, includes briefs and prior rulings in the case ofFisher v. University of Texas at Austin, in which Abigail Fisher, a white woman rejected for admission by the university, said that her rights were violated by UT-Austin’s consideration of race and ethnicity in admissions decisions.
Fisher’s argument was that past Supreme Court decisions have allowed colleges and universities to consider race and ethnicity only if diversity could not be achieved in race-neutral ways, so the University of Texas had no legal need to consider race. The university in turn said that the percent plan provided it with only a limited level of diversity and that it had the right to take additional measures to assure a greater level of diversity. Most major college associations backed the University of Texas, as did many civil rights organizations. Asian-American groups split on the case. – Inside Higher Ed. Read the full article here.
A few months ago I read an article entitled “Some perspective for racist whites in SA” by Hanjo. If you haven’t yet read it please do so. In his letter, Hanjo basically says the following things:
a) He advocates AA/BEE (Affirmative Action/Black Economic Empowerment) – provides the reason that it is to “undo the past” and to “level the playing field”
b) He says that most whites are racist – basically states that whites “reach for their racist agenda” when dealing or debating this topic. Considering that the majority of whites do not support AA/BEE, he is implying that most whites are racist.
Besides his negative stereotyping of one specific race, which by definition is racist, I also find it disturbing that he directs his argument solely at whites, not Indians, Coloureds, Asians, and yes Hanjo, even Blacks that also do not support AA/BEE. I’d question your motives for ignoring these groups when discussing a topic that affects an entire country which you call “a democracy”.
What are you advocating?
Those that support the current AA/BEE system usually provide the same argument that Hanjo has in order to advocate AA/BEE. But what are you really supporting:
a) You are backing a system which takes jobs and wealth from one racial group and gives it to another racial group. This is racist and unconstitutional. In a country with huge unemployment figures, you promote the transfer jobs and wealth rather than the creation thereof.
b) You support a system that uses time and money which could rather be used on issues such as “crime, poor governance, poverty, unemployment, over population, education, etc”. It is as evident as night and day that government puts more emphasis on transformation than it does on issues which you say are important. It makes sense however, as taking from the whites and giving to the blacks is far easier and cheaper than dealing with these important issues.
c) You advocate a system that seeks to replace the skilled candidates with weaker candidates based solely on race, thus weakening the entire team, in which case everyone loses.
d) You vote for a system that at present is enriching only a select few, and was designed by a select few, who steal hundreds of billions of rands each year from the citizens of this country.
e) You endorse a system which is a paradox to nation building and racial harmony. A system which mimics Apartheid.
I challenge you
Come with me to one of the thousands of white Afrikaner squatter camps around the country which hold almost a million white Afrikaners and do the following:
a) Justify to these peace loving, law abiding people why they had their jobs taken away and why they are now unemployable, thus left unable to support their children because they are white.
b) Justify to them why they are refused jobs even when there are vacancies which have been open for months, even years. And why in some cases government will even import foreigners above qualified locals because they are white.
c) Justify to them why they are refused government aid such as grants and food aid because they are white, and are even told by government officials that “it is racist to feed poor whites”.
d) Justify to them why government is even refusing to support those charities (non-profit organisations) which provide care and support to whites.
This is the system which you support and openly advocate, a system which has all the characteristics of genocide.
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