

With their country collapsing, persecution growing, and well-founded fears of genocide and bloody communist revolution, a group of Western-minded Christians in South Africa is preparing for the worst.

Meet the Suidlanders, or "Southlanders," who describe their organization as "the world's largest non-state civil defense organization."

Their motto is simple but encapsulates their mission well: “Servants of the All-Highest, free before the whole world.”

Basically, they refuse to be victims.

In media reports from around the world, the Suidlanders have been compared to American "preppers," people stockpiling supplies in preparation for everything from an economic collapse or an EMP attack to a foreign invasion.

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But in reality, the situation the white South Africans are facing is much more bleak than what most Americans can comprehend.

And their preparations, while completely non-violent and non-military in nature, are much more serious and far-reaching than those of American "preppers" collecting extra beans and rice in the pantry.

The Suidlanders organization, which began as an evangelical ministry calling for national repentance but morphed into a group preparing for societal chaos, is made up primarily of "Afrikaners" and Boers, as they sometimes prefer to be called.

Jerry McMullen explains all about race in "Right, Write and Race: Understanding America's Principles," from the WND Superstore.

The estimated three million Afrikaners are the descendants of primarily Dutch Calvinists, French Huguenots, as well as German and Scandinavian Lutherans who originally settled at the Cape of Good Hope on the southern tip of Africa in the 1600s.

It was mostly uninhabited, except for the Hottentot people, who were decimated in an early 1700s smallpox epidemic along with many whites and a handful of nomadic San bushmen.

But inspired by an 1838 covenant with God, whose protection they sought amid hopeless odds staring down a massive Zulu army at the Battle of Blood River in the South African interior, the Afrikaners were forged into a unique nation (or tribe, as some see it) in Africa over a period of centuries – complete with a unique language, history, culture, and essence that are all in mortal danger.

Once the dominant people group in South Africa, with control over most levers of power, they surrendered that power in a 1992 vote. Since the advent of majority rule two years later, the Afrikaners have become an embattled minority, fighting for survival in the face of official racism, discrimination, and even the very real threat of genocide.

So the Suidlanders have good reason to be concerned.

And they are coming to America next month to share their story with Americans, who share more in common with the Afrikaner than any other people in the world.

The Rainbow Nation collapsing

South Africa appears to be on the brink of collapse, even though the mainstream media has done little to report on the looming doom.

Infrastructure is crumbling, racial tensions and genocidal sentiments are being whipped up by political leaders, land grabs are accelerating, attacks on free speech are ramping up, university campuses are burning, and the economy is in complete disarray.

And even before the latest developments, the country was swirling around the drain, according to many experts who have spoken to WND over the years.

This month, the normally soft-spoken former South African President F.W. de Klerk, who along with Nelson Mandela oversaw South Africa's transition from apartheid to "Rainbow Nation" democracy, sounded the alarm.

Specifically, the Nobel Peace Prize recipient who shared his prize with Mandela, blasted South African President Jacob Zuma, the current South African leader, who famously went on national television and sang a genocidal song advocating the slaughter of the European-descended Afrikaners, for his increasingly dangerous actions.

"President Zuma is determined to accelerate our descent along the road to state capture, economic crisis and racial confrontation," De Klerk said at a conference marking 27 years since he announced the release of Mandela from prison.

The current rulers are contributing to the nation "stumbling aimlessly down the road to societal collapse," said De Klerk on February 2.

In what some critics derided as a striking understatement, De Klerk also accused the ruling establishment of being "openly hostile" to white people based "on negative racial stereotypes."

The attitude was creating a "negative racial climate" aimed at "taking away the legitimate economic and cultural interests of [white] citizens, based purely on their race," De Klerk added.

If current trends and government racism continue, he added, it will "lead to the disappearance of the white minority in South Africa within the next 50 to 60 years," the widely respected former South African president warned.

Mrs. Marike de Klerk, the former first lady of South Africa, was murdered by a black security guard in Cape Town.

During the apartheid era, there were fewer than 20 race-based laws.

Today, more than 100 race-based laws discriminating against whites have been created under the guise of "empowering" blacks.

The result has been hundreds of thousands of whites excluded from the labor market, living in squatter camps that have recently been garnering international media attention.

Estimates suggest as much as 10 percent of the white population is now living in squatter camps, with one analyst classing it an "economic genocide."

More than a few experts predict that the Afrikaner will not survive as a people unless current trends change.

Many whites with the ability to do so have already fled South Africa, with estimates suggesting at least a fourth of whites have left the country.

And as WND reported in December of 2013, despite some improvements after the fall of apartheid, the nation is crumbling on virtually every metric, contributing to the exodus.

Genocide and chaos

President Zuma, the controversial polygamous and animist ruler from South Africa's Zulu people, has also blamed Christianity and whites for South Africa's escalating problems, painting a target on the backs of Christians.

Here's Zuma singing the genocide song:

This month, a massive brawl broke out in South Africa's Parliament, with members of the genocidal "Economic Freedom Fighters" (EFF) party and members of the far-left African National Congress, which rules South Africa in a partnership with the Communist Party, beating each other amid a speech.

The leader of the increasingly powerful and aggressive EFF, Julius Malema of the amaPedi people, has also advocated the extermination of whites and the theft of their property.

Like Zuma, he regularly sings genocidal "struggle" songs.

Malema also suggested recently that the time to slaughter the embattled minority was fast approaching.

"This is our continent, it belongs to us," said Malema, adding that "no white person is a rightful land owner" in South Africa or anywhere on the African continent.

"We are not calling for the slaughter of white people‚ at least for now," he added, with the genocidal threat sparking alarm among whites and blacks across South Africa.

The dire situation, while quickly deteriorating, is hardly a new development.

WND reported in 2012 that Genocide Watch chief Gregory Stanton, a former anti-apartheid activist, had visited South Africa that year and warned that white South African farmers were facing a genocidal onslaught and were on the road to facing full-blown genocide.

Stanton also warned that racist and communist forces were taking over the nation.

Genocide Watch, a highly respected U.S.-based nonprofit organization led by arguably the world's foremost expert on genocide, had already been sounding the alarm on the genocidal scheming in South Africa for a decade.

Over those 10 years, thousands of white South African farmers, known as Boers (the Dutch word for farmer), were massacred in the most horrific ways imaginable.

Often, the victims are brutally tortured, with a Bible sometimes being left on their mangled bodies.

This month, Tanya Wiers, a 44-year old white South African mother of three, was stabbed more than 20 times before having her eyes gouged out, the Daily Mail reported last week. The area in which she was murdered is dominated by Malema's Pedi people.

Unlike the overwhelming majority of cases, which go unsolved, a young black man was arrested for the crime.

Similar scenes of genocidal horror targeting whites especially are a regular occurrence in today's South Africa.

Experts say the ongoing slaughter constitutes a clear effort to exterminate the whites or at least drive the remaining ones – now less than 10 percent of the population – out of the country.

In other words, South Africa appears to be facing the literal U.N. definition of geocide.

More than 3,000 farm murders have been documented, representing a significant number considering the total number of commercial white farmers is now estimated at around 35,000, down from around 80,000 when Mandela assumed power.

Tens of thousands of other whites have been murdered throughout South Africa, too, according to estimates.

Because the government refuses to compile crime statistics based on race or ethnicity, many experts believe the true scope of the problem is being deliberately obscured by government.

Warning signs

Stanton, who has successfully predicted genocides and is widely regarded as the world's leading authority on the phenomenon, says the signs are troubling.

"Things of this sort are what I have seen before in other genocides," he said of the murdered white farmers after a fact-finding mission to the "Rainbow Nation" in June of 2012.

"This is what has happened in Burundi, it's what happened in Rwanda," he continued in a speech to the Transvaal Agricultural Union in Pretoria. "It has happened in many other places in the world."

After his fact-finding mission, Stanton also said there was "strong circumstantial evidence of government support for the campaign of forced displacement and atrocities against white farmers and their families."

"There is direct evidence of government incitement to genocide," he added, calling for Zuma to be impeached and Malema to be put on trial for the crime of inciting genocide.

In an email to a prominent Afrikaner monitoring the dangers, Stanton noted that Genocide Watch had raised the Genocide Stage level for South Africa to Stage 6 based on "evidence that the murders of Afrikaaner farmers and other whites is organized by racist communists determined to drive whites out of South Africa, nationalize farms and mines, and bring on all the horrors of a communist state."

At the time, Genocide Watch used an 8-stage model for genocide, with stage 6 representing the planning and preparation phase, stage 7 being the extermination phase, and the 8th and final stage being denial after the fact.

Since then, the scale has changed and now has 10 stages. South Africa is now listed by the group as being on stage 6, which is the "polarization" phase, with preparation being the next phase after that.

"We returned it to polarization after the ANC expelled Malema and kicked him out of the presidency of the ANC Youth League," Stanton said.

Others say the situation has deteriorated significantly since then.

Also added to the list of victims in South Africa were immigrants facing xenophobic attacks, as well as police.

And after some racists and others falsely cited his findings to declare that South Africa was already facing a genocide, Stanton emphasized in 2014 that he had never said that.

"Dr. Gregory Stanton, Founding President of Genocide Watch, warned that early warnings of genocide are still deep in South African society, though genocide has not begun," the group said in a 2014 statement.

Stanton and Genocide Watch have also urged the U.S. and Australian governments to allow white South Africans permission to immigrate to escape the threat.

The Suidlanders are prepping, not leaving

For many white South Africans, and the Suidlanders in particular, the warning signs are everywhere.

And so, to deal with what they believe is looming catastrophe, the group is involved in extensive preparations.

Jerry McMullen explains all about race in "Right, Write and Race: Understanding America's Principles," from the WND Superstore.

The group says it is dedicated to the protection and welfare of its members, mostly conservative Christian Afrikaners in South Africa.

Beside their logo, they often include the following description: "Suidlanders is an emergency plan under international humanitarian law, according to the protocols additional to the Geneva conventions with regard to the protection of victims of armed conflicts of 8 June 1977."

Under the Geneva Convention protocols cited by the group, the protections apply specifically to identifiable groups, such as ethnic groups.

In a wide-ranging interview with WND, Simon Roche, chief of the Suidlanders' headquarters, explained that such protections would have applied to Jews during World War II, Tutsi people in Rwanda amid the genocide there, or Croats in Serbia during the civil war in the former Yugoslavia.

"We, as a particular persecuted group – over 74,000 whites murdered by blacks since 1994 and over 3,500 farmers alone murdered by blacks since 1994 – which happens to be white, are no different," Roche explained, saying the group was not racist but was responding to hate being whipped up against South African whites.

Among other problems, the Suidlanders leader, who unlike many Afrikaners speaks perfect English, noted that in 2015, Zuma pointed to the arrival of whites in 1652 as "the start of trouble in this country."

Roche also noted that Zuma regularly sings songs advocating the slaughter of Afrikaners and Boers.

Primarily, though, the Suidlanders are a Christian organization, he explained.

"We are a unique group whose roots lie deeply in Christianity and whose identity was forged through covenants made with God Almighty," the group says in its promotional materials.

The organization, which says it has around 6,000 active members, 12,000 associate members, and 70,000 family members, estimates that some 800,000 people will participate if and when the need arises to put its evacuation plans into effect.

The general plan is to escape the cities and head for well-stocked farms in the countryside.

There are hundreds of routes planned to get out of South Africa's cities in the event of crisis, and hundreds of separate destinations depending on where in the country the members are located.

The organization also has a national headquarters, communications systems, refugee coordination, security, and medical preparations in place for if and when they are needed.

The Suidlanders were initially founded as an evangelical ministry by former military intelligence officer Gustav Muller, who dedicated his life to the Lord and still believes that his core mission is to call his people to repentance.

But over the years, the Suidlanders has become an organization dedicated also to "bringing Boers to the Lord to prepare for a crisis," Roche said.

Raising funds and awareness in America

Now, two leading members of the group, including Roche, are coming to America to raise awareness of their plight and try to raise funds for their anticipated flight to rural farms when the time comes.

The two men – Roche, who runs the group's headquarters, and Andre Coetzee, chief of security for the organization – will be giving a series of presentations regarding their preparations for anticipated chaos in South Africa in the months and years ahead.

The presentations will begin on March 5 in Lake Mary, Florida, with a presentation in Daytona Beach the next day. They conclude March 25 in San Diego, California.

In between are stops in Nashville, Tennessee, South Carolina, Texas, Louisiana, Arizona, San Francisco, and San Diego.

While a number of events have already been scheduled, the two speakers are trying not to set anything too firmly in stone so that they can remain flexible.

Their presentation, which has already been seen by multiple journalists at major publications around the world, will be given free of charge to groups, churches, or individuals that request it, if it can be fit into the schedule.

The plan is to go where the Lord leads them, Roche said.

"The Suidlanders team will be in the U.S.A for an extended period and they are well-prepared to travel, so don't hesitate to inquire about hosting an event in your area," Roche added.

Inquiries can be made at: [email protected], via Skype by contacting simon.roche3, or by phone at 011 27 84 969 8658, he said.

The goal of their tour is to raise awareness of their plight, and funds for preparations such as diesel, trucks, food, medical supplies, communications gear, and similar supplies.

All preparations are legal, and all donations are strictly for vital necessities for civilian non-combatants, the group explained.

Details on the legal trust that governs all donations to the group are available from the Suidlanders' administration department upon request.

Motivations and prophecies

Among other concerns, the group and its leaders are readying to help get their members out of the cities and population centers and to farms in the event of civil war, revolution, or societal collapse.

Many in the organization also take inspiration from a Christian leader who died almost a century ago known as Nicolaas Van Rensburg.

Some South African Christians, particularly among Boers, consider him to be a prophet.

Among other predictions, Siener (Seer), as he is affectionately known, foretold that South Africa would one day be a democracy ruled by a black government.

He also predicted that the first black ruler would be deemed a saint by the world, with leaders from all over the world paying homage at his funeral.

While at the time the idea sounded ridiculous, and resulted in a tremendous loss of respect among his contemporaries, present-day supporters believe that prophecy was fulfilled in Nelson Mandela.

Van Rensburg also predicted major turmoil for his people, the conservative Christian Boers of South Africa, after the advent of black rule.

"Secondly, we are inspired by the very clear temporal evidence around us of an onslaught upon conservative Christian Caucasians in South Africa," Roche continued, saying the examples were "too numerous to mention."

Outsider view

Dr. Harry Booyens, a scientist and prominent Afrikaner author who left his homeland in dismay and moved to Canada, wrote "AmaBhulu - The Birth and Death of the Second America."

The massive book documents the history of the Afrikaner nation from the arrival of some Dutch, French, and German settlers to today.

While he is not a member of Suidlanders or even an expert on the group, he does appreciate what they are doing.

"I also think they are perfectly correct to prepare for an upheaval, if not a revolution," Booyens said, adding that they have "strong grounds for their fears."

He speculated that if the Suidlanders lived in the United States, they would be supporters of President Donald Trump and Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.).

"They'd be in church every Sunday morning, and they would help anyone who needs help," said Booyens, adding that their leader was a "perfectly decent ex-military intelligence guy" and that "they insist that they subscribe to all that is stated in the Geneva Convention."

He did question and even criticize some of their views on prophecy, the birth of the Afrikaner nation, and other matters.

But he defended them against other critics who think the Suidlanders are being alarmist.

"It is easy for liberal folks to sit in the West Cape or, if you wish, elsewhere behind protective walls in urban protected communities, and mock these folks, question their motives or their intelligence," Booyens told WND. "But, once you have visited a small town like, say, Tarkastad in the East Cape, as I have, you will innately understand."

"I keep telling folks, take the people from Kansas and stick them in Rwanda," Booyens added. "That is what the eastern half of South Africa now is."

"Take a good hard look at these people," said Booyens, whose book draws many parallels between the Afrikaners and Americans. "They are ordinary decent White Protestant Christian folks, like most folks in Middle America. This what the West looks like when it comes to an end. Take a good hard look and weep. Then extend a hand to these folks and do something before America slides into the same abyss.

:President Trump may well be a very rough diamond, but he represents the reaction of millions of Americans to but one thousandth of what these folks in South Africa have been exposed to," he added. "That is why I keep telling folks in North America it costs one air fare of around $2,000 to go and see your future… unless you take action NOW."

Over the potential long-term solutions:

Over the long term, though, Booyens suggests that white South Africans would be wise to emigrate or move west to the Western Cape, so as to form a majority and eventually consider formal legal secession with help from other embattled ethnic groups in South Africa.

"By now there is so much discrimination against 'Coloreds' by the ANC that they will go along," he predicted. "Those feelings will only grow stronger."

With whites numbering fewer than five million in South Africa today – amid a total population of over 50 million – obviously not all of them are on the same page.

Other Afrikaners hoping to create an independent homeland are looking to other areas of South Africa.

But alongside growing fears and preparations, support for the idea of Afrikaner self-determination is gaining ground among significant segments of the white population and allies among other ethnic groups facing the brunt of ANC-Communist Party rule.

Willie Cloete, the leader of South Africa's newly formed National Conservative Party, is among those seeking self-determination for the Afrikaner people.

Citing the deteriorating situation, the fears of genocide, the official discrimination, the end of Bible and prayers in school, and more, he said it was time for Afrikaners to regain control over their own destiny.

"All the different peoples of South Africa should govern themselves in separate states with good neighboring relations," argued Cloete, who said his party is based on Christian values and would like to unify Afrikaners.

Cor Ehlers, a South African farmer and anthropologist, believes that without self-determination, Afrikaners will cease to exist as a people.

And so, he has made it his mission, as the chairman of the Onafhanklike Afrikaner-selfbeskikkingsekspedisie (OASE) organization, which in English means Independent Expedition for Afrikaner Self-determination, to pursue that goal through peaceful international norms.

Citing the South African constitution (Section 235) and a variety of international treaties and covenants to which South Africa is a party, he noted that the Afrikaner people, like all peoples, have the right to self-determination.

He believes that, if a fair and internationally monitored referendum were to take place, the vast majority of Afrikaners would support self-determination.

"Representing the majority of white people in South Africa, Afrikaners clearly face a very dark future in Africa, if at all," he said, adding that many Westernized blacks and Indian people would also prefer to live in an Afrikaner nation than under the ANC regime.

He added that it would be good for the broader West, too.

"We believe Afrikaners enjoying self-determination over specific territory will bolster Western interests in Southern Africa which is increasingly leaning towards Marxism," Ehlers said.

All citizens of the nation, regardless of race or other characteristics, would have equal voting rights, he said, warning of a fringe racist group that also promotes self-determination but does not legitimately represent the Afrikaner people.

The negotiations, of course, would be long and arduous, he said.

But Ehlers told WND that he believes it is possible, and the best solution for all involved.

OASE will eventually be sending a delegation of legal experts to the United States to sound the alarm about South Africa, seek support for Afrikaner self-determination, and more.

For now, Ehlers also pointed to Steve Hofmeyr, a prominent and popular Afrikaner singer, as one advantage held by embattled Afrikaners trying to stop the eventual disappearance of their people.

Seeking help from Trump

Hofmeyr, who apparently has the support of hundreds of thousands of Afrikaners within and outside of South Africa, is hoping to raise money to come to America and meet with President Donald Trump to make him aware of the potential for genocide in South Africa.

"I have no doubt the costs will be met," he said about the fundraising. "But, as an Afrikaner, I am convinced that we'll have to first survive some in-fighting, some government rage and then the overlooked practicalities of getting such an appointment with POTUS (the president of the United States of America)."

"But once there, I would repeat keynotes of my European and UN addresses," continued Hofmeyr, who, like Trump, is occasionally smeared as a racist by political enemies despite the lack of evidence for such a charge.

"Genocide is only one article of it," the singer said. "The advent of land grabs, the end of freedom of expression and 114 extra race-based laws has turned us into an insignificant communist state, deserving of sanctions – not the lenient U.S. checkbook."

Other South African leaders involved in the struggle, such as Freedom Front Plus (FF+), which has hundreds of thousands of mostly Afrikaner supporters, are working inside Parliament and outside of South Africa at the at the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO) and other forums to advance their cause.

On a practical level, they are calling for a return to the Commando system to protect farmers.

The system, which was disbanded by the government in 2003, was a sort of "home guard" defense system for rural areas and farms.

Citing the murder this week of four members of the Smuts family on their farm, Werner Weber, leader of the FF+ party in Mpumalanga, said it was time to bring back the Commando structures.

South African authorities have also vigorously pursued gun control, leaving many victims defenseless.

The attacks on gun rights and the dismantling of the Commando system has also caused observers to sound the alarm about potential genocide, which historically is often perpetrated after the victims are disarmed.

Preparing in the meantime

While South Africans and Afrikaners in particular try to figure out what to do about their plight, the Suidlanders are praying and getting prepared for the worst.

Precise details of their plans are not released to the public, for obvious reasons.

But the general idea is that, if and when a severe crisis develops, members will be notified by text message or other means to head for a rendezvous point with their families.

From there, they will join up with a convoy to move together toward predetermined "safe areas," which will be well stocked with supplies to help care for the needy, including refugees who may not have prepared themselves.

Members are expected to ensure that they have their own supplies for themselves and their families, too, so that care and available resources can be focused on the many expected refugees who did not prepare.

The ANC-Communist Party government is aware of the Suidlanders and their preparations but has so far declined to comment.

With problems getting worse, the Suidlanders are hoping to educate their American cousins on their plight, and perhaps even find support.

Jerry McMullen explains all about race in "Right, Write and Race: Understanding America's Principles," from the WND Superstore.