Times were different back then. Kids played outside instead of being on their phones, there were two Germanies, and “Separate the Coloureds from the Whites” was a government policy as much as a laundry instruction. South Africa has come a long way from the Apartheid era but the wounds haven’t healed, and the current government is having a poke around in said unhealed wound. I look at the nation’s chequered past to seek answers as to why South Africa is enduring a political and racial storm. I’ve watched Invictus once and also represented South Africa at a Model UN. Is that enough to write a decent article? No, but that hasn’t stopped me before.

South Africa, the so-called Rainbow Nation (Come on Skittles, you should not be able to sponsor a country) saw the end of Apartheid just about 25 years ago. Morgan Freeman walked out of prison after spending about 27 years in prison. He developed osteoarthritis while on the inside and had to struggle to even walk to the prison gates. “A long walk to freedom”, he’d recount this experience later in his autobiography “ A lengthy stroll to liberty”. Mr Freeman worked with the then South African president FW de Klerk to eliminate Apartheid and guarantee universal voting rights to all citizens. The white and black population of South Africa joined hands in the longest recorded human hand-chain and danced to “We are the world”. Well that, and inequality deepened, HIV rates soared, and violent crime was incredibly common. So… yay for the peaceful transition?

The newly elected South African President, Cyril Ramaphosa, promised to hasten the process of overcoming inequality by, wait for it, taking land from white farmers (and not compensating them) and reallocating it to the black population. This is not the first time this has been debated. In fact, the ruling ANC in 1994 proposed to take over 30% of the land owned by whites (and compensate them) and either reallocate or return them to the blacks. Over 20 years, only 10% of the proposed land was transferred. Not to mention, a lot of those who received the land did not even know what to do with it.

This is understandable to me. Well, a bit. I am not even sure what my family did during the colonial era. Neither of my grandparents fought against the British. They were school teachers who came home for lunch and napped a bit before going back. The point is, if my family was ever swindled out of land by the British who now are willing to pay reparations to me, I would be a tad bit confused. I grew up thinking food grows in supermarkets. And I still do sometimes. The idea of managing a farm is just as alien to me as the concept of a farm. I’d think we would all be better off if those who know about things do only those things. The farmers can farm and I can continue writing about foreign countries that I probably will never visit (Suck it Bolivia). Also, it might not be entirely true to say my grandparents did nothing to fight the British. My grandfather married twice during the colonial era. So.. make of that what you will; Butterfly Effect and all that.

Back to land transfer without compensation, or how those who say intelligent stuff call it, land expropriation. The failure of the ANC to fully keep its promise led to the founding of the radical left wing party in South Africa. Like a shitty, unimpressive, and totally unnecessary phoenix, Julius Malema soared up from the fire of racial tensions that he himself keeps fuelling with his self-professed Marxist ideologies and founded the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF). He is also the President and the Commander-in-Chief of the EFF. I sometimes like to dress up as ancient Indian Maharajas and order my little cousin to massage my legs, and even I find the title of Commander-in-Chief to be a bit too far. What army are you even commandeering Mr Malema? A lot of political experts (those who use the term ‘Land Expropriation’ outside the context of picking up women) have described him as a fascist and a race nationalist. I have been told those are not nice things to say to someone. Then again, his policy seems to be centered around the core principle of “Evil Whitey”. Malema proposed a bill in 2017 that would take land from those who are white and legally own it and give it to those who are black and do not legally own it. This is ostensibly to achieve equality. First resoundingly defeated that year, this March, it passed with an overwhelming majority. I do not intend to be derogatory towards Mr Malema. However, if it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and the duck is land-grabby and hopes to abolish socio-economic class by seizing property, Malema is a communist.

Has land expropriation without compensation citing perverse reasons of reparations been successful anywhere else before? If successful means unsuccessful, then yes. Zimbabwe did this very exact thing in 2000 and their cricket performance immediately plummeted. That, and a credit freeze being imposed on them, an ever-rising trade deficit (from a 200 million dollar surplus the previous year), worsening food production so much so that imports are needed to feed the population, and a decline in foreign investments happened after implementation of the scheme. Mostly the cricket performance dipped and nobody wants to be the reason for that. I mean it is understandable South Africa has not paid any attention to the faraway nation of Zimbabwe. Not like they are bordering nations or anything.

So should South Africa carry on with their land redistribution programme? I’d say no, but then again, I am only a guy who eats Doritos on the couch in only my boxers while rewatching Honey Boo Boo.