Why South Africans hate African migrants

Perhaps the best example of South Africa’s connection with migration is the family of its president, Jacob Zuma. One of the president’s six wives was from Mozambique (she died in 2000). He has a fiancée from the Swaziland royal family. Edward Zuma, his first son, was born in Swaziland. His daughter, Gugulethu Zuma, is married to Wesley Bongani Ncube, the son of Zimbabwe opposition politician, Welshman Ncube. And, moving from personal ties to business, Duduzane Zuma, another son, has been the focus of reports exploring his business ties with the controversial Gupta brothers, who are originally from India.
Those connections tie in with the various issues that the current anti-foreigner violence in South Africa has raised. Zuma left South Africa for Swaziland in 1975, where his first son was born.
From Swaziland he moved to Mozambique, where he met and married the South-African born Kate Mantsho, who was working as a stewardess for the Mozambican national airline at the time.
Bongani and Gugulethu met at the University of Cape Town, where they were both students. The first Gupta brother, meanwhile, arrived in South Africa in 1993 to scout business opportunities and was later joined by two of his brothers; it is a route many other Asian businessmen in South Africa have taken.
As the past two weeks have shown, the first families’ myriad connections with migration would not sit well with many ordinary South Africans.
Immigrants from Somalia, Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mozambique, Malawi, Zimbabwe, Burundi and Nigeria have had their shops and homes attacked and looted. Some were killed. And while those are the most targeted nationalities, few foreign immigrants feel safe.
South Asians have also been attacked, while the Chinese embassy – acting on reports from its nationals that their shops were looted – lodged a formal complaint with the South African government.
The attacks started in Kwa-Zulu Natal Province, soon after the Zulu king, Goodwill Zwelithini, addressed a “moral regeneration” rally and asked “foreign nationals to pack their belongings and go back to their countries.”
The remarks were yet to settle in before the Swazi-born Edward Zuma weighed in with support for the king: “We need to be aware that as a country we are sitting on a ticking time bomb of them [foreigners] taking over the country,” Edward Zuma said. Zwelithini, it should be noted, has two Swazi wives.

No country for immigrants
Xenophobic attitudes are widespread in the South African population, and occasionally erupt into violence and looting.
In January, shops owned by Ethiopians, Somalis and Pakistanis were looted in Soweto after one of the migrants shot dead a 14-year-old boy who was part of a group that tried to rob his shop.
The looting eventually spilled over to other townships around Soweto. Foreign-owned businesses are usually targeted in South Africa’s all-too-frequent service delivery protests.
The scope of the current violence has led to comparisons with the wave of xenophobic attacks that swept the country in May 2008, leaving 62 dead, 21 of whom were South Africans.
The violence was a climax of attacks on foreign migrants – some fatal – that had been happening throughout the year across the country, including one by the police on a church in Johannesburg where Zimbabwean refugees had sought refuge.
They started in the Alexandra Township, a stone’s throw away from the affluent Sandton suburb, with the murder of two foreign migrants on May 11, looting of shops belonging to foreigners, and rape.
The violence spread to other parts of Johannesburg and Gauteng Province, before moving on to Kwa-Zulu Natal, the Free State, North West, Limpopo and Western Cape provinces.
Seven years later, it is clear not many lessons were picked. At least eight people are dead and hundreds injured. Scores of foreign immigrants have lost their property to looters while many have decided to leave South Africa altogether.
The shocking images of the attacks, combined with the fact that most of the victims are Black Africans has led to soul-searching among some South Africans: why does it always come to this? What happened to the ‘rainbow nation’?

They ‘steal’ our jobs
It is, therefore, not surprising that immigrants, especially those seen to be thriving where locals have failed, would be at the receiving end of the society’s frustration. Hence the common refrain among the attackers that the foreigners “steal” their jobs. Why should the foreigners thrive and prosper when natives are living in poverty.
But are the foreigners stealing jobs? Research seems to disagree. A survey released by the African Centre for Migration and Society (ACMS) at the University of the Witwatersrand in 2014 found that “people born outside the country were far less likely than those born in South Africa to be employees, and far more likely to be their own account workers (self-employed without employers) or employers.”
This is largely a result of immigration and domestic law, which makes it hard to employ foreigners, especially those who are unskilled, and also places a premium on employing Black South Africans. 50 per cent of foreign migrants work in the informal sector, according to ACMS.
The choice for most foreign migrants is stark: work or starve, hence the low unemployment rates. But the work options open to them are often unstable and precarious; few get contracted work or benefits. These are often jobs that the average South African will not do.

Exceptionalism
The idea of South African exceptionalism compared to the rest of Africa is another of brand South Africa’s building blocks. It is an upper-middle income economy, and has the infrastructure to show for it. Johannesburg, its financial capital, styles itself as a ‘World Class African City’. It has Africa’s largest stock exchange, its best universities, and has hosted the World Cup. Little wonder, then, that the average South African feels his country has no equal in Africa.However, the superiority complex traces its roots to the insularity and programming of apartheid, according to some observers. Black Africans from outside South Africa were derided by the apartheid regime in both the white and black communities, even as the same regime told Black South Africans that they were not as good as the rest of their countrymen. Apartheid ended, but that view of Africa has endured. Different surveys have pointed out an intolerance of foreigners in South Africa across all sections of society. According to the World Values Survey, South Africans “were more hostile and resistant to immigrants and refugees than citizens of any other country.” Additionally, a survey carried out by the Southern African Migration Programme in late 2010 found that “South Africans still have a poor opinion of irregular migrants, refugees, and African migrants.” Nearly 80 per cent of respondents supported the prohibition of migration or strict limits to migration. Black people were however found to be less xenophobic compared to other racial groups.

The rainbow nation
South Africa has successfully branded itself as the “Rainbow Nation,” referring to its patchwork of races and colours supposedly living together in Ubuntu-inspired peace and harmony.
The truth could not be any more different as the country continues to grapple with the ugly legacies of its apartheid past. It is the most unequal society in the world, according to the World Bank, with the top 10 per cent of the population owning 53.8 per cent of total income and the bottom 10 per cent owning only 1.1 per cent.
This high income inequality probably explains the high levels of crime in the country (several studies have found a strong correlation between high income inequality and violent crime), with a 2014 United Nations report ranking it ninth in nations with the highest homicide rates in the world. Because of its relatively advanced economy,
South Africa is a popular destination for immigrants from across Africa escaping political instability and repressive regimes, or looking for economic opportunity. There are several estimates of foreign immigrants living in South Africa, with 2011 census data putting the figure at 1.7 million while the World Bank estimates they are 1.8 million. Most of the immigrants do not move to rural areas, but settle in urban areas, usually in the settlements and townships where the average South African lives.
A good number of them are not so well educated refugees locked out of formal employment by South Africa’s strict labour laws.
On top of the high income inequality, South Africa also has high levels of unemployment, placing it among the worst performers in the upper-middle income economy category. The official figure is 24.3 per cent, although the more realistic rate – which includes people who have given up looking for work – is 34.6 per cent.
Unemployment is highest among Black Africans at 27.2 per cent using the narrow rate and 39 per cent using the expanded rate.
Breaking it down further, the percentage of those without jobs in the 15-24 age group (all races) is 63.6 per cent and 39.4 per cent for those between 25-34 years using the expanded measurement. Most of those are Black Africans coming from poor backgrounds.

The politics
Some commentators have pointed out that migrants do not vote, so no one really cares what they think. And when continual protests against the government fail to change living conditions or improve incomes, they are always the easy scapegoats.
South Africa’s current leaders, especially those who were involved in the anti-apartheid struggle, know too well the road migrants have travelled to get into the country, their experiences as they build new lives and probably start new families.
But, at least until the recent attacks, they have done little to offer them basic protections or prepare their own societies for integration.
There is only so much that politicians can do to solve a problem that is part of the nation’s psyche. Still, they have not offered a lot on which they can be judged positively. In 2008 President Mbeki waited 10 days – as the violence spread nationwide – before ordering the army to help police contain attacks on foreign nationals; he was in Tanzania day the order was given.
While the current situation has not necessitated such measures, the ruling party – including the President – have been accused of coddling the Zulu monarch and refusing to call him out on his remarks.
The only one who did so apologised after the king protested, while the Police Minister has done his best to defend Zwelithini. Before these attacks, several politicians ranging from ministers to an opposition Member of Parliament have blamed foreigners for one problem or the other, feeding simmering prejudices.