The staidness of smoke of South Africa’s Xenophobic attacks, apart from this current saga between her and Nigeria and other African states, seem not to have waned with wind and wave with time as the Xenowatch – a tool, a non-proprietary platform developed by the African Centre for Migration & Society (AMCS) to monitor xenophobic threats and violence across South Africa and to make a publically available statistic of any violence at the instance of xenophobia, has been posing eyes over decades on Xenophobic matters in South Africa. Xenowatch, with its keen need to develop effective tools for countering xenophobic arm-twisting and promoting social cohesion in South Africa, revealed that over the past decade, approximately 150,000 people have been killed, injured, or displaced in xenophobic incidents across the country.
Though the South Africa government had been alleged not to have a correct collection of data on attacks of foreign nationals in their country but the smoke of Xenophobic attacks in South Africa as revealed by Xenowatch, is traceable to 1994 according to information from activists, victims, and observers. The threats, attacks, and killings of foreigners in South Africa were revealed to be at a brimming level in 2008 and 2015. In the 2008 saga, thousands were displaced, several hundred allegedly injured, voluntary deportation of immigrants to home countries, destruction of immigrant-owned property and over 60 people were reported to have been killed who were mostly refugees and migrants.
From 1994 till date, a Pew Research Poll that was conducted in 2018 showed that South Africans usually viewed other nationals living among them as a burden by taking their jobs and social benefits and that 61% of South Africans thought that they (foreign nationals) were much more responsible for crime than other groups. In 2015, there were waves of attacks across the country against non-South Africans mostly in the cities of Durban and Johannesburg, which alerted a number of foreign governments to begin repatriating their citizens and made to the deployment of the army to dissuade further turmoil. According to Xenowatch, the Province with Xenophobic violence incidents from 1994 to 2018 are Gauteng (includes South Africa’s largest city Johannesburg and the capital Pretoria), Western Cape, KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo, Eastern Cape, Mpumalanga, North West, Free State, Northern Cape. The country was reported to be one of the countries with the highest murder rates in the world, and of last year, records 27% of unemployment with poor economic performance.
Migrants from neighbouring Zimbabwe, Mozambique, and Lesotho were stationed to be 70% of foreigners in South Africa, and the remaining 30% is made up of people from Malawi, Namibia, Nigeria, and other countries. But one million dollar question to ask is how can Africans be regarded as foreigners in Africa.
The Fire as in Vengeance
Weeks back, antagonism between two African powerful States- South Africa and Nigeria left many wondering whether there exist some international relations between them. The violence was reported to have been sparked because of the death of one Nigerian woman by name of Elizabeth Ndubuisi-Chukwu who happens to be the latest Nigerian to die in South Africa in the apparently convulsive phenomenon. However, according to the report published by BBC News on 29th August, it claimed that an autopsy revealed she had died of “unnatural causes consistent with strangulation” but officials say CCTV footage showed that nobody entered her room.
However, South Africans were usually tagged to be jealous of Nigerians for being full of confidence and capacity in striving to outshine them (South Africans). This may perhaps, has caused many attributions at the instance of Nigerians living in South Africa to be criminals.
“We hear that South Africans detest Nigerians because they believe we are criminals, are too loud, and our men steal their women.” Journalist Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani.
The clouds later extended to Nigeria, whereby Nigerians were revenged by destroying South-African-owned businesses in Nigeria. The BBC News reported that the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) – which represents university students at campuses across the country – has picketed branches of South African telecoms giant MTN, and those of supermarket chain Shoprite, turning away staff and customers.
However, before it was noticed that fake news- of stories, photos, and videos that were being shared on social media really contributed to the incident, the flames of revenge have extended to Zambia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and other countries for reprisal attacks and violence.
The Fluff and Aftermath of the Match
The reverberation of the sad incident affected football, trade across the border, touring, and even beclouds the World Economic Forum in Capetown being boycotted by the Nigerian vice president and other dignitaries. There were loss of lives and property- damaged, stolen, most especially from firms which were looted in the cause of the incident. Destruction of businesses, shops, vehicles, and closure of the embassy.
The incident geared reaction from Celebrities, Presidents of other nations, and even the international community, particularly, United Nations. The United Nations through her Deputy Secretary-General, Amina Jane Mohammed, condemned the sparks of those xenophobic attacks in South Africa and implored South Africa for open arms at the instance of international relations.
“There isn’t anything that justifies the level of violence against another person for trying to make a livelihood and, in particular, in the African context, a guest in your home should not be harmed,” said Amina Jane Mohammed.
Between SA and Nigeria now- currently, Air Peace has commenced evacuation of Nigerians from South Africa. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed that Nigerians had been cleared by the immigration and the evacuation commences on Wednesday. The ministry revealed 640 Nigerians have shown their desire to return from South Africa and had registered to do so, postulating that the second batch would depart Johannesburg for Nigeria on Friday.
However, the meeting has been scheduled in October in South Africa between Nigerian President, Muhammadu Buhari and South African President, Cyril Ramaphosa for talks on trade and the security of citizens. There have been business nexus between South Africa and Nigeria for the fact that thousands of Nigerians were employed by MTN, Shoprite, MultiChoice, and the many other South African companies that are household names in Nigeria- so vengeance and vendetta may not be appropriate action and would add much more salt to the wound, though vice versa.
However, to discuss this crisis, leaders of both countries have agreed to meet in order to among several issues discuss tangible “issues relating to the wellbeing of citizens”, the Nigerian government says. However, whether all these fluffs will still be lit and metamorphosed into the fire is a pregnant question begging for birth. Time beckons.
