South Africa Part 1 of 3

Before I get into my travels in South Africa, I feel the need to explain a bit about what I learned about the people of South Africa.

Arriving in Cape Town we were welcomed by a beautiful view of the city including Table Mountain and Lion’s Head Peak. The ship literally pulls up right into the city, one block away from a mall that rivals the Galleria in Houston. Perhaps this is representative of South Africa in general where the discrepancy between wealth and poverty overwhelms the country. Honestly, one could easily spend weeks in Cape Town without seeing the desolate state in which the majority of citizens live.

A Brief Summary of South Africa’s Socioeconomic Situation

I had the wonderful opportunity to get to know and speak with Lavinia Crawford Brown who’s husband is a professor on the ship. Lavinia and her husband are South African natives and she was actually Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu’s personal secretary for over 25 years. Needless to say, she is quite interesting. Much of the more informal information in my blog comes from our discussions.

Stemming from apartheid, South Africa is split into three social groups: the “whites”, the “blacks” and the “coloureds.” The first two being more straight forward, the third is actually not based on skin color quite as much as language ability. “Coloureds” are black, indigenous, Indian, mixed race, etc. that are able to speak English. Therefore, people who fall into the “blacks” category means they only speak their own local tongue- usually related to a tribal language. During apartheid, the three groups were quite strictly separated and opportunities were unfairly rationed out which has led to the current socioeconomic situation. South Africa is noted for its extreme difference between wealth and poverty. The “whites” being the upper class, the “coloureds” being the middle class (which is actually below the poverty line), and the “blacks” making up the lowest class. When I asked Lavinia if she felt racism led to the continuation of this segregation, she had a different answer. She said obviously racism plays some part, but she feels that socioeconomic reasons keep people in the same place. She gave the example that a wealthy person does not want anything to change in order to protect their wealth. So it is more out of protecting what one does have, that keeps the opportunities limited.

The fourth day in Cape Town I had the opportunity to visit the District 6 museum. District 6 was a neighborhood from the 1920’s through 1966 where “blacks” and “coloureds” lived a prosperous and enjoyable life. The museum commemorates this happy and progressive time and neighborhood. District 6 was close to the dock, where all of the jobs were, and allowed for people to do quite well for themselves. However in 1966, apartheid laws forced the residents to sell their homes for next to nothing and more out into the “cape flats” or townships. The city bulldozed the homes of District 6 and created high end housing for the “whites.” At various points, non-whites were not even allowed within Cape Town city limits. With few jobs outside of the city and no transportation into the city to work at the port, the once educated and prosperous “blacks” and “coloureds” fell into poverty.

Townships (basically squatter villages) cover the landscape outside of the city. People make their homes out of anything they can- pieces of plastic, tin, wood, etc. Lavinia said that the shacks within the townships of South Africa are built unusually close together. As we were driving in the countryside, the townships literally went on for miles- millions of people. Many townships have electricity through a single wire brought in from the highway and everyone hooking up to it. The government provides limited/no resources to the townships. Public education is not free, and many to most children in the townships do not attend school. Some townships have as high as 50% HIV/AIDS infection rate. While the national unemployment level is 40%, townships frequently have an unemployment rate of 80%. As people are pushed farther and farther from the city, jobs are more and more scarce.

We had a graduate student from South Africa join us between Morocco and South Africa, Dayle, who gave a number of wonderful speeches about her childhood and the current issues in her native country. South Africa has roughly 12 political parties, the ANC (Nelson Mandela’s party) has been in control since his presidency. The other 11 parties do not really actually have a chance of ever acquiring power. However, in recent years the ANC has become quite corrupt and another group split off from it making a new political party. Elections are coming up this April and for once the ANC will have significant competition from this new break off group. From what I gather, the country would be better off with this new party. The candidate for the ANC has been convicted of both major financial scandals and rape in recent years.

More to come… :-)