Politicsweb - How to write about race - Top stories

Politicsweb - How to write about race - Top stories

An eight step guide to commenting on South Africa's favourite obsession

Introduction

South Africans love race. One might even say we are obsessed with it. We cannot get enough. You cannot open a newspaper, read a blog, listen to radio discussion or watch a current affairs show that doesn't have yet another someone or other telling us what an enormous problem race is, how under appreciated the scale of the crisis is and how desperately we need to move past it.

Anyone who doesn't want to talk about race or considers themselves non-racial is accused either of effectively being racist themselves or living in some kind of dangerous denial. And it is everywhere. I mean everywhere. There is not a thing that is not interpreted through a racial lens or, indeed, argued itself not the product of some kind of racial malfunction.

Written Interview with Andreas Thomas - Windhoek Observer - 7 Feb 2012

Good afternoon Mr Louw
It seems that a new political stance has emerged were tribal sentiments and ethnicity is now at play in local politics. Tribal outburst allegedly made during the interview by Youth Minister Kazenambo against Oshiwambo speaking people and the subsequent reactions toward the comments paint a picture of a society deeply rooted tribalism in our society.
I would like to assist me answer some of pertinent questions regarding tribalism and tribal loyalties in Namibia especially in the wake of the upcoming Swapo Party congress and impact it might have on the country.
 1.      Do you think the problem of tribalism has seeped into the ruling party Swapo Party and how bad do you think that is?

Tribalism and associated decision making because of ethnic relationships had been a product of the Apartheid South African ruling system. This we have to accept. However, we as a nation have committed ourselves to another standard, whereby through reconciliation and the adoption of our constitution, we do not base decision-making on culture or tribal affiliation.

Having said that though, we must realise that politicians present things in certain ways to get themselves elected. Look at our opposition parties and all have an ethnic (though some say locality) representation.

Swapo, being the party representing the largest protion of the population, would obvisouly thus also constitute the largest section of Oshiwambo speaking people. From a representative viewpoint, thus also many of the leaders of SWAPO would also be of this cultural group.

However, tribalism is not the problem. I believe the problem is rather nepotism - (patronage or favoritism shown on the basis of extended family relationships) and cronyism (partiality to long-standing friends, especially by appointing them to positions of authority, regardless of their qualifications).

If however, the person seeing this act nepotism is only seeing it in tribal terms, as they themselves are not part of that specific tribe.

So no, tribalism is not the problem, nepotism and cronyism are.

 2.     Government adopted the policy of National Recompilation mainly to achieve reconciliation between blacks and white Namibians. Since independence, it has increasingly become evident that there is a tension between the various ethnic groups in Namibia. Should reconciliation between black Namibians therefore not had been the first priority after independence and is there not a need even now to start a process of reconciliation between various ethnic groups?  

Please allow me to explain a little - Reconciliation can be used in terms of either

• conflict resolution or
• ethnic relations 

Thus Namibian reconciliation as Independence was conflict resolution between two ideological opposing sides. The one side, wanting Namibia to be a part of South Africa as a fifth province, and the other side wanting independence from South Africa. Thus conflict resolution reconciliation has been effective.

What we are seeing is that there is a need for ethnic resolution reconciliation.

So no, it could not have been a first priority. But it is still a step we need to take as a nation. We need to create a common memory - a history lesson we all feel comfortable with which explains where we all come from, why we came here, and what our shared future vision is.

I would like to see our leaders rather promoting our differences, and what we can learn from each other, than what has been reportedly said my the Minister.

I believe this quote explains what I mean, "..But maybe memory is what young people need to be taught before they can be taught actual history."

 3.     Minister Kazenambo feel that he is being victimised because of the calls he made for the next country President (Swapo) to be non-Oshiwambo. But how would you suggest Minister Kazenambo should have handled this matter during the interview?

I cannot say how the Minister should or should not handle any matter. However, if any reporter should ask me how i feel as a coloured person, I would immediately state that I believe in in integration. By this I refer to the lump sum off all of us as citizens of a specific country. It is the pride we have when singing the national anthem, our support to the members of our national sporting codes, or identifying with a Namibian that has done well on the world stage.

The best way to illustrate this is: "Before Independence I was Coloured, now I'm Namibian".


 4.     Having a current situation of politics based on the premise of “now it is the turn of other tribes to take over". What do you think the impact this will be on politics in the country and society in general? Do you expect tribal loyalty take centre stage at the congress?

First, if it is "the turn of others" to take over - it should be the turn of a Namibian woman to be President. Or do we as a nation, or political party, or as families, not yet believe woman are as good (or even) better as leaders?

I wish to state that there is more gender-based discrimination among Namibian men than what there is tribal-based discrimination.


The issues of leading Swapo, or Namibia will always be what is best for us as a nation. Each and everyone must vote according to their conscience. We deserve the leaders we choose.

Nevertheless, we must face the reality that whoever is elected to be in command of SWAPO after Comrade Pohamba will be the next President of Namibia. So yes, it will have an impact on our society if the person chosen is not the best candidate, but rather the "best oshiwambo" candidate.

During the last congress when Hidipo Hamutenya, Nahas Angula and Hifikepunye Pohamba stood as candidates, it is clear that the Swapo members chose the person who in the long run has been the best choice for us as a arty, and Namibia as a nation

Will tribal loyalty take centre stage - yes in the form of cronyism. All political parties in the world are based on give and take within the voting process - who is my friend, who will do something for me. However, terming it tribalism is just another way to hide from the fact that in Namibia too many of us still do not believe we are "One Namibia, One Nation".

We are a tribe, the Namibian tribe.

Culture, racism and tribalism

My rambling thoughst about race, tribalism and the recent tribal based comments by KK and others

Namibia and Integration

Most of the Namibian peoples have come to this area leaving behind war or oppression of some sort or the other. They chose this inhospitable place to settle and live peacefully, not only with one another, but also with the natural environment they found themselves in. During periods of oppression they have not had a choice but to react to ensure their continued peace and stability.

After Independence, it was only natural that Namibians should choose to have one of the best constitutions in the world that ensures this peace and continued peaceful co-existence with one another. The policy of reconciliation was as natural for its people as breathing and eating.

Today, Namibia is a model that few other countries can emulate. Worldwide, countries struggle with problems of integration. These differences take the form of religion, language, customs or race. In Namibia these differences are recognised, but do not form the basis of either government policy decisions or social interaction.

As Namibians we have a lot to offer the world, and more specifically our neighbours in Southern Africa. We are an “Institute of Integration” where peoples from other parts of the world can come to learn what we know – we have a dependency on our fellow human beings and the natural environment in which we stay.

Differences in Namibia

We have thrown the baby out with the bathwater. This is the only explanation of the total lack of information based on cultural affiliations in our census in Namibia. Unfortunately, this attitude of “let’s pretend it is not there” does not make it so.

Even in South Africa, where the Apartheid system was the most formalised, they have recognised the need to keep the information and knowledge of all cultural groups as part of the “rainbow nation”. Discrimination because of race colour or culture is a thing of the past and is replaced by recognition and acceptance of our differences.

We have also outlawed discrimination on the basis of gender, yet still need this categorisation to measure the needed changes that must take place in our country for gender equality. In the same way it is important to note that when a previously marginalised group, such as the San people, have qualified teachers from within their own tribe and culture (Republikein – 14 April 2009).

The lack of recognition of certain groups can have detrimental effects on our country. Look at what has happened to some of our pre-Independence orphans who returned from East Germany. More recently we have seen the SWAPO veterans and orphans also wishing to be recognised as a distinct group with specific needs. In the near future we will see a new group forming of AIDS orphans who have grown up differently with specific disadvantages that need to be addressed to allow them to fully pluck the fruits of our freedom. What culture shall all these groups inherit?

There is a national culture Namibia. Thus we can refer to our language as Namlish with its peculiarities and pronunciations. We are known by our friends and foes on the sport fields as the Brave warriors and the Biltongboere.

In business we refer to the marketing process. It starts with an analysis of the present and then moves to develop a strategy. In marketing it is recognised that to provide the best product for the customer you need to segment the market. Tools such as the Living Standards Measurement are used to focus our marketing efforts. A typical LSM would include age, gender, race or cultural group and income. (Living Standards Measurement Study (LSMS) household surveys have become an important tool in measuring and understanding poverty in developing countries.)

The people of Namibia are the customer. To serve our people better we must recognise our difference not only in gender or language but also in race. The census in Namibia must measure the race and culture embraced by each resident in future.

The tertiary education institutes in Namibia must then participate in research focussing on cultural, racial, gender, urban-rural economic and livelihood inequalities in Namibia. This ongoing research must continue to ask what the relationship is between the growth and spatial distribution of the public and private economic sectors. It must also encompass the formal and informal economy, the nature of poverty, the characteristics of poor areas, and socio-economic empowerment.

I am a socio-political entrepreneur

I often consider myself a socio-political entrepreneur. To me this means that while I chase a business objective, i also need align certain political / legal frameworks to enable me to reach my longer term goals.

Perhaps they just express it a little to harshly for my ego.

Architects of the Future: The Socio-Political Entrepreneurship Style of 5GW

PurpleSlog. "Architects of the Future: The Socio-Political Entrepreneurship Style of 5GW." PurpleSlog. August 27, 2007. http://purpleslog.wordpress.com/2007/08/27/architects-of-the-future-the-socio-political-entrepanuership-style-of-5gw/ (accessed January 14, 2011).

In the second blog post of a series of blog posts exploring potential archetypes, or styles, of 5GW, PurpleSlog suggests a “Socio-Political Entrepreneurship” style of 5GW.

Unlike the first archetype explored in the series (“The Puppet Master”), the Socio-Political Entrepreneurs will operate in the open to effect large-scale changes but their exact motives and ultimate goals will be hidden from view; that is,

The S-P-E 5GWer acts out in the open (not in secret), but their true aims or expected/hoped-for consequences are closely held (secret) and/or at longer timespans than most folks consider or notice (there’s the secrecy), or the effects are so broad/horizontal that the ramifications are overlooked by most.

The Socio-Political Entrepreneur will operate across many domains, with and/or upon a wide variety of other actors, through visible means, but his apparent goals will be seen as the normal goals of entrepreneurship of one sort or another while his real motivations and goals remain hidden. PurpleSlog gives a short list of examples, although these are given as metaphors and not necessarily as examples of real Socio-Political Entrepreneur 5GW effectors:

• Super-empowered money actors (think Gates, Buffet, Soros)
• Super-empowered media access actors (think Gore, Michael Moore, Kos)
• Super-empowered idea/meme generating actors

Furthermore, many apparatuses such as NGOs or even Dan Abbott’s “Military-Industrial-Sysadmin Complex (MISC)” or other force structures or public organizations could conceivably operate as Socio-Political Entrepreneur 5GW organizations.

Architects of the Future: The Socio-Political Entrepreneurship Style of 5GW - 5GW Theory Timeline

To my old slave master

Dayton, Ohio,
August 7, 1865
To My Old Master, Colonel P.H. Anderson, Big Spring, Tennessee

Sir: I got your letter, and was glad to find that you had not forgotten Jourdon, and that you wanted me to come back and live with you again, promising to do better for me than anybody else can. I have often felt uneasy about you. I thought the Yankees would have hung you long before this, for harboring Rebs they found at your house. I suppose they never heard about your going to Colonel Martin's to kill the Union soldier that was left by his company in their stable. Although you shot at me twice before I left you, I did not want to hear of your being hurt, and am glad you are still living. It would do me good to go back to the dear old home again, and see Miss Mary and Miss Martha and Allen, Esther, Green, and Lee. Give my love to them all, and tell them I hope we will meet in the better world, if not in this. I would have gone back to see you all when I was working in the Nashville Hospital, but one of the neighbors told me that Henry intended to shoot me if he ever got a chance.

I want to know particularly what the good chance is you propose to give me. I am doing tolerably well here. I get twenty-five dollars a month, with victuals and clothing; have a comfortable home for Mandy,—the folks call her Mrs. Anderson,—and the children—Milly, Jane, and Grundy—go to school and are learning well. The teacher says Grundy has a head for a preacher. They go to Sunday school, and Mandy and me attend church regularly. We are kindly treated. Sometimes we overhear others saying, "Them colored people were slaves" down in Tennessee. The children feel hurt when they hear such remarks; but I tell them it was no disgrace in Tennessee to belong to Colonel Anderson. Many darkeys would have been proud, as I used to be, to call you master. Now if you will write and say what wages you will give me, I will be better able to decide whether it would be to my advantage to move back again.

As to my freedom, which you say I can have, there is nothing to be gained on that score, as I got my free papers in 1864 from the Provost-Marshal-General of the Department of Nashville. Mandy says she would be afraid to go back without some proof that you were disposed to treat us justly and kindly; and we have concluded to test your sincerity by asking you to send us our wages for the time we served you. This will make us forget and forgive old scores, and rely on your justice and friendship in the future. I served you faithfully for thirty-two years, and Mandy twenty years. At twenty-five dollars a month for me, and two dollars a week for Mandy, our earnings would amount to eleven thousand six hundred and eighty dollars. Add to this the interest for the time our wages have been kept back, and deduct what you paid for our clothing, and three doctor's visits to me, and pulling a tooth for Mandy, and the balance will show what we are in justice entitled to. Please send the money by Adams's Express, in care of V. Winters, Esq., Dayton, Ohio. If you fail to pay us for faithful labors in the past, we can have little faith in your promises in the future. We trust the good Maker has opened your eyes to the wrongs which you and your fathers have done to me and my fathers, in making us toil for you for generations without recompense. Here I draw my wages every Saturday night; but in Tennessee there was never any pay-day for the negroes any more than for the horses and cows. Surely there will be a day of reckoning for those who defraud the laborer of his hire.

In answering this letter, please state if there would be any safety for my Milly and Jane, who are now grown up, and both good-looking girls. You know how it was with poor Matilda and Catherine. I would rather stay here and starve—and die, if it come to that—than have my girls brought to shame by the violence and wickedness of their young masters. You will also please state if there has been any schools opened for the colored children in your neighborhood. The great desire of my life now is to give my children an education, and have them form virtuous habits.

Say howdy to George Carter, and thank him for taking the pistol from you when you were shooting at me.

From your old servant,
Jourdon Anderson.

_________________________________________________________________________________________

In the summer of 1865, a former slave by the name of Jourdan Anderson sent a letter to his former master. And 147 years later, the document reads as richly as it must have back then.

The roughly 800-word letter, which has resurfaced via various blogs, websites, Twitter and Facebook, is a response to a missive from Colonel P.H. Anderson, Jourdan's former master back in Big Spring, Tennessee. Apparently, Col. Anderson had written Jourdan asking him to come on back to the big house to work.

In a tone that could be described either as "impressively measured" or "the deadest of deadpan comedy," the former slave, in the most genteel manner, basically tells the old slave master to kiss his rear end. He laments his being shot at by Col. Anderson when he fled slavery, the mistreatment of his children and that there "was never pay-day for the Negroes any more than for the horses and cows."

 To take a look at what appears to be a scan of the original letter, which appeared in an August 22, 1865 edition of the New York Daily Tribune, click below:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7035/6790780585_466117fe88_o.jpg

From:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/01/in-recently-discovered-le_n_1247288.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000009