Riots and demonstrations about immigrants, especially if the immigrants are of a different race and religion from the natives, are much in the news now, usually in Western countries and particularly in the United Kingdom. There have been English demonstrations by immigrants, against immigrants and against people opposed to immigrants (called “far right”). Far worse riots and even killings of immigrants in South Africa do not make a comparable stir in the Western mainstream media.
I am afraid there are all the old racist reasons for this. The composition of the anti-immigration rioters, by race and class, follows a familiar pattern through history, although there are paradoxes. It is a depressing pattern.
At about the same time as I was hearing at first hand confirmation that most South Africans are deeply hostile to foreign people, I saw this heading on the web: “South Africa is the friendliest country in the world”. I read the story, which included this extract: “As per the survey findings, South African locals are renowned for their warmth and hospitality, creating an environment where travelers and visitors instantly feel comfortable. It’s a common experience to receive friendly greetings from strangers while strolling along the streets, and South Africans are generally inclined to engage in conversations, showcasing their affable nature and sharing their jovial spirit through plenty of banter and humour.”
Now around the corner from me in Masiphumelele (near Kommetjie in the Cape Peninsula), black people from Zimbabwe, Malawi, and elsewhere in Africa tell me they are in constant threat from black South Africans, who resent them and loathe them. My girlfriend exhibits craft sewing work in markets and meets black colleagues from the rest of Africa. Their stories are even worse.
A Zimbabwean woman now resident in Philippi lives in fear of her life. She shuts herself in her shack most of the time, terrified to go out in the streets. She has even given up going to church on Sundays, fearing she might be assaulted. In 2008, South Africa was rocked by xenophobic attacks by black South Africans against black African migrants. It began in Alexandra, Johannesburg and spread to the rest of South Africa. At least 62 black migrants were killed. I was attending a nuclear conference in Johannesburg at the time. Foreign delegates were advised not to attend, nor even to venture anywhere in public. I was sitting in the front of a bus when the black South African driver muttered at men crossing the road. He said they were criminals. I asked him how he knew. He said, “They are too dark.”
I listen to SAFM radio in the mornings where woke presenters invite people to phone in on topics that interest them or bother them. Most of the callers are black. The topic of overwhelming interest to them is black immigrants, whom they blame for most of South Africa’s misfortunes.
Depressing
Then how does this square with “South Africa is the friendliest country in the world” and the locals are “renowned for their warmth and hospitality”? I’m afraid the answer is simple and depressing but all too usual. The survey upon which South Africa’s friendliness was based came from a “UK-based relocation website, Remitly”, which it seems deals mainly with international tourists and rich people wishing to relocate to another country. In other words it is interested only in an international elite whose wealth makes it easy for them to move from country to country. It is not interested in the poor people of the world, and especially not interested in poor Africans.
The fact that most poor black Africans dislike poor black migrants and that poor black migrants suffer at their hands is of no concern to Remitly. In fact poor black Africans live in a different and disregarded world as far as Remitly is concerned. Remitly is not unusual in this regard. Most Western politicians and most African leaders also disregard poor black people. The ANC leadership regards them with contempt.
In the UK now, immigration is probably the number one political issue, although the politicians have not found out how to convert it into votes. This is because they have all made a complete pig’s ear of checking the flood of legal and illegal immigration. There is much talk about “the boat people”, illegal immigrants crossing into England in small boats run by criminals. There is also disquiet among many native Brits about the fact that Muslim immigrants are changing the character of many English towns and cities. Reports of Pakistani “grooming gangs” preying sexually on white English girls in the north of England were turned into a major upset by the fact that the woke side (BBC, Guardian, most Tory, LibDem and Labour politicians) tended to downplay or deny them while white racists tended to exaggerate them.
The Hamas atrocities against Israeli civilians, men, women and children, on 7 October 2023, caused huge pro-Hamas demonstrations in England, which were nervously noted by millions of gentle English people, although they had nobody to turn to to express their apprehension. (The protests against Israel immediately after 7 October, before Israel responded, were more ferocious than the ones after she did. The protestors were both full of delight that Israelis, which they often called “Jews”, had been slaughtered, raped and mutilated, and full of fury that they might be seen as victims.) Then there was a misunderstood atrocity when three young white English girls were murdered, and this time the anti-immigration people, or rather some of the anti-immigration people, came out in violent force.
At the end of July in the northern English town of Southport, three white British girls, aged six, seven and nine, were stabbed to death by a young black man. The suspect was quickly arrested but the judge did not name him for a fateful few days because he was under the age of 18. That gave the anti-immigration extremists enough time to persuade themselves and some of the public that he was a Muslim jihadist who had entered Britain illegally. Reports of actual atrocities against women in many Muslim countries lay the tinder for such fiery assumptions. It turned out that the suspect, Axel Rudakubana, was not Muslim, and was born in Cardiff to parents who had immigrated from Rwanda.
Motley bunch
The anti-immigrant mob rioted in northern English towns, smashing buildings, attacking mosques, assaulting policemen. They seemed a motley bunch, comprised of young working-class whites and a few outright racists from the fringes, including some who brandished Swastikas (to the delight of woke commentators, always hungry for white racism). They did not seem representative of the massive segment of Brits who feel immigration has gotten out of hand and feel displaced in their own country. The protestors were called the “hard right”. They were vigorously put down by the British police, and many were arrested and convicted. This reaction by the British police, quite rightly of course, seemed to many completely different from their reaction when pro-Hamas and extreme Muslims demonstrated violently in English cities. There were complaints about a “two tier” policing system in England.
By this was meant that the English police would be completely tolerant of pro-Hamas, pro-Palestinian, anti-British violence but come down like a ton of bricks on pro-Israel and pro-British demonstration. The police were quite happy when the Palestinian flag was waved aggressively at Trafalgar Square but would prevent anyone waving the Union Jack or, even worse, the flag of England, the red cross of St George. This is the impression I’ve got so far but I should have to study the facts on both sides to be sure, which I have not done.
The anti-immigration violence in South Africa in 2008 and the anti-immigration in England in 2024 have this in common: some locals were reacting violently against people of a different race entering their country. Poor black South African races dislike the different black races from the rest of Africa when they enter. But there are profound differences.
The South African violence against black immigrants was far worse and the response from the world’s media was far less. In Britain, the police sided with the immigrants and arrested the protestors; in South Africa the police opposed the immigrants and sided with the protestors. In Britain, the politicians mumble but mainly support the immigrants; in South Africa many of the leading politicians are blatantly anti-immigrant (Gayton McKenzie for example). The reason the world’s mass media showed such little interest in South Africa’s terrible attacks against black immigrants is simply because the attackers were mainly poor black people, who count for nothing in their eyes. They are only interested in whites who oppose immigration.
What are the motives of the emigrants? Why do they choose to emigrate to Europe and Northern America and not to Africa or Haiti? Let me be blunt about it. Why do they want to immigrate to countries ruled by white people and not to countries ruled by black people? For this is obviously the case. In 2020, a band of black African refugees came to Cape Town, occupied the Central Methodist Mission Church, and demanded that the South African authorities find them safe refuge in Canada! The demand was mad but the wish was logical. They knew from experience that in any black African country they would be met with ferocious hostility whereas in Canada they might be treated kindly. They knew that black racism against other black races is always far worse than white racism against black races.
Similarly black refugees to Europe or North America know that although a small white minority might attack them most whites will just accept them. I once read an article in the Sunday Times (I think) about the aspirations of ambitious black South African youths. They were asked what country they would choose to live in if they had to leave South Africa. Not one of them chose an African country. They chose countries such as France, Canada, Sweden, and the USA.
Instructive but discouraging
The history of xenophobia is instructive but discouraging. The kings and queens of European countries might fight each other or form alliances with each other, and might marry each other for political advantage, but the common people of all countries tended to dislike and be suspicious of each other. The key example of xenophobia in English history was the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381. The people who revolted had a perfectly good liberal mission, which, if fulfilled, would have propelled England forward by a century at least, but they also had racist intent and bloody methods. The Black Death had wiped out a third of the English population, and suddenly workers and peasants were in short supply and their value greatly increased. So the ruling class passed maximum wage laws to stop employers paying them more!
The prolonged, idiotic and deathly 100 Years’ War between English and French aristocrats had crippled the English economy. Finally the ruling classes imposed a poll tax on everyone, rich and poor. This was the last straw. The peasants of southern England exploded. (“Peasants” is a misleading term. Actually it was anyone, peasant, worker or artisan, not of the ruling establishment.). They formed themselves into an army and marched into London. They demanded the end to serfdom and the right of workers to negotiate their own terms of employment. Perfectly right and reasonable. But their methods were brutal. They laid waste. They killed. They chopped off heads, and displayed them on poles. Their main enemies were lawyers, bishops – and foreigners. They particularly targeted Flemish textile artisans, whose skill had added greatly to the English economy. If they saw a man who looked like a foreigner, they would hold a loaf of bread before him and ask him to say what it was. If he said, “Brood”, they would kill him. This has eerie resonance with the South African xenophobic killings against the “kwerekwere”, who could not pronounce words as the locals do, 627 years later.
The answer to the problem of immigration everywhere is simple. We must have controlled immigration, and we must firmly and consistently resist illegal immigration. Immigrants can, and usually do, add great value not only to the local economy but to art, science and technology. The indigenous people of the Americas, Australasia and South Africa (the Bushmen) – what is left of them after annihilation by immigrants – might disagree. But since we cannot undo the past, from a practical point of view there is no other sensible policy except for controlled immigration.
The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR
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