{"id":169195,"date":"2020-10-18T16:17:37","date_gmt":"2020-10-18T14:17:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/south-africa-needs-a-fresh-national-imagination-here-are-some-ideas\/"},"modified":"2020-10-18T16:17:37","modified_gmt":"2020-10-18T14:17:37","slug":"south-africa-needs-a-fresh-national-imagination-here-are-some-ideas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/south-africa-needs-a-fresh-national-imagination-here-are-some-ideas\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africa needs a fresh national imagination: here are some ideas"},"content":{"rendered":"

Imagine that during the COVID-19<\/a> lockdown South Africans woke up one morning to TV shows, radio broadcasts and pamphlets announcing a declaration by \u201cwhite\u201d South Africans: \u201cWE ARE NO LONGER WHITE!\u201d <\/p>\n

In their statement they explain why.<\/p>\n

They have come to a realisation that South Africa was the only real home they ever had. That they now felt at home in a country and continent where over a billion people have had to carry the devastatingly false label \u201cblack\u201d. All because technologically advanced European nations from the 15th century onwards began to violently acquire, for their exclusive benefit, countries all over the world and the people who lived and worked on their lands. Forthwith, such conquered people existed for Europe.<\/p>\n

Buoyed by successful seasons of repeated conquests around the world, Europeans \u2013 and where they were in the Americas \u2013 finally chose to embody the entire value of their humanity in a colour: \u201cwhite\u201d. \u201cWhite\u201d South Africans have been among the vital parts of this violent history.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo more!\u201d they had now declared. \u201cWe are signing out of \u2018global whiteness\u2019 and throwing out a false label that never had any human substance to it!\u201d<\/p>\n

Unlikely as such a miraculous event might be, it could be a useful reflective metaphor for giving expression to a significant unfolding shift in South African \u201cwhite\u201d sentiment towards the contemporary human environment in the country. Two historic events may be deemed to have contributed significantly towards signs of what looks like a far more committed unfolding.<\/p>\n

Two historic events<\/h2>\n

The first event is one that many South Africans may have forgotten: that 68.73% of \u201cwhite\u201d South Africans voted in the 1992 referendum<\/a> to give President FW de Klerk a mandate to negotiate with Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress for a new constitutional democracy. In this way they signalled a willingness to contribute to making possible a shared future with all South Africans.<\/p>\n

The second one was an unexpected trigger for \u201cwhite\u201d South Africans to wade into the river of history and cross it as the flood levels of water were rising at the ford. The COVID-19 pandemic has seized the South African collective mind and unleashed a wave of bonding and sentiments of fellow-feeling<\/a> in the face of the prospect of random collective dying.<\/p>\n

If the referendum signal took more than 20 years flashing with urgency, COVID-19 has struck like lightning with the full force of a challenge up to now embraced with some reluctance. The optimism that combined a referendum and a negotiated political settlement now demands to be lived by all South Africans.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
A mural in Westdene, Johannesburg, by Norm Abartig and Nicholas Kerr.<\/span> Kim Ludbrook\/EPA-EFE<\/span><\/span> <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Realignments that are needed<\/h2>\n

If the South African constitution<\/a> is the supreme law of the land, then there has to be a new covenant to achieve the intended goal of equality<\/a> as a leveller among all citizens. The legacy of race-driven loyalties and solidarities must be pushed out of the way of human equality, fairness, and justice. <\/p>\n

The constitution is as a much a life-giving leveller of human beings as the deadly, invisible virus is a leveller in the destruction of human life.<\/p>\n

South Africa seems poised to witness major realignments in human congregations. These could also result in realignments in loyalties and solidarities that should now coagulate around vital community interests at the local, regional and national levels. <\/p>\n

There are constitutional levers to make such social coagulations desirable, possible and even sustainable.<\/p>\n