For the umpteenth time, Nigerians living in South Africa have come under a spate of violent and avoidable attacks in what is fast becoming a pastime of whining South African youths. Alleging job stealing and crimes such as human trafficking, prostitution and drug dealings, the South Africans have unleashed an orgy of attacks on foreigners, with particular venom targeted at Nigerians, destroying and looting their businesses and inflicting physical injury on them. These are unfortunate incidents that should never have been allowed to occur between citizens of Africa’s foremost economies who actually need each other to forge ahead.
Regrettably, what has been evident from happenings so far has been the failure of governments, both on the part of Nigeria and that of South Africa. While the host country is guilty of failure to use the relevant state apparatus to prevent the attacks, the Nigerian government has also failed to act promptly to protect its citizens. When Nigeria reacted, it was slow, tepid and lethargic; a lot of damage had already been done. In fact, reports have it that the High Commissioner, Martin Cobham, did not respond to the distress call of his helpless compatriots. “The most annoying thing is that our mission here is about five kilometres from the scene of the attacks,” lamented Adetola Olubajo, an unimpressed eyewitness.
A country with a vibrant policy of citizenship diplomacy would not have wasted time in summoning the South African High Commissioner to Nigeria and sending a very strong message to his president, Jacob Zuma, about the need to protect Nigerians. The South Africans should have been made to understand that whatever was happening to Nigerian citizens in their country could be reciprocated here. They should have been made to appreciate that just as Nigerians had investments in their country, so also do South African businesses thrive in Nigeria.
Perhaps, what the Nigerian government failed to do was to remind the former apartheid enclave of the reciprocity of 2012, when a planeload of Nigerians was turned back in Johannesburg on the flimsy grounds that the 125 people on board had fake yellow fever certificates. Nigeria had to send back South African flights in retaliation.
What has come out clearly in the current xenophobic attacks, as had been the case with previous ones, is the fact of Pretoria’s tacit support for the xenophobes. Obviously, the ruling African National Congress, having failed to deliver on promises of better governance, is now faced with widespread disillusionment in the land. With unemployment rate at a 13-year high of 27.1 per cent, according to November 2016 figures released by Statistics South Africa, the government is happy to see the heat directed at the wrong quarters. That is why Zuma had not only been slow in condemning the attack, but has not been forceful enough. And that is why it was convenient for the South African security agents to look the other way while the atrocities were being committed.
It should not be forgotten that the Mayor of Johannesburg, Herman Mashab, had in December last year, blamed immigrants for the high rate of crime in the city, calling on them to leave. Two years ago, the Zulu king, Goodwill Swelithini, threw caution to the winds when, to a resounding acclaim by those listening, he described foreigners, Africans like him, as lice that “should be plucked out and left in the sun.” He continued, “We are requesting those who came from outside to please go back to their countries.” In a veiled reference to Nigeria’s “frontline-state” role in the crusade against apartheid, he said, “The fact that there were countries that played roles in the country’s struggle for liberation should not be used as an excuse to create a situation where foreigners are allowed to inconvenience locals.”
It is, therefore, clear that the xenophobic tendencies of South Africans – especially towards Nigerians – are not limited to the ordinary man in the street, but is a state policy that is acted out from time to time. It was for this same reason that our own Nobel laureate, Wole Soyinka, was once humiliated and detained at the airport for hours on end, despite visiting as the guest speaker in the late Nelson Mandela’s birthday celebration.
According to the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Foreign Affairs and Diaspora, Abike Dabiri-Erewa, no fewer than 116 Nigerians have been killed extrajudicially in South Africa in the last two years. This certainly cannot be allowed to continue. If there are criminals in a country, it is the duty of the security agents to fish them out and try them in the court of law.
After years of fighting apartheid, South Africans should learn to live in a civilised world governed by laws. South African businesses are grossing billions of dollars in Nigeria and in other countries. The only way the government of that country can show that what happened did not have official backing is for the criminals to be arrested and prosecuted. From the records so far, this has never happened, despite various past incidents of xenophobia. Denial alone, as Zuma has done, will not be enough. The Nigerian government should employ all diplomatic weapons to protect Nigerians and demand justice and compensation for those killed, dispossessed or injured.
