This article is in response to remarks made by Zulu monarch, King Goodwill Zwelithini as reported by TimesLive.

For a rabid libertarian like me, one that is sceptical of the state and state institutions in many instances, I rather like the monarchy. And no, not the British one (don’t get me wrong, I love them, being an anglophile) but I do, in principle, support the maintenance of traditional African monarchies. Yes they’re not perfect and by many Western standards they may not measure up (being polygamous, patriarchal and so on), but they are somewhat useful. (By the way, where they don’t measure up, as is evidenced by the article mentioned above, I think they should do so. Nor do I believe that the argument that “Western” standards are incompatible with traditional society)

Why? Well here’s a rapid fire (and woefully under-developed and response:

1) They usually act as a repository of culture, language and tradition. (Yes, some of them are questionable, but on the whole they actively militate against loss of indigenous culture and language as has been experienced elsewhere. Holding onto that history is pretty important)

2) They often provide access to communities that are too parochial and where the government has no presence at all. This access is a two-way street: people who are sceptical of government are more likely to buy-in to the AIDS messages that the amakhosi support (mostly) and conversely, the people who live in these vulnerable areas and have no access to government services are able to access them through traditional societal structures.

These positive outcomes make them worthy of some funding. Again though, I don’t think this means exorbitant, excessive nor profligate expenditure. Nor do I think it means monarchies can spend on activities/things which actively undermine the state’s attempts at non-discrimination and tolerance. Especially considering how influential they are in communities which are themselves rather opposed to homosexuality as it is. No government department or Minister for example would (or should) be able to enjoy taxpayers’ money having said something like this.

Zwelithini should lose every cent he is given for perpetuating such hate undermining the struggle for true equality for all people.

The stage is set; blue and red fluorescence blinds the audience; men in suits smile eagerly into the camera – these politicians must convince middle America that they can beat Obama. This mediocre crew of Republican candidates (now reduced to five forerunners – minus the belle of Tea Party conservatism, Michele Bachmann) has been battling it out, forced to stumble over answers and flip-flop towards the creation of a policy platform which would woo conservatives, and fight back against the so-called socialism of “Yes, we can!”

The rise of Dr Ron Paul, who came second in the recent New Hampshire primary, is indicative of a Republican Party, and America, in dire need of a new direction. Paul, a man who views the disbursement of pocket money to children as an extension of nanny state dependency, is an avowed ‘pro-life’ libertarian. He wants to end foreign military intervention and believes in the legalisation of drugs; he also wishes to reduce the size of America’s government. A Ron Paul Administration would scrap social security for the poor.

With an end to foreign wars, and the return of thousands of America’s troops, it is not difficult to see Ron Paul’s possible term in office resurrecting the proudly individualist post-WWI America of the 1920s. This was a time when unemployed soldiers, having just returned home from Europe’s trenches, formed giant squatter camps to protest government’s reluctance to provide welfare to an increasingly impoverished country.

It would take Roosevelt’s foray into Keynesian economics and a new world war to get America moving forward after the Depression. Barack Obama is in a position to implement a similar wave of domestic investment schemes to create jobs. But he’s proven to be an establishmentarian; Obama has not raised taxes for America’s wealthiest (the so-called one percent?) and the corruption that pervades Capitol Hill is as firmly entrenched as before.

But it would be foolish to think Obama has not initiated schemes to improve the lives of all Americans; he delivered on his 2008 promise to institute universal healthcare, and was summarily condemned as a socialist by hordes of  ‘Don’t tread on me’-flag-bearing housewives and conservative ideologues. Despite the fact that Obamacare, as it’s become known, served as part of Obama’s winning election platform, the American electorate angrily turned against it as soon as it became law.

The electorate is now seemingly aware of America’s escalating government debt, and Obama’s slow reaction to this issue has spurred voters (even those identifying themselves as the occupiers of Wall Street) to consider the politics of Paul, Bachmann and even Rick Perry – a man who was unable to name the three government agencies he’d like to axe as President.

Primary voters are participating in an election which will most likely result in less government intervention in the economy,  but will signal the re-commencement of increased intervention into the private lives (read: bedrooms) of ordinary Americans. The incessant flip-flopping of Mitt Romney, the most likely GOP candidate in 2012, is indicative of this – his former liberal stances on gay rights have turned rigidly conservative. And Rick Santorum, a former lobbyist and proprietor of all that is wrong with American politics, believes only in dignity – not equal rights for all.

Only in the land of the truly free would the vacuous and vapid, intolerant and incongruous, corrupt and corruptible, and decidedly hypocritical have a serious chance of winning the battle to become the leader of the free world.

Lord have mercy on us all…

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Tonight, whilst tucking into a sumptuous slow roasted lamb leg done in a red wine and garlic sauce, I happened to overhear the dulcet tones of a fellow diner, who no doubt to the thoughts of all those around him, thought he was hilarious.

The conversation went like this:

Customer: “So how does it feel when your people lose the cricket?”

Waiter (in a thick Indian accent): “I’m sorry Sir, I no Sri Lankan, I’m Indian. I support SA.”

Customer: (continues to make some remark about how all your people support each other and MUST have been sad).

My simple opinion of this guy: what an absolute dick.

(Of course I leave out how I turned to him and in my full baritone voice, mimmicking the best Indian accent I could muster said: “blease sir buy pive in one dee-bee-dee. After which I will cut hair, make suit and shave you and then smack your trashy face blease for being so racist.” Needless to say, lots of hand gesturing, head-shaking and masala came flying from me whilst I did this. I mean, a few more prejudices wouldn’t hurt that ignorant fuck now would it?)

Amichand Rajbansi was a divisive figure that was hated and loved by
many people. Whilst I do not consider my dislike for the man’s
politics to be so strong so as to classify it as hate, my dislike for
his politics does not limit my ability to empathise with his family,
his party and his supporters at what must be a difficult time. Death,
despite its inevitability, is a sad thing.

However, the death of Mr Rajbansi and the empathy/sympathy it invokes
must not be allowed to blur an honest and frank discussion about his
contribution to South African politics, especially in the democratic
era. It would be unfitting of such a fighting man to shirk from the
truth: something I am led to believe he always strove to achieve.

The truth, or rather (in the adapted thinking of Albie Sachs in his
latest book) my experiential truth, is that the death of Rajbansi
raises some important questions for South African Indians. It is my
firm belief that the answer that is given will determine not only the
South African Indian community’s future, but will also play a
significant role in answering questions of race that affect South
Africa generally.

Rajbansi’s politics were highly divisive. Whilst I’m sure his followers
will justify his collusion with the Apartheid state as a necessary
evil to guarantee some form of basic service for South African
Indians, the cost of such a tactic can never be under-played. In doing
what he did (namely in setting up a political party that participated
in the Apartheid-created and Indian-only limited-parliamentary system), he created a degree of internal and international legitimacy for the
Apartheid state and its warped ideas of separate development. In so
doing, he allowed the Apartheid state the opportunity to paint the
struggle as being out-of-touch with the needs of South Africans and
allowed the NP to show how normalcy could be achieved in a
pseudo-democratic state in which white people illegally, unfairly and
unjustifiably retained their superiority.

Not only am I sure that this weakened the moral case of the struggle
to those who were abroad and possibly ignorant of the facts, I am sure
that it created a degree of acceptance amongst older South African
Indians who in my experience still see the Apartheid government as
having been better for them than the current one. The fact that people
may hold that opinion is saddening and regrettable: not only at the
level that it robs them of their own self-actualization but that it
does so at the cost of others’ ability to do so.

Probably more devastatingly, his collusion fractured collective
non-white opposition to Apartheid. The result of which is that many
black people, especially political opportunists like Julius Malema and
Fikile Mbalula, wrongfully still believe to this day that Indian
people did not suffer under Apartheid or that if they did, it was to a
lesser extent than the black majority and are thus worthy of less
protection than other previously disadvantaged groups and are thus
somehow less part of our new democracy. Whilst I do not contend that
black people did not suffer the most (in number and probably in
severity), I do contend that his collusion to some extent created the
mistaken belief that these kids of attacks are  acceptable.

Despite such a belief being wrong, it isn’t difficult to see how it
can be reached: why should we black South Africans give anything to
the “Indians” whose rights we were fighting for as well, but who chose
to accept the Apartheid state? It takes a mature political theorist
and someone of absolute commitment to justice to say that such a thing
does not require reparation, merely commitment to a non-racial future.
That political class, especially in today’s ANC is lacking and
Rajbansi’s politics allow them to make their case all the more easily.

As a libertarian, in this instance I would argue that such an attempt
to advance South African Indian self-interest was wrong as it  came at
too great a cost.

For Rajbansi’s conduct post-Apartheid was no more dubious. He actively
played to people’s fears that as a minority, they would never be
looked after and that the only way in which “Indians” could protect
themselves was to band together and sell themselves to the highest
bidder. This amoral exploitation of people’s (irrational) fears (which
he helped create by propping up and being part of an NP government
that said the very same) undoubtedly increased the “us” and “them”
type discourse that was and is used in our democracy today by not only
the Minority Front, but by the likes of the ANC and the Freedom Front + too.

Thus in 2004, Rajbansi even shattered his own voters’ hopes and
expectations when he did the unthinkable and joined the ANC in a
coalition to wrest control of KZN from the IFP. Whilst possibly
beneficial to him, he was given a seat in the Cabinet, the people of
KZN experienced no remarkable service delivery that he claimed would
be the result of his political crosstitution.  If anything, it made
many within the ANC rank and file regret the need for such a party
(and by extension the people he claimed to represent) and allowed them
to dump him with much relish and haste (and I would say along with
their commitment to non-racialism too) when he was not needed in 2009.

The divisive tactics again proved to have come at too high a price. For
whilst the playground bully needs you to do his spying, he will be
your friend, but the moment the bully doesn’t need you any longer, you
are in just the same position to him as everyone else: fair game!

But now that he is gone and his party — which was more of a cult of
personality than a serious political party that took policy
formulation and representation seriously — faces a questionable
future, the question is obvious (to the remainder of the MF): will you
continue to play race against race in an effort to maximise your own
political capital or will you embrace South Africans (including South
African Indians) as being that: South African?

The answer is simple.

We must be allowed to celebrate our heritage, to revel in our
ancestry, to sing our forefathers praises and to appreciate all which
makes us uniquely who we are. To argue otherwise would be ridiculous.

What we cannot allow, is for any person or party, despite their
historical or individual merits, to dupe us into believing that we are
unique by virtue of our race and that somehow our race determines our
future prospects. The responsibility of the MF’s new leadership is to
seek to defend the ideals of democracy as encapsulated by our
Constitution for all not some, to speak for the many not the few, and
work with those that seek to advance justice not perpetuate injustice.
As difficult as the temptation may be to sell-out and do otherwise for
personal political gain, the reward of making sure that South Africa
is better for all its people will surely be greater.

We are all South African and we all have a claim to this democracy.
This country will only start working when everyone realises that.

The recent spat between Helen Zille, Premier of the Western Cape, and the Afro-Jazz musician Simphiwe Dana can only be described as a traditional South African race row.  Back-and-forth accusations, patronising ignorance, and overly offended sensibilities – the hallmarks of such a vulgar debate. Within the mind-numbing miasma of this twitter war, one could easily have missed Simphiwe Dana’s divisive comment about what constitutes being an African. With hundreds of users jumping in and coalescing around the notion that either Cape Town is or isn’t racist, Dana tweeted: “Nope. We’re not all Afrikans (sic)” in reply to a “we’re all African – regardless of our race, let’s get along”-type tweet.

Was I the only person to have noticed this appropriation of populist politics by Dana? And why was no one else outraged? To answer the latter question: the opinion that white people are not African (or African enough) has become acceptable in South Africa. Commentators like Sentletse Diakanyo have aggressively defended this opinion in the public sphere, and now a popular South African musician has nonchalantly beamed this idea – which was irrelevant to the greater Cape Town question — across the internet. South Africans should recognise the dangerous nature of these comments – and the mainstreaming of such ideas.

Simphiwe Dana’s opinion is comparable to the rhetoric of the European Far-Right, who base their political platforms on the premise that Arab Muslim and African immigrants have no place in an ageing Europe. David Theo Goldberg refers to this as ‘Euro-racism’ in his book The Threat of Race: Reflections on Racial Neoliberalism. He goes on to state: “… Euro-racism ensures that those ‘racially non-European’ are never nor can ever be European, or at least European enough.” Whereas immigration in Europe, for example, is a more recent political issue, the migration of people from Europe and Asia to South Africa has been prominent in our history for over 300 years.

Sentletse Diakanyo believes the term ‘African’ only denotes one’s race, analysing the historical use of the term as a means to rebut the idea that all who call Africa home are in fact Africans. Ideologically, the term ‘African’ has often been used to bolster nationalist and Pan-Africanist fervour.  However, the creation of a new South Africa, one with a liberal democratic constitution, should have signalled the proud annexation of the term ‘African’ by South Africa’s new toolbox of values – unity, human rights, and equality. In fact: the idea that many South Africans can (and do) now buy into the vision of a united country and shared future on this continent – as Africans – should be a positive sign of change. It should be hailed as a step towards a future free of racism, and of a liberal South Africa where citizens can be whoever they want to be – African or not.

The repudiation of Simphiwe Dana’s comments would take place almost anywhere else. Had she said Latinos were not actually real Americans, for example, she’d have faced considerable criticism. Had she tweeted about Muslim immigrants in England, the organisation Unite against Fascism (UAF) would surely have taken her on. Unfortunately, Dana loses her moral legitimacy as a crusader against racism when she reverts to the conservative town hall politics of a polarised America and Europe.

Although Ayaan Hirsi Ali, prominent Somali-born activist and former Dutch parliamentarian, and the enigmatic Dutch politician Geert Wilders share common concerns with regards to immigration in Holland, Hirsi Ali has called for a moderate and pragmatic approach. Instead of demonising the immigrant, she has called for the assimilation of these immigrants into the Dutch culture. Integration above intolerance; reason over racial prejudice. Imagine how glorious it would be if the high-profile South Africans littering twitter with their personal opinions could apply some of Hirsi Ali’s common sense.

If South Africans are serious about creating a society entrenched in our constitutional principles, then more people should start defending the ideologies which promote progress, and reject the ideas which divide us and devalue segments of our society. Divisive rhetoric, as expressed by Simphiwe Dana, impedes nation building and unity, and ought to be shunned by more South Africans.

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