Two die in Soweto xenophobic violence

Jean-Jacques Cornish — Tue, 28 Aug 2018 22:00:00 +0000

Two people have been killed in Soweto as residents attacked and looted foreign-owned businesses.

The giant township neighboring Johannesburg has been at the centre of xenophobic violence in 2008, 2015 and 2017.

The attacks on the shops are believed to have been sparked by a Johannesburg newspaper reporting that foreign businesses are selling fake and expired goods to local consumers.

The first death occurred after a Somali shopowner owner fired a pistol in self defence.

A police spokesperson said one person has been arrested for murder and another for attempted murder.

Officials have appealed for calm and warned people to refrain from taking the law into their own hands.

The police spokesman confirmed the targets of looting were foreign-owned businesses.

The ANC government, with its history of having neighbors offer shelter and support to South African refugees during the struggle against apartheid, is particularly embarrassed by outbreaks of xenophobia.

The worst of these was in 2008 when 62 people died and special camps had to be erected to shelter foreigners outside Johannesburg.

In 2015 at least seven people died when gangs hunted down foreigners in Johannesburg and the east coast port city of Durban.

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Africa in xenophobic pincer grip

Jean-Jacques Cornish — Thu, 23 Apr 2015 22:00:00 +0000

by Jean-Jacques Cornish
Xenophobia is gripping Africa in a north-south pincer movement with leaders hamstrung on dealing with it honestly.
The brutal attacks on foreigners in South Africa – mainly from neighbouring states – has left at least seven people dead and displaced five thousand .
It is sadly reminiscent of the violence seven years ago that caused 62 fatalities.
Yet when six people died in attacks on foreign-owned shops earlier this year, government refused to acknowledge it as such, insisting it was criminality.
This time it has dispensed with such equivocation.
President Jacob Zuma has spoken out daily against the violence and virtually every member of Cabinet has made his or her rejection of its clear.
But it has taken the giant National Union of Metalworkers, now in the enemy camp, to make the point that government must take responsibility the root causes of the frustration giving rise to the violence.
NUMSA cites service delivery failure and government’s inability to produce a life-changing post-apartheid dividend for the majority of its citizens.
Leaving daily from ports in north Africa – mainly ungovernable Libya – are overcrowded, unseaworthy boats hoping to make landfall on the closest piece Europe.
Last weekend, an estimated 800 people drowned in the largest tragedy sparked by this desperate exodus. Largest, indeed, but one of hundreds of sinkings that have left thousands dead.
EU leaders decided at an emergency summit in Brussels on Thursday to triple the amount spent on rescuing those in peril on the Mediterranean.
They also resolved to destroy the boats of these people traffickers.
Their decisions got the headlines they were seeking.
They also have transformed the pressing social, humanitarian and political posers into issues of criminality that can be more decisively dealt with.
There is no certainty over how long the rescue operations will persist.
And precious little is given about the pilot programmme to resettle the refugees who have risked their lives to find better, more peaceful and freer lives in Europe.
Most importantly the summit did not address the question of why the migrants are forced to brave the dangerous sea because legitimate routes into Europe are closed.
Is there a leader courageous or perhaps foolish enough to brave the xenophobic wrath of his voters to attempt an answer?

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Two die in Soweto xenophobic violence

Africa in xenophobic pincer grip