Oyena Gwebityala

Have you ever had someone accidentally hit you in the nuts? It hurts like hell and you probably feel like returning the favour, but then you realise it was an accident and all you can do is say “don’t worry about it while they apologise”. I think that is the same kind of feeling young white South Africans have at the moment, at least the ones that I have been speaking to about the subject of affirmative action.

Most of white friends don’t deny that apartheid was an injustice, or that some people (even them) benefited and others lost out. They don’t even dispute that something needs to be done to try and correct those injustices. But what does that mean for them? Well for starters it means they find themselves further and further down the employment queues, they can’t start up companies without BEE partners, they have to compete extra hard for bursaries, scholarships and internships. And other such things. I would be silly to think that anyone could ever accept this kind of treatment because it corrects a past injustice. Moreover if you look at the kind of people I am talking about, it is almost impossible to think that they think it’s fair. These are mostly guys who turned 7 or 8 in 1994, there is no way they could have played part in perpetuating or ending apartheid. There is no reason to believe that they would have ended up on either side of the camp had they been old enough to take that decision (although many will tell you they would have ended up on the right side- let’s not get into that one).

So is it fair that these kind of guys must suffer? We send them to the back of every line in South Africa and expect them to stay and do some nation building, when they never broke it to start with. And those that decide to leave are called unpatriotic and irresponsible. I say; If I were white I would never stay either. Would you and why.