South Africa: Black Slavery protected by a Black government

Black Slavery protected by a Black government

A few days ago, I took part in a television programme together with Nelson Abbey from The Voice – a London Black community newspaper, and we spoke about racism and the word Slavery came up.

I thought that Apartheid ended with the election of 1994. Unfortunately, listening to the news, I now understand that I was wrong. Since 1994, South Africa has had a new kind of Apartheid under the rule of the African National Congress, initially headed by Nelson Mandela.

Although Slavery was supposed to have ended in the Nineteenth Century, Slavery continues in South Africa in the Twenty-First Century. When a government fully accepts the exploitation of its own citizens made to work as miners for less than two pound a day, eighteen years after the end of Apartheid, I call it Slavery.

Today, President Jacob Zuma ordered an investigation and a theatrical state organised series of mourning events was put in place. On April 27^th 2011, Jacob Zuma said that his government was committed to reversing the legacy of Apartheid and Colonialism. So, I would like to be able to ask Jacob Zuma how he calls the actions of foreign companies that are still treating Black South Africans as Slaves under an African National Congress government.

I have to say that I haven't heard any commments from the Labour Party so often heard talking against Racism, Slavery and Colonialism. Where are the voices of the Left when exploited South African miners are murdered under an African National Congress government? Where is the indignation when people who live in desperate conditions end up losing the last thing they have left - their own lives?