Why I'm fleeing South Africa
by Anne Paton (widow of Alan Paton)

I am leaving South Africa. I have lived here for 35 years, and I shall leave with anguish. My home and my friends are here, but I am terrified. I know I shall be in trouble for saying so, because I am the widow of Alan Paton.

Fifty years ago he wrote Cry, The Beloved Country. He was an unknown schoolmaster and it was his first book, but it became a bestseller overnight. It was eventually translated into more than 20 languages and became a set book in schools all over the world. It has sold more than 15 million copies and still sells 100,000 copies a year.

As a result of the startling success of this book, my husband became famous for his impassioned speeches and writings, which brought to the notice of the world the suffering of the black man under apartheid.

He campaigned for Nelson Mandela's release from prison and he worked all his life for black majority rule. He was incredibly hopeful about the new South Africa that would follow the end of apartheid, but he died in 1988, aged 85.

I was so sorry he did not witness the euphoria and love at the time of the election in 1994.But I am glad he is not alive now. He would have been so distressed to see what has happened to his beloved country.

I love this country with a passion, but I cannot live here any more. I can no longer live slung about with panic buttons and gear locks. I am tired of driving with my car windows closed and the doors locked, tired of being afraid of stopping at red lights. I am tired of being constantly on the alert, having that sudden frisson of fear at the sight of a shadow by the gate, of a group of youths approaching - although nine times out of 10 they are innocent of harmful intent. Such is the suspicion that dogs us all.

Among my friends and the friends of my friends, I know of nine people who have been murdered in the past four years.

An old friend, an elderly lady, was raped and murdered by someone who broke into her home for no reason at all; another was shot at a garage.

We have a saying, "Don't fire the gardener", because of the belief that it is so often an inside job - the gardener who comes back and does you in.

All this may sound like paranoia, but it is not without reason. I have been hijacked, mugged and terrorised. A few years ago my car was taken from me at gunpoint. I was forced into the passenger seat. I sat there frozen. But just as one man jumped into the back and the other fumbled with the starter I opened the door and ran away. To this day I do not know how I did this. But I got away, still clutching my handbag.

On May 1 this year I was mugged in my home at three in the afternoon. I used to live in a community of big houses with big grounds in the countryside. It's still beautiful and green, but the big houses have been knocked down and people have moved into fenced complexes like the one in which I now live. Mine is in the suburbs of Durban, but they're springing up everywhere.

That afternoon I came home and omitted to close the security door. I went upstairs to lie down. After a while I thought I'd heard a noise, perhaps a bird or something. Without a qualm I got up and went to the landing; outside was a man. I screamed and two other men appeared. I was seized by the throat and almost throttled; I could feel myself losing consciousness.

My mouth was bound with Sellotape and I was threatened with my own knife (Girl Guide issue from long ago) and told: "If you make a sound, you die." My hands were tied tightly behind my back and I was thrown into the guest room and the door was shut. They took all the electronic equipment they could find, except the computer. They also, of course, took the car.

A few weeks later my new car was locked up in my fenced carport when I was woken by its alarm in the early hours of the morning. The thieves had removed the radio, having cut through the padlocks in order to bypass the electric control on the gates.

The last straw came a few weeks ago, shortly before my 71st birthday. I returned home in the middle of the afternoon and walked into my sitting room. Outside the window two men were breaking in. I retreated to the hall and pressed the panic alarm.

This time I had shut the front door on entering. By now I had become more cautious. Yet one of the men ran around the house, jumped over the fence and tried to batter down the front door. Meanwhile, his accomplice was breaking my sitting- room window with a hammer.

This took place while the sirens were shrieking, which was the frightening part. They kept coming, in broad daylight, while the alarm was going. They knew that there had to be a time lag of a few minutes before help arrived - enough time to dash off with the television and video recorder. In fact, the front-door assailant was caught and taken off to the cells. Recently I telephoned to ask the magistrate when I would be called as a witness. She told me she had let him off for lack of evidence. She said that banging on my door was not an offence, and how could I prove that his intent was hostile?

I have been careless in the past - razor wire and electric gates give one a feeling of security. Or at least, they did. But I am careless no longer. No fence - be it electric or not - no wall, no razor wire is really a deterrent to the determined intruder. Now my alarm is on all the time and my panic button hung round my neck. While some people say I have been unlucky, others say: "You are lucky not to have been raped or murdered." What kind of a society is this where one is considered "lucky" not to have been raped or murdered - yet?

A character in Cry, The Beloved Country says: "I have one great fear in my heart, that one day when they are turned to loving they will find we are turned to hating." And so it has come to pass. There is now more racial tension in this country than I have ever known.

But it is not just about black-on-white crime. It is about general lawlessness. Black people suffer more than the whites. They do not have access to private security firms, and there are no police stations near them in the townships and rural areas. They are the victims of most of the hijackings, rapes and murders. They cannot run away like the whites, who are streaming out of this country in their thousands.

President Mandela has referred to us who leave as "cowards" and says the country can do without us. So be it. But it takes a great deal of courage to uproot and start again. We are leaving because crime is rampaging through the land. The evils that beset this country now are blamed on the legacy of apartheid. One of the worst legacies of that time is that of the Bantu Education Act, which deliberately gave black people an inferior education.

The situation is exacerbated by the fact that criminals know that their chances of being caught are negligible; and if they are caught they will be free almost at once. So what is the answer? The government needs to get its priorities right. We need a powerful, well-trained and well-equipped police force.

Recently there was a robbery at a shopping centre in the afternoon. A call to the police station elicited the reply: "We have no transport." "Just walk then," said the caller; the police station is about a two-minute sprint from the shop in question. "We have no transport," came the reply again. Nobody arrived.

There is a quote from my husband's book: "Cry, the beloved country, for the unborn child that is the inheritor of our fear. Let him not love the earth too deeply. Let him not laugh too gladly when the water runs through his fingers, nor stand too silent when the setting sun makes red the veld with fire. Let him not be too moved when the birds of his land are singing, nor give too much of his heart to a mountain or a valley. For fear will rob him of all if he gives too much."

What has changed in half a century? A lot of people who were convinced that everything would be all right are disillusioned, though they don't want to admit it.

The government has many excellent schemes for improving the lot of the black man, who has been disadvantaged for so long. A great deal of money is spent in this direction. However, nothing can succeed while people live in such fear. Last week, about 10km from my home, an old couple were taken out and murdered in the garden. The wife had only one leg and was in a wheelchair. Yet they were stabbed and strangled - for very little money. They were the second old couple to be killed last week. It goes on and on, all the time; we have become a killing society.

As I prepare to return to England, a young man asked me the other day, in all innocence, if things were more peaceful there. "You see," he said, "I know of no other way of life than this. I cannot imagine anything different." What a tragic statement on the beloved country today. "Because the white man has power, we too want power," says Msimangu.

"But when a black man gets power, when he gets money, he is a great man if he is not corrupted. I have seen it often. He seeks power and money to put right what is wrong, and when he gets them, why, he enjoys the power and the money.
Now he can gratify his lusts, now he can arrange ways to get white man's liquor. I see only one hope for our country, and that is when white men and black men, desiring neither power nor money, but desiring only the good of their country, come together to work for it .

"I have one great fear in my heart, that one day when they are turned to loving, they will find we are turned to hating."

Original Poster:
Yep, thats what its still like around here . . . but hey . . . what can i say . . . you get used to it . . . its just another type of lifestyle.

Walls around your home, barbed wire on top of the walls, an electric fence on the top of the barded wire, an alarm system, security gates on all doors and windows, emergency knobs in most rooms of the house, video cameras showing the driveway and street to search for any hijackers before you leave for work, no loud music & no TV on (If it hasn't already been stolen) so you can hear if someone is breaking in. Gear locks, satelite tracking systems and gorilla locks for your car.
Thats if you're "lucky" enough to have all these security items available for your protection. (excluding mental and emotional protection ofcourse!)

You have to teach your children a strategy for when the house is broken into- so you know where to find them afterwards:
1. run to the nearest alarm button and press it
2. run to the cupboard inside your bedroom wardrobe and stay there until help comes . . . if help comes.

Its kinda like living in a computer game or something. I kindof enjoy it these days. Its like you're in a high-security home and you're waiting for the bad guys to come- because you know they will come. It gets more fun over the years. You start planning of better hiding places and better strategies of how to deal with the possibly fatal situations that will be thrown at you. And when your cell phone gets stolen out of your hand while you're talking on it- you just think to yourself "If only i had a remote control for a bomb to blow up in the thief's hand" - that would be so excellent. Blow the fucking assholes hand off so he will never be able to steal again!! Fuck finger-prints and the law- Its basically non-existant!

I will also be leaving SA within the next year. Its the only thing you can do to avoid being killed, raped or loosing all your money and posessions - and i'm not talking lots of stuff: I'm just a student and the little i have is very important to me. The thing is that its not just theft type of crimes, its violent crime that makes SA so notorious. The thief sees a guy with a wallet in his pocket. He takes out a gun and kills him for it. But it only had R20 in it. Its like that.

I'll have to DISaggree with Anne Paston and what she said about "black-on-white" crime. This is not the motive behind the crime. There is not alot of racial tension anymore (or certainly none that I or any of my friends have experienced!). Its simply poverty-stricken, uneducated people who have no respect for human life because of what they witnessed from the apartheid government.
Yes, you reep what you sow. The apartheid government has sown hatred and violence. Today's generations of South Africans (white, black, indian, coloured . . . ) will now reep this.

Ott:
Yes its really as bad as the article describes. Infact, since 1998 the crime levels have shot up (details from local police stations) They have come up with more sophisticated ways of robbing you and killing you. But its mostly in the cities . . . youknow, Cape Town, Joburg Pretoria and Durban. There in the game reserves and in the outdoors where the tourists go its not as bad. Just be cautious and keep all doors, security gates locked- car windows closed. Don't leave things like cell phones/wallets on counters at shopping malls etc. One slip and theres a big chance that you're fucked. So stay alert!

She asked for it!  They all did.

Three years ago, I spent some time working as a guard for a company based in South Carolina that had an office Johannesburg.  The day I landed there was May 31.  That's their independence day, and the airport in Johannesburg was closed because of a protest that turned into a small riot.  We had to land in Kimberley, and drive to the company housing.  At the airport, the company representative in Bloemfontein told us to wait at the airport near the terminal, and to not under any circumstances even leave the terminal.  Three hours later, I got to see why.  The van that came to get us had three broken windows that were taped-up with duct tape and several bullet holes and cracks/dents from other impacts.  The guide said the van was only 4 months old(!), and they always park it behind a gate at the office and at the housing.  Apparently, those happened while they were driving the van around town!  The windows were blacked-out (some of it tinted, but most of it black paint!) so that, according to the driver, the natives couldn't tell that there were white people in the van.  Less than two blocks from where we stayed, I saw a black man dead on the sidewalk that looked like he had bled to death from having his throat slashed.  The apartment where we stayed had 14' high stucco walls around it with a 10' (I think) tall electrified chainlink fence on top of the stucco wall.  I even saw a Holiday Inn with a wall like this!

Why is South Africa so important?  According to the briefing I got from my employer, they're the world's largest producer of platinum, gold, chromium, and the JSE is the eighth(?) largest stock exchange in the world and the largest on the continent.  That's why this company opened an office there.

My job was to "supervise" three big rednecks who flew over with me.  We were going to be the body guards in the van that shuttled people from the office to the trading building.  I thought the pay was great for just riding around in a van.  One of the guys with me was a former Marine.  The other two were brothers who grew-up in a rough black neighborhood in south Atlanta.

(continued)

We weren't even there for 12 hours before all four of us were ready to pay our own way home.  We got our wish the next day when we found-out that the company was closing all of their operations in South Africa.  The manager of the office's personal assistant was found the day before we arrived.  She had been car jacked.  The attackers didn't even bother to kick her out of the car when they stole it.  They shot her once then stuffed her in the floor on the passenger side.  When they finished with the car, they parked it, poured gas on it, and lit it on fire.  The girl was still alive in the car when they lit it on fire, because she had crawled a few feet out of it in an attempt to survive.  The (expletives deleted) drove around for hours with her in the car suffering from a gun shot then they burned her alive.  The police there said it was a typical car jacking.  The four of us went with the office manager to the police station.  The police, as they read-out what happened to the manager, didn't seem a bit surprised or concerned.  It was just another typical occurrence to them.  That day, we booked a flight home, because the company was closing their operations in South Africa.  They had had enough violence.  400 South Africans lost their jobs that day, because the people in this business couldn't put-up with the violence any more.  It's sad to see a country self destruct like that.  From what I saw, South Africa is a nice place with a well-educated populace, but too large of a portion of the people would rather steal and kill than work for a living.  

You forgot to put a icon to let us know you were joking- you were joking, right?

Rise, O voices of Rhodesia.
God may we thy bounty share
Give us strength to face all danger and,
Where challenge is, to dare.
Guide us, Lord, to wise decision,
ever of thy grace aware.
Oh, let our hearts beat bravely always,
for this land within thy care.
[b]Rhodesian National anthem[/b]

Rise, O voices of Rhodesia,
bringing her your proud acclaim,
Grandly echoing through the mountains,
rolling over far-flung plain.
Roaring in the mighty rivers, joining in
one grand refrain,
Ascending to the sunlit heavens,
telling of her honored name.

What a tragedy.

Clarification,

Remember what she and her husband stood for, and what they wanted to accomplish.   Look what happened in Rhodesia?  I good friend of mine is from Nigeria.  He moved here because of his home county is dangerous.  He talked about criminals coming to houses and telling the owners what time they should leave so they would not get hurt when the criminals came to rip them off.  He said the cops would not intervene because they were afraid.

She writes:

“As a result of the startling success of this book, my husband became famous for his impassioned speeches and writings, which brought to the notice of the world the suffering of the black man under apartheid.

He campaigned for Nelson Mandela's release from prison and he worked all his life for black majority rule. He was incredibly hopeful about the new South Africa that would follow the end of apartheid, but he died in 1988, aged 85.

I was so sorry he did not witness the euphoria and love at the time of the election in 1994.But I am glad he is not alive now. He would have been so distressed to see what has happened to his beloved country.”

And

“But it is not just about black-on-white crime. It is about general lawlessness. Black people suffer more than the whites. They do not have access to private security firms, and there are no police stations near them in the townships and rural areas. They are the victims of most of the hijackings, rapes and murders. They cannot run away like the whites, who are streaming out of this country in their thousands. “

ZOOM writes:

“The police there said it was a typical car jacking. The four of us went with the office manager to the police station. The police, as they read-out what happened to the manager, didn't seem a bit surprised or concerned. It was just another typical occurrence to them. That day, we booked a flight home, because the company was closing their operations in South Africa. They had had enough violence. 400 South Africans lost their jobs that day, because the people in this business couldn't put-up with the violence any more. It's sad to see a country self destruct like that. From what I saw, South Africa is a nice place with a well-educated populace, but too large of a portion of the people would rather steal and kill than work for a living. “

ArmdLbrl:

I am not.

Raf:

I speak from experience.

I stand by my statement.

Remember; an armed society is a polite society

From the original post, sounds like Mandela may be a racist.  Maybe him, jesse, al sharpton, & farakan should get together for coffee.

They have never met togeather in one place, but they all have met each other. Jackson and Farrakan cant meet, they hate each other personally- they have a similar relationship to that Stalin and Hitler had before the war.  But Mandela has met all of them before, at least once.

Quite frankly, I can't believe that there are still [b]white people[/b] left in South Africa, or in Zimbabwe, for that matter!

I mean what are those folks thinking about!

Forget any nostalgia for the good old Afrikaner way of life, it's gone for good!

What are they waiting for? Bishop Desmond Tutu to come help them pack?

G'won, get outta there, while the getting's good!

Eric The(YouDon'tNeedUnderstanding,YouNeedLuggage!)Hun[>]:)]

I'm afraid the writing has been on the wall for sometime now!  You had only to look at what was going on in Zimbabwe (Rhodesia) to realize this!

The socialist/marxist excesses that take place in Zimbabwe only take a short time to spread to South Africa.  

It's sad when any nation falls to the socialist/marxist piper!  But South Africa is the richest and most powerful nation on the African continent.  Others on the continent will (or will be forced to) follow SA's lead! ...and those who don't... will face THE BOMB or the "necklace"!

Isn't that just peachy?  A rogue marxist nation with nukes!

DaMan  

That must be a serious problem in South Africa, because the three papers I've read from there mentioned several incidents of that happening!  Two guys were found dead because they tried to steal copper wire from a power line while the power was still on!  To make it worse, the power company couldn't immediately replace it, because someone stole a hundred tons (from what I remember) of wire out of their warehouse.  Another group was found, because they were burning several tons of the wire to get rid of the insulation.  The article said you could see the smoke for miles, and also smell it downwind about as far as you could see it.  Imagine if someone stole a few tons of copper wire and lit it on fire near a US city.  Our driver explained to us that fencing (if that's the right word to use), even multiple tons of copper, in South Africa is easy, because of all of the local copper mines.  He even joked that at one mine near where he grew-up, he saw about as much copper being trucked into the mine as trucked-out.  In other words, they weren't getting most of their copper from the ground.

BellSouth (Hell$outh) has enough trouble providing basic phone service around here.  I couldn't imagine how bad it would be if criminals were stealing wire off of the poles.  I've caught several people stealing copper wire from a construction site, but I couldn't imagine someone taking wire that was being used.

What would you have me say?  Is it sad and tragic?  Yes, it is.  Do I feel bad?  No.  Self-determination is a god given right.  If they are unwilling or unable to take back the night, then they will be forced to live in the darkness.

This is the end result of touchy, feely I love everybody liberal politics. Take note all you Democrats, this is what lies ahead for America if your Tony Blairs and Billy boy commies are successful in creating their borderless UN, (we don't need no frigin Constitution) world.
I take QCMGR's remarks as political not as vengeful.

QCMGR, your post pissed me off at first!  But now that I understand your meaning....I agree!  

But sometimes the thieves are so damned slick (taking only a little bit at a time) that you don't realize you've been robbed until they've stolen EVERYTHING!

DaMan

I regret your grief, but the truth should never be white washed.  Bad things are going on in Africa.  My African friend (who is now an American) would never go back to live.  

I do not wish to be hurtful, your friends need to get the hell out of Africa.  It is bad news.  If not, they need to prepare to fight and possibly die.

Welcome to turn of the century America. Every house I see has an ADT or some other brand of security sign in front of the house. Judges are declaring prison overcrowding to be the fault of the state, not the criminal, and ordering some of them released. During the riots, as we all saw, police commanders in Los Angeles ordered their officers in on the clock, then forbid them to leave the parking lots. The Marines rolled in and martial law was in effect, whether declared or not. Police in Cincinatti don't even patrol in the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood anymore. It's career-damaging to do so. It can also get you killed when stopping the wrong color driver for a speeding ticket gets you surrounded by his fellow travellers and subject to howls of "rage," thrown objects and possibly bullets.

The first job site I got sent to on my first (midnight shift) day of my new job after getting out of the Marine Corps was LA 13, the Pacific Bell central office at 108th and Vermont in south central Los Angeles. I had to be given a code for the gate by my boss before I went down. There was a sign on the gate directing anyone who opened it to pull inside, but not park until the gate had closed so that the locals couldn't pull in behind you. The fence is 15 feet tall with a roll of bow tie wire above that, then a 12 foot brick wall inside that. There were bullet holes in the windows, and dings where bullets had impacted on the brick of the building.

A friend of mine who runs a fiber optic cable splicing crew in Los Angeles told his boss that his guys would not work in certain areas again unless the company bought them level II kevlar vests. They would quit before they went back without it.

America is being carved up and Balkanized while we sit and watch it happen. You don't have to look to South Africa. Look outside your house.

Jarhead out.

This woman, Anne Paton, is an idiot. She whines about crime and violence, etc. but then says the solution is to have the state intervene again, when they're the ones that screwed everything up in the first place! She says it here:

"The situation is exacerbated by the fact that criminals know that their chances of being caught are negligible; and if they are caught they will be free almost at once. So what is the answer? The government needs to get its priorities right. We need a powerful, well-trained and well-equipped police force."

What South Africans need is the right to carry light weaponry, blacks and white, to dust off all of these bandits that are terrorizing their country! These people embraced socialism and Marxist policies in government in order to reconcile their racial differences, and it only led to societal devolution. The same damn thing is happening in England and Australia too. Give it time.

themao [chainsawkill]

Well South Africa doesnt seem like a nice place to live, unless you are criminal.

When I left South Africa in 1984, I predicted to my friends that their whole existence will be changed when the blacks take over, every part of their existence will be affected. They all laughed at the idea that the blacks will take over, and laughed at the idea that their lifes would change. Sorry to say, I was right. Until Black Africa develops a social conscience, and the education and moral fibre to build and demand a western style civilized society (is there any other?), things will only get worse. I could not see it happen in another 200 years, if ever, so I left.  

I think I understand the comment that CQMGR, directed at the supporters of Nelson Mendela.

The phrase "Poetic Justice" comes to mind.

It will happen here, If we allow the Liberals to disarm us.

To paraphrase B Franklin, (or was it Jefferson?)

"Those who would give up essential liberty for a little temporary safety deserve neither."

This is what happens when gun control laws that are so restrictive as to make legally obtaining firearms a practical impossibilty are enacted. If you think moving to Britain is the answer, I got news for you, the Bobby's are packing HKMP5s. Crime rates there are statistically soaring, especially crimes involving violence. Britain is probably not far from going the way of SA. In the USA, we are at a pivotal point in history, if we are not careful and vigile, within the next few years we will loose the 2nd amendment and our RKBA rights altogether. It's not to late, but I fear we may be less than a decade from living in these same conditions everywhere here ( hell it's already like that in many large cities as it is).
I wonder how many thousands and perhaps hundreds of thousand or millions around the so called free world will have to die horribly, before the masses wake up and start taking personal responsibilty for thier safety/liberty/rights instead of relying on the police or the government to save them and always be there when they need them.
I think the men and woman who fought for and founded this country are rolling in thier graves, not to mention every veteran who has fought and died for the USA since.
There is a time for everything, unfortunately many live in a time of fear.

Themao;

You can get guns to carry in SA but it won't help.  I had an uncle shot when he drove his Car somewhere for business, he carried a gun.  They rob your store with a bunch of guys with "full-auto AKs" in front of your family.  They would rather kill then let you go because you can not identify when dead. They also like to steal your hand gun and usually just kill because of it.  But I understand I would rather die with a gun in the hand then not - Not many people who own guns, go and enjoy it at the range like we do, so when situation arises they can not handle it. I bet if they get organized and train together, the Anti's will be there to stop it because they can not have that.

Unfortunately the black dominant party also wants to take away private ownership as to make it safe.  The Idiots do not know it is "Illegal " guns and breakdown of police that do the damage - left overs from the "guerilla" war and bad politics.  

When I was in Botswana, you could buy an full-auto AK for $50 but if you got caught, you better be friends with the president or filthy rich to get out - They call it, bearing arms of war! :) Can you believe it.  But criminals do not have to worry because they have nothing to loose or fear because they know they are safe from being caught as the Police force can not respond fast enough to catch them.  But since the law binding citizen lives at an address it is easier for them to come and visit you or prosecute you - just like Canada, where criminals have better rights then you have when they come to rob you.

The only way they can control it is by having a well trained and efficient force like they used to have.  But it wont happen because they will not get the co-operation of higher up people to support them - Kinda like having "demos" over here helping us keep the right to bear arms.

Right now the farmers are having okay time since e they still help each other out when one of them gets hit by help of radios where they all rush and make a combine effort - But missing is the choppers of security forces that used to help them and kick butt.

In Zimbabwe it's worse because they do have firearms available to them like they do in SA.  Guess where the illegal guns in Botswana came from ?  Former Rhodesia.  

Anyway, we got out of Africa no sooner and let me tell you , it is no fun when you know their might be no way out. I was born in Tanzania, moved to Zambia, then to Botswana to stay one step ahead as one by one things started to go to hell.  Although I was born in Tanzania it did not mean s#$t because Africa is for Africans and if you do not have money or place to go abroad, you are SOL.  At least some have a way to bail out to England or elsewhere, but there are people there who have no place to go!  USA and Europe will not take thousands of people just like that.  So these people who were born there just like their fathers and fathers before them will have to make do ... until it gets like what happened in Uganda when Dada Amin expelled the Asians and Country's started to take them in. Then you had those Skin Heads giving problem but it was better then where they were.

Things like that will happen in SA at slower pace because they have learned from other Africa countries that they somewhat depend on "Whites" and "Asians" in keeping the Economy going and things will go to hell if they don't keep them in the country.  But truthfully, majority of local black population does not care if they stay healthy economically or not!

Africa is really beautiful Place to live but politics is bad and one tribe wants to rule or dominate over the other - generally. What a waste of potential to have great growth since demand outweighs supply!

So...most so called foreign people stay there because there is no way to bale out .. at least those who do not have tons of money and power.. and in the case of SA which is little different then most other African Nations.. They have lots of "Afrikaners" and not only the British.  

I wish all the Demos could live there with no option to bale out or money and they will see what it is to live where you have no individual rights !

All I know it is "great" to be American and at least for now, I know I am free.

Thanks for bearing this with me!

And my (white) former roommate is going to S. Africa this winter for a month for a U of Delaware class.  I warned him the crime rate was astronomical and that he shouldnt go, but he kept insisting that it was all lies, the school brought in an embassy staffer or somebody who kept saying there wasnt any crime in S. Africa that the students had to worry about.  I hope he and the other 19 people (some of them female) survive unscathed.  Do you have a source for this article? I'll send a copy to him and his parents, his mom had MAJOR misgivings about the trip when he was asking to go.

Kharn

I started this thread only because I've been interested in the Rhodesian war since a few months ago, started reading, I have also orderd Ian Smiths book which should be on the way.  I've never been interested in reading and learning about any other war in recent history, colonialism or whatever.  It's always been Vietnam, since I was young.  Anyway, I started running across these sites and information that portrayed the horrible tragedies taking place and my heart just goes out to the people who had to [b]Evacuate[/b] their homes and flee the country.  

I wish there was a way to help people who are old and defensless, old farmers and women who are victims of terrible and horrible crimes.  


When I read the posts from hagar, njoji and Eric, I was depressed that there is no plan of action to take back Africa, to make it safe again.  Will the people who lost it, ever get their land back?  How long will corrupt officials be allowed to continue to destroy peoples lives?  Africa has such great potential and it's being wasted (in my lifetime anyway).

A. The road to disaster is paved with good intentions.

B. It is better to have and not need than to need and not have.

C. Be wary of mmen who make rules, for they intend to be the proctor of those rules when imposed on the society at large.

D. When you lick the lions paw beware of the claws.


Yes they did have it comming, I am hard pressed to conjure up sympathy for a society that foregoes common sense and laws to install fairy tail politics with no reguard for the consequences. Nor shall I feel pitty for those in a society who sit back and watch it happen when they have the means to stop it.

"For those who have fought for it freedom has a flavor the protected will never know"

Semper Fi

You know, I lived in Kalifornia for 16 months, and this sounds exactly like Kalifornia; just not quite as bad, but almost.  I think that if anybody wants to read the future for Kalifornia, it is written above.  Sorry all you Kalifornicators, but I have to speak the truth.  Those of you Kalifornicators who don't agree; remember that the smart Jewish people who lived in Nazi Germany read Mein-Kampf, saw the future coming and left.  The bible has a quote that goes something like this "the prudent see danger coming and seek refuge from it while the simple keep going and suffer for it".  And believe it or not, all of my friends who have left the State of Kalifornia, every one of them to the last person, is much happier now that they are living elsewhere.

Kharn;

My advice to your friend going there would be :

Take advice from the locals who stay there, meaning trustworthy people.  It's like going to any other country or going places here in US, like NY, LA or Miami on vacation.  You tend to stay away from bad neighborhoods, do not go into certain areas after certain time.  Do not carry Items of value visibly and keep in areas known to be safe.  Normally, locals who own stores, houses are targeted just like those when we speed .. you get selected out of a bunch when we get radar.  Car Jacking would be his major concern in certain section of town just like in bigger cities here.  Otherwise he will just be like anywhere else in the world. Since his trip is a short stay and if he wants to see places like a tourist then he is taking risk just like going to vacation abroad.  It is a beautiful country and if he is aware of the crime situations then he can use this information to his advantage and make sure he reduces a chance of running into a problem.  There are many places in this world there is a potential of situations going to chaos but they don't happen because everyone is doing their thing and the conditions that bring about riot situation do not happen.

Let see if my memory serves right.  Asians get it first because they stay and do business closest to the black townships, then it's whites since there areas where furthermost from black townships.  Ofcourse that might have changed now but.. most people still follow the same .. White people tend to help white and hence jobs and cost of housing and people of same kind tend to stick together and also their occupation usually determines what type neighborhoods they stay in - Usually, house keeping used to be done by blacks due to cheap labour and that's why now there is fear of crime because when you fire them or have bad understandings, guess where this is going ..

Hence this separation still should exist.  The People who commit drastic crimes tend to come from same areas.  Picture to get is .. you are part of the wildebeest herd and the lions pounce on those who seem to be weakest at that moment cause by a situation.. When that happens, the time has come and outcome depends on what is on hand.  I think this happens everywhere else.  So visit all lands if you are willing to risk ... Except the real safe thing to have is work towards securing a safe place to go bale out if you can. The rewards of working abroad is worth the risk, easy life, high pay although it might be less then here but the cheap labor costs and expenses or other benefits make it a good temptation - I remember the British govt. paying extra benefits or money when you go out of Britain to work and hence after several yrs, you can have all that other money given to you build into a nice little nest to come to.  That's how they end up going there in first place and in the days of apartheid it worked out real good.. because Blacks got it worst, then Indians and coloreds, and then Chinese who were classified same as whites.  They were plusses and minuses,as I would have not like to stay in such a place, but my relatives used to tell me that it was way better then the so called free -independent African states I used to stay in.  They were right in some sense, because they drove expensive cars and had big houses from their fruit of hardwork and were not bothered by not being able to go into certain areas that were classified as white only.  At least they said they knew what they could do and not do and were willing to accept that because it meant that they had a better security and grantee of life.  I could visit them and had fun with them but given a choice between that and other countries like USA, I would easy take make a good choice. I am mostly talking about South Africa here and some of it does relate to other nations.  So in short most of my relatives are still in SA and do their day to day business and accept the rest that comes with it.  They run family businesses and I think even going to schools would not change it unless they graduate with Masters or something in the field that would allow them to come and work in USA or Canada and acquire a residence status, otherwise the only way would be if you and your family came from England and can go back there as English, etc, citizens.  But like many Asians and Afrikaners, they have no way to go out unless you can get a Refugee status and that would happen if things go out of wack like Somalia or Ethiopia or like other palaces where you have a better chance of getting a refugee status then if the country was not in war or total chaos.

Enough sad .. Just wanted to give some insight, purely mine, and take it so that way.  As a Last word, if SA somehow became part of USA and every door of prosperity by hard work opened up and everybody started to work for a good cause, I would come and stay there and work for it just like the Pioneer days, but with an important clause .. Right to bears Arms with all the bullets I need and offcourse the select fire options with possible upgraded to HK21E's.

Also, there is no take back Africa .. Gotta remember .. Southern Africa belonged to people like Bush Men and they in turn were driven away by Migration of African Tribes from the North that were pressured by the holy war situation by the Arabs.  The Colonial Powers then came in like the Germans and the English and the Dutch in SA.  The English dominated most compared to Germans and the Portuguese and French.  The Colonial Powers bought Western Civilization but maybe it was not what the Africans wanted, they were okay by themselves, tribes fighting and dominating just like the colonial powers did amongst themselves.  

[edited cause...never was good at spelling..an engineer type..better with symbols.]

They did all in their Power to better their Nation and did not want to build the Locals because they were colonial.  So when the Countries years after the world wars started to demanding freedom and were granted and in some cases like South Africa, gave the Boers (Afrikaners) power, the Africans were left forced to go to communist as they had seen misuse of the english and fair transition.  Who created Apartheid, it was the British!  Not Afrikaners.  Boers just kept the system so they can build and keep the power, but they did see the potential.  So you can see why the rest of world still sees why this is a no problem, because they envision it in same eyes as the downfall of Soviet Union.  So we can not take back Africa.  IT is the Africans responsibility to build and educated and bring about change to utilize their potential and bring down barriers and work together and will take time just like it took in USA and make it worse it might take longer then that.  Do they have leaders to do that like our forefathers did ?  No, in my opinion, because they are busy creating one party state, Controlling the Army rules, and filling your own bank accounts via UN funds,etc rules rather then doing for your country.  Our people in USA are busy with Liberals and the liberals do not know how to help them but they feel like they do.

Just wanted to make sure we can not take back for the above reasons, it's like saying the American Indians and Australian Natives wanting to go back to what was.

Don't mean to tick people off but I am just sharing something I have spend half of my Life in.  Hope it bring light into matter.

I really feel sorry for the people living there especially the ones who want to leave but have no other place to go.

Seems like the whole continent is falling into chaos and with the aids situation, their future is bleak. I really feel sorry for the kids with aids or the kids orphaned by Aids.

I read today that China is busy building a submarine base in South Africa and has for all intents and purposes already made an agreement with Russia and Shiite Muslims about how to best carve up Africa.