———————————————————
••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
ஒடுக்குமுறைக்கு எதிராக தென் ஆப்பிரிக்காவில், ஆக.22 ,1894-ல் நேட்டால் இந்திய காங்கிரஸ் மகாத்மா காந்தியால் உருவாக்கப்பட்ட அமைப்பு உத்தமர் காந்தி பொது வாழ்க்கையில் தன்னை இணைத்துக்கொண்ட நாள்.
இன்று தென் ஆப்பிரிக்காவில் நடப்பது
என்ன?
தென்னாப்பிரிக்கா குறித்து ஏற்கனவே பதிவுச் செய்திருந்தேன். இன்றும் அங்கே இந்திய வம்சாவளி குடியினருக்கு பாதுகாப்பில்லை. குப்தா சகோதரர்களுடைய அத்துமீறல்களை மனதில் கொண்டு இந்தியர்கள் மீது தாக்குதல் நடத்தப்படுகின்றன. டர்பன், ஜாபர் ஸ்பர்க் போன்ற நகரங்களில் இந்திய வம்சாவளியினர் அதிகம் வாழ்கின்றனர். உத்தமர் காந்தியின் போராட்டக்களங்கள் அமைந்த ஆப்பிரிக்காவில் இந்தியர்கள் பாதிக்கப்பட்டுள்ளது கவலையான விஷயம் ஆகும்.
இது குறித்து இந்திய பிரதமர் மோடிஅவர்களுக்கு நான் அனுப்பிய கடிதம்.
My letter to the Prime Minister of India ,Thiru Modi….
I would like to bring to your attention two important issues, one relating to theattacks on Indians’ business establishments in South Africa in the recent violence there, and the other aboutthe Sri Lankan Government’s attitude towards the indigenous Tamils and itsNavy’s attacks on fishermen from Tamil Nadu. I will be grateful to you if the Centre, under your leadership, takes action on these issues.
Racial tension between Africans and Indians is part of a plan against the State
South Africans have been stunned at the sheer scale of looting, damaging and burning of property from July 9 to 17, 2021. It is difficult to compose one's feelings in a rational and calm mannerover this violence. The protests, looting,gunfire and bloodshed started when former President Jacob Zuma was jailed for contempt of court, relating to his failure to cooperate with the Commission of Inquiry. This led to his supporters protesting his imprisonment, which iswidely believed to be the handle that led to the extensive looting and vandalism of property. The country’s State Security Agency warned the Government of an imminent plan to destabilise the country although the warning came a bit late in the day.
The masterminds behind this looting and arson appear to have had a network of rogue intelligence operatives. Media briefings from the Minister of Police, Bheki Cele, indicate that some of the violentchaos was plotted, pushed via platforms including WhatsApp and social media, then launched, with meticulously briefed groups targeting key sites. Thereafter,criminals and destitute residents were easily drawn into this plan with many looters having had no understanding of the handle or the politics behind former President Zuma’s incarceration.
The looting was mainly confined to two of South Africa’s nine provinces, namely KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng. Kwazulu-Natal is the home province of Zuma and bore the brunt of the looting and vandalism. This led to the closure ofCovid-19 vaccination sites in the affected areas, as South Africa struggles to contain the rapid spread of the Covid 19 Delta variant that appears to be ravaging the country as it goes through the third wave of infections. Unemployment is ruling at a high of 32 per cent.
Many Indian owned businesses were looted in Durban, Pietermaritzburg, Verulam, Tongaat and Stanger. Chaos spread to Johannesburg, South Africa’s financial hub. The most affected were theGujarathi, the Tamil, the Telugu and the Punjabi businessmen. However, there is no evidence to suggest that lootersspecifically targeted Indian businesses because trade establishments owned by all racial groups were affected. In many residential areas, the civilians took it upon themselves to fend off looters by barricading entrances to residential areasthat were situated close to areas affected by looting.
Racial tensions ran high in areas such as Phoenix (north of Durban), where a lot of people of Indian origin live. This area was previously demarcated as an Indian area under the White minority apartheid government’s Group Areas Act. However, with the advent of democracy, this area has now taken a cosmopolitan outlook with all racial groups living in it. Racial tensions were heightened in the past two weeks when persons manning the barricades started to behave like vigilantes, leading to racial tension. Politicians, community leaders and human rights activists were quick to quell the situation with the assistance of the police and army.
In fact, there are worries now whether South Africa is falling apart.
In an article titled, “South Africa riots: The inside story od Durban’s week of anarchy”, Andrew Harding, BBC News, Durban, said on July 29, 2021, “In one of the worst affected neighbourhoods, Phoenix, members of the large community of Indian origin expressed concern that racial tensions had been deliberately enflamed by those orchestrating the violence, and the security forces had failed to protect the communities.
“”It was like a war zone. It was something orchestrated. Something sinister. These were highly trained guys.They were trying actually to cause a civil war in this country. It was a direct attack - on the Indian community”, said Marvin Govendar, from the local residents’ association.
“But he noted, with satisfaction, that “Communities ended up protecting themselves.”
Harding said “Indians - who first arrived in South Africa in the late 1800s as indentured labourers – make up 2.6 per cent of South Africa’s population. The majority of them live in KwaZuklu – Natal.
“In a predominantly Indian neighbourhood in the town of Verulam, Nasreen Peerbhaysaid her husband, Mohammed RahoofSathar, was killed at an informal roadblock set up to guard the community.
“Video footage from the scene, on a main road near the family’s business, showed a red car speeding directly into a crowd.
“”There were five black guys in the car. He drove out at full speed, taking out eight guys, five critically injured. My husband was one of those killed. It was something so ugly and so bad. So many lives destroyed in just a few days,” she said.
As John Eligon, the Johannesburg bureau chief of New York Times said in his article published in NYT on July 15, 2021, “South Africa has been rocked to its core over the last week by looting and vandalism that has left at least 117 people dead and hundreds of millions of dollars in damage, official said. It was among the worst violence and unrest the country had seen in the nearly 30 years since the end of apartheid.”
Eligon added: “The turbulence was initially triggered by the imprisonment last wee of South Africa’s former President, Jacob Zuma, for defying a court order to testify in a corruption inquiry. Mr. Zuma, though scarred by extensive allegations of graft, nevertheless retains a loyal following.
“But the unrest quickly became about broader grievances against the government and its failure to uphold the promises of a democratic South Africa. It was as though the lid blew off a pot that had been boiling for years.
“”People lost their conscience,” said Sifisco, the hotel worker, who is 32, and lost his job last year in pandemic-induced shutdowns. “The government is failing us, meaning they don’t care about how we feel as the people of South Africa. If it means we are going to a mall to loot or to block a road for the government to actually hear people’s cries, then so be it.”
Deputy State Security Minister ZiziKodwa said, “You can see this operation is run by people who have run operations before… the plan is well orchestrated… it’s not like sporadic, it’s not like spontaneous. That’s why you hear allegations that people are being paid.” The Deputy Minister further pointed out the attack on Strategic targets mostly in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng. These included:
• Food Supermarkets, various warehouses emptied out.
• Communication Community radio stations, broadcasting infrastructure – including 113 network towers – vandalised.
• Transport Roads blocked, preventing residents from getting to shops and petrol stations.
• Healthcare Pharmacies vandalised; Covid-19 vaccination sites forced to close.
• A Water treatment plant set on fire in Pietermaritzburg.
Justice Minister Ronald Lamoladescribed the situation as “clear economic sabotage”. Presently, South Africans have breathed a sigh of relief as 25,000 troops from the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) were deployed to the affected areas. Over 200 shopping malls, 300 bank branches and 1400 cash machines were looted. Clearly, this was part of a plan that involved economic sabotage and the stirring up of racial tension where the rule of law was undermined. The former President is not above the law and he defied an order from the Constitutional Court. Fortunately, the government of South Africa under President Cyril Ramaphosa was able to avert a catastrophic situation of lawlessness and anarchy.
Many political analyists and politicians are of the view that the planned and orchestrated attempt by a faction of the African National Congress to regain control has failed. This desperate attempt at destabilising the country was a hatched-out plan by those implicated in corruption and State capture in an attempt to avert criminal prosecutions. The attempted coup is far from over and President Ramaphosa has an immense task to rid his government and the African National Congress, which is the ruling party, of corrupt individuals. If the current government under President Ramaphosais to survive, it must conduct a thorough investigation that brings to book the perpetrators of this heinous crime that is tantamount to treason.
Coming to Colombo’s cruel treatment of the Tamils, the Government of India should compel the Rajapaksa brothers to accept an international inquiry into the killings of several lakhs of Sri Lankan Tamils by the island’s armed forces, beginning from the anti-Tamil pogrom on July 23, 1983. This international probe should go into the Sri Lankan Army, Navy and Air Force killing about a lakh of Tamil civilians at Mullivaikaal in Mullaitheevudistrict in May 2009.
Besides, the probe should cover the disappearance of many hundreds of Tamil militants and their leaders, and the disappearance of Tamil civilians in May 2009. Tamil civilians, who are still held illegally in detention camps, should be released. India should insist on the rehabilitation of Tamil women, rendered widows by the killing of Tamil men by the Sinhala Army.
The Government of India should insist that the Sri Lankan armed forces dismantle their camps in the Northern and Eastern Provinces, and hand over to the Tamils the agricultural lands on which these military camps were built. India should stop the colonisation of the Tamil areas by the Sinhalese.
India should compel Colombo to agree to conduct a referendum in the Tamil majority Northern and Eastern provinces, under international supervision, on the creation of a separate Eelam State.
Importantly, India should ensure that the Sri Lankan Navy stop attacking the trawlers of fishermen from Tamil Nadu. These incidents of the island’s Navy attacking and damaging fishing trawlers have increased manifold after the Rajapaksa brothers returned to power a few years ago.
with regards,
Y/S,
K.S.Radha krishnan
———————————————————
From bondage to freedom - The arrival of Indian workers in South Africa
The feature on Indian South Africans forms part of our larger feature on the People of South Africa. It is a long term project to build a comprehensive overview of the rich diversity of peoples, traditions and culture that address the question, 'Who are South Africans?' This year, 2020, is the 160th anniversary of the arrival of the Indian indentured labourers and the birth of this community in South Africa. We are using this to launch and major project to build a comprehensive social and political history of this African community.
Origins:
South Africans of Indian origin comprise a heterogeneous community distinguished by different origins, languages, and religious beliefs. The first Indians arrived during the Dutch colonial era, as slaves, in 1684. A conservative calculation based strictly on records shows over 16 300 slaves from the Indian subcontinent having been brought to the Cape. In the decades 1690 to 1725 over 80% of the slaves were Indians. This practice continued until the end of slavery in 1838. They made up the majority of slaves that came from the Far East and were by the 1880s totally integrated into the Cape White and Coloured communities.
In the second half if the 19th Century, Indians came to South Africa in two categories, namely as indentured workers in 1860 and later as 'free' or 'passenger' Indians. The former came as a result of a triangular pact among three governments, which stated that the indentured Indians were to work for the Natal colonial government on Natal's sugar plantations. The 'free' Indians came to South Africa mainly as traders alert to new opportunities abroad. These 'free Indians' came at their own expense from India, Mauritius, and other places. However, emigration was stopped in 1914.
Between November 1860 and 1911 (when the system of indentured labour was stopped) nearly 152 184 indentured labourers from across India arrived in Natal. After serving their indentures, the first category of Indians were free to remain in South Africa or to return to India. By 1910, nearly 26.85% indentured men returned to India, but most chose to stay and thus constituted the forbearers of the majority of present-day South African Indians.
With 1994 and the advent of a democratic constitution, immigration policy restrictions, imposed by the apartheid regime, were scrapped. People from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, arrived in South Africa as new immigrants. However, there is a major cultural division between these new groups and Indian South Africans.
A key factor that helped forge a common South African "Indian" identity was the political struggles waged against harsh discriminatory laws enacted against Indians and the other Black oppressed groups in the country. As a consequence, the Indian community established a number of political formations, the most prominent being the Natal Indian Congress (NIC) established by Gandhi in 1894, and the Transvaal and Cape Indian Congresses in the early part of the 20th century. Members of the Indian Congress, together with socialist activists in the Communist Party of South Africa were instrumental, from the 1930s, in building cross racial alliances. The small Indian, Coloured and White progressive sectors joined with progressive African activists and together, they conducted a common non-racial struggle for Freedom and Equality.
Language, culture and beliefs:
English is spoken as a first language by most Indian South Africans, although a minority of the Indian South African population, especially the elders, still speak some Indian languages. These languages include Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu, Punjabi, and Gujarati. Indian South Africans are predominantly Hindu, but Muslims, Christians, and Sikhs also came to South Africa from India from as early as 1860.
Hindu, the most prominent religion in India, originated 5000 years ago. The Hindu religion prescribes a three fold approach to serving God. This approach includes knowledge, or the studying of the Bhagavad-Gita and other sacred texts; yoga, to connect both body and mind, and devotion or bhakti, which promotes serving God through prayer and benevolent acts. Notable Hindu festivals include Diwali/Deepavali, the festival of lights, and the Tamil Thai Poosam Kavady annual festival.
Islamic influence began in South Africa with the arrival of indentured workers from the west and south coast of India. As only 7- 10% of these workers were Muslim, Sheikh Ahmad, the founding father of Islam in Natal, and later Soofie Saheb ensured that impoverished Muslim Indians were not drawn to Hinduism. Therefore, a concerted effort was made to retain their religious heritage, through the demarcation of Islamic festivals and the establishment of Muslim schools or madrasahs.
The Islamic community continues to thrive in South Africa, in both Natal and the Western Cape - where indentured labourers moved with their families after the completion of their contracts. Followers of the Muslim faith are committed to praying at least five times a day, and are not permitted to drink alcohol. Notable Muslim celebrations include Eid and Ramadan.
The Sikh faith forms a slender portion of the local population, and is a religion influenced by both Hindu and Islam. The Sikh religion is concerned with a belief in One Immortal Being and ten gurus. Many Sikhs wear an iron or steel bracelet as a symbol of their devotion to their religion. Originating in the Punjab region, prominent Sikh celebrations include Parkash Utsav, which celebrates 'Divine Light' or 'Divine Knowledge'.
The diverse Indian population in South Africa is concentrated in Kwa-Zulu Natal's largest city, Durban, which has the most substantial Indian population in sub-Saharan Africa. South Africa as a whole also has a substantial Indian population, with over 1 million people of Indian descent. Therefore, Indian influences have contributed to the multi-cultural diversity of South Africa. The local culinary landscape has been infused with a diverse array of Oriental flavour - most notably in the Natal region. Popular dishes include curry, and an intrinsic Durban dish called 'bunny chow', which is half a loaf of bread, hollowed out and filled with curry.
South African Indians retain a sense of cultural and social connection to India, and a concept of primary local and secondary ancestral identity is prevalent among people of Indian descent.
No comments:
Post a Comment