Despite knowing of the incident you mentioned (and having read pieces on your blog before) and others, I am still amazed at how quickly and easily it spread and I don’t find the arguments as to why, so simple, why “this” time it spread as far. I am not yet convinced of the inevitability of the reasoning.

Another possible source of their confidence:

http://mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=339969&area=/insight/insight__national/

It would not surprise me if what they allege about Zuma is true. After all he does tell every audience what they want to hear.

People keep on repeating this?! Why? It’s obvious.

These attacks have been going on for ages. Remember that 40 Somalis were killed in October 2006. As far as I know only the Mail and Guardian covered this. And I blogged about it. Neither publications have nation wide reach.

Since then we’ve had more immigration, and food prices have gone up.

What is also different this time, is that the first two deaths happened in Alex, a 20 minute jog from Sandton. So what happened? Marauding gangs got day in day out coverage in print and radio and tv.

So what do the public learn? Your unlikely to be stopped, if you want somebodies house and they happen to be a foreigner. Or if you hate their guts.

Also, now when a Mozambican gets shot in Soweto, the press will assume its xenophobic. This is now on the news agenda. While it was completely off the radar before.

Don’t underestimate the analytical skill of the public.

Lets hear your voice.

Talk about a swipe! Both the Zimbabwean and Ugandan perspectives on the immigrant attacks convey their frustration. Some of the things which come out are quite unfortunate. Some of the stuff very provocative (especially the Ugandan perspectives) to ordinary and middle class black South Africans alike. I am itching to respond – as Khosi has done – and show how general and inaccurate some of the points are, from the underlying causes of the attacks, to the state of our (black) education (progress made in this area), SA black entrepreneurial spirit, skills problem, to our infrastructure and the future of SA economy, to perceptions on SA companies operating in Africa. But I have decided against it. I think we should simply echo the many calls made to condemn the attacks on immigrants, and for those of us who can lend a helping hand to the victims, to do so.

I think people like kuloba Roberts should not be paid much mind. Of course, envy will play a part in his rantings. He forgets one simply thing and that South Africa belongs to all who live in it. We have our problems but to say that we are poorer than other Africans is just incorrect. If we are so poor, why do we have so many people from the rest of the continent here? What he does not know is that most of the people who live in squatter camps are migrants who otherwise have well maintained living structures elsewhere in the country. They are where they are in search of better opportunities because they believe that they can make a better life for themselves and their families.

It would also be foolish for fellow Africans to forget the very positive contribution our country has and continues to dispatch in the whole continent. We are the ones who finance and champion Africa’s development programs. I can count countless things our country does for the continent. We house more than 5 million of Africans from other countries, more than 10% percent of our population. What other country in the world would allow for that to even start happening? Our president is demonized every day for taking on the Africa project and we have twice voted him into power because even the poor amongst us buy into the Africa project.

Yes something went wrong, but that cannot erase the good we are so far as our continent is concerned. Anyone who thinks they can pass judgement on us should just let us be and we will resolve our issues.

That said, I think that government has now been given a license to be more radical in its approach to wealth redistribution. Remember the ‘Two nations’ speech!