ANC has deliberately, methodically sought to exclude white people

With his pilchard recipes becoming stale, Tito Mboweni decided to stir the pot with illogical nonsense that he knew would attract attention. “Why are the majority of white South Africans not nonracial? Join the ANC!” the former finance minister tweeted.

The implication is that because they don’t join the ANC, most white South Africans are not nonracial. Ergo; white South Africans are racist.

In fact, the opposite is true. The ANC has consistently shown it is a racist organisation. This was proven again at its 55th national conference in December, when not one white person was voted into the top seven. There were no whites or Indians among contenders for these posts.

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We all know what ANC politicians mean when they talk about “our people”. This is the party that introduced a panoply of laws ensuring preferential treatment for people who are not white.

In December, the Institute of Race Relations (IRR) calculated that South Africa’s parliament had adopted at least 116 pieces of racial legislation since 1994.

Martin van Staden, IRR deputy head of policy research, said 20 racial laws were passed in 1998 alone – the highest number in any year.

The ANC is perpetuating racial classification and racist laws from a bygone era, in reverse. The Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment Act, like other ANC initiatives, entrenches discrimination against white people in the workplace and in procurement practices – including the awarding of tenders.

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The ANC has deliberately, methodically sought to exclude white people. Members have amplified this idea in their voting patterns within the party. It makes no sense for white people to join or vote for an organisation that negatively targets them on racial grounds.

During the process that led to democracy in 1994, the majority of whites voted in favour of a nonracial, rainbow future. This turned out to be illusory under the leadership of Thabo Mbeki and successors.

The current elite ANC habitually uses the term “our people”, but not to predominantly white audiences. It is not only white people who reject the ANC. South Africans of all colours dislike the blatant corruption enabled by ANC policies and practices.

They don’t like the ANC’s infatuation with dictators and warmongers and they reject its economically ruinous ideologies. And, lately, they are repelled by the air of failure and desperation that stalks ANC-controlled entities, especially Eskom.

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People of all colours know the ANC has wrecked much of this country’s infrastructure. And the ANC is incapable of rebuilding.

Most white people can see the ANC is not for them. The optics are glaring.

Consider, for example, the Johannesburg ANC caucus. A caucus (noun) consists of members of a legislative body who belong to a particular party. So, Johannesburg ANC councillors make up that party’s caucus.

The ANC has 91 councillors in Johannesburg. Not one of them is white.

Tweeto’s tweet should be rephrased: Why don’t whites join the ANC? Answer: Because the ANC is not nonracial. The second-biggest caucus in Johannesburg is by far the most diverse.

Its unforced, free-flowing nonracialism offers the best hope for South Africa’s future. It’s a successful recipe for all our people.

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