Protests: A nation in pain must address the ‘us versus them’ battle

The looting has subsided and the country is beginning to find itself again.

We appreciate the spirit of Ubuntu that prevails people from all walks of life who have rolled up their sleeves and come to sweep, donate, offer help and assist wherever they could.

This is the South Africa we want to love, the one our parents and grandparents were promised when the dream of the “rainbow nation” was presented to them.

While we celebrate the phoenix spirit that has restored our faith in people and a sense of community, it would be naive of us to not acknowledge that rage still exists within our people.

The problem we refuse to honestly acknowledge in our country, that which constantly comes back to haunt us, is that we are an angry nation.

This is true not only in terms of economics, but also in race, education, opportunity and the balance of power.

We are a nation that still needs to heal from a past many are too afraid to speak about.

We are a nation deep in debt from the unbalanced economic scales and one where we are worlds apart in terms of religion and ethnicity.

That’s why when violence breaks out, it quickly turns into an “us versus them” battle.

This is the South Africa we need to confront. It is the dynamite whose fuse was set alight pre-democracy, with the explosion coming 24 years into our democracy.

What is required is the removal of a Band-Aid on a septic sore that has grown over the years.

Unless we do something about this, we will find ourselves in the emergency room, unable to believe that from a mere sore, we have a debilitating wound that could cripple us. There is no denying that we have made certain gains.

But until we address the pains that many people have; until we acknowledge that in democratic South Africa there are those who were displaced and today their anger has grown into resentment until we acknowledge that the rich have gotten richer and the poor, poorer, we will continue to take one step forward and two backwards.

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