South Africa to deploy army to quell anti-immigrant attacks
Source: AFP
South African soldiers will be deployed in Johannesburg to quell anti-immigrant violence that has killed at least seven people in several weeks of unrest, Defence Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula said Tuesday.
Police have struggled to contain mobs who have been attacking foreigners from Zimbabwe, Malawi, Mozambique and other African countries in both the economic capital Johannesburg and in the port city of Durban.
The government had vowed to crack down strongly on the unrest, but the decision to put soldiers on the streets came after two nights of relative quiet in both cities.
"We come in as the last resort, the army will serve as a deterrent against the crime that we see," Mapisa-Nqakula told reporters, declining to give details on how many troops would be involved.
Read more: https://sg.news.yahoo.com/south-africa-deploy-army-quell-anti-immigrant-attacks-112820858.html
AngryAmish
(25,704 posts)The PM is a Zulu but is trying to keep a lid on ot.
pampango
(24,692 posts)South Africa, the continent's most industrialized nation, attracts millions of immigrants from across Africa, especially from neighboring nations like Zimbabwe and Mozambique. Ethnically and linguistically, they are not very different from the average black South African, but Nkosi says the psychological gulf between locals and immigrant communities is huge.
"South Africans are still very much inward-looking, because apartheid had isolated the country for decades, and they still see Africa as the Dark Continent,'" he says. "They talk about other Africans as people from Africa, as if they are not in Africa. And that psychological makeup is what creates the divide.
Nkosi says South Africans also tend to look down on people from poorer countries. One reason is economic: Immigrants are willing to work for lower wages, and many South Africans find it hard to get jobs. Unemployment in the country stands at just over 24 percent.
I spoke to a man called Levi who comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Nkosi says. He had gone to pick up a car from his workshop only to find that the workshop was torched. He said that the Congolese people supported South Africans when they were under apartheid, and he was surprised that this is how they thank them. He said he would leave here with tears in his eyes. Hes very, very unhappy.
http://www.pri.org/stories/2015-04-17/foreigners-south-africa-arm-themselves-fend-anti-immigrant-riots