The Personal Side of Bias, Prejudice and Oppression

An incident of oppression I have come across was in the news. Some years ago, there were numerous and deadly xenophobic attacks against immigrants from other African countries living in South Africa. Now, these attacks were perpetuated by Black South Africans living majorly in sub-urban towns against their fellow Africans. These attacks involved violent street protests, seizure and destruction of properties belonging to any foreigner especially the Nigerians there because it is a known fact that they are usually very successful in their endeavours.  Their grievance was that the foreigners were taking their jobs and businesses, and also excelling at it.

I have a friend who lives in Pretoria and she once told me that most of the natives there refuse to enrol into Higher learning institutions but rather just sit around doing nothing. This means that they are less qualified but yet feel entitled to be employed by companies. A high percentage of university students in South Africa are foreigners which may mean that they are more likely to be employed by companies. Furthermore, businesses owned by foreigners may be thriving because of their business models, work ethics or hard work and so it sounds unfair that they should be faulted for their successes.

It is quite sad that there is oppression and prejudice against people who are of the same race as the dominant race. This simply shows to me how nuanced discrimination could be. It sounds silly when the South African nationals try to justify their ineptitudes on the apartheid they suffered many years ago. Their anger in this case is towards people who played no part in the segregation and sufferings they endured for many years. In as much as Black South Africans went through hard times during apartheid, the entire African continent also suffered during the slave trade and also through colonialism.

In order to attain greater equity, I think the South African government should encourage its citizens to get higher education so that they can compete in the workforce, through incentives. The citizens should also let go of their ego and understudy successful business owners so that they can learn the ropes of the business rather than expect for other people not to make progress in whatever they do.