Afrikaans-speaking South Africans will not be misled by Zuma

Afrikaans-speaking South Africans will not be fooled by Jacob Zuma's ‘divide and rule' tactics. People understand that the only way for minority citizens to be secure in South Africa is if everybody stands up for the rights of everybody else. They know that retreating into a small enclave will weaken their ability to protect their culture, not strengthen it.

Playing different groups off against each other plays into the ANC's hands, but it doesn't help those South Africans who feel left out in the new dispensation. Everybody knows that the ANC has systematically undermined the language and cultural rights of Afrikaners. People feel excluded because of Black Economic Empowerment and Affirmative Action policies which benefit only the ANC elite.

In singling out white Afrikaners as the only true white South Africans, Jacob Zuma has revealed an ethnically and racially blinkered world view in conflict with our Constitution. The preamble to our Constitution says that South Africa belongs to all who live in it, united in our diversity. It does not say that some people have more of a right to call themselves South African than others.

Of course Afrikaners are true South Africans. But so is every other citizen of this country, regardless of their race, religion or language. That is what the new South Africa is about. We must go forward as one nation towards a prosperous future, not many nations with an uncertain future. That is what the Democratic Alliance (DA) is about.

Statement issued by Desiree van der Walt, MP, Democratic Alliance spokesperson for arts & culture, April 2 2009

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