South Africa’s truth Commission noted twenty years ago, the work. The social inequality has continued to increase since. Observers: whites are “good.”
29. October 1998: Archbishop Desmond Tutu handed over to Nelson Mandela, the report of the truth Commission
South Africa was once regarded as a beacon of hope on the African continent. The rainbow Nation at the Cape, celebrated after the end of Apartheid in 1994, the political u-turn to real democracy, which made the South Africans confident in a peaceful future. Nelson Mandela contributed at that time the country on a reconciliation course with the aim to alleviate the wounds of the bloody clashes between the white minority and the black population. But the South Africa of today is a rapidly growing gap between rich and Poor and between Black and White. The former engine of Africa has become an economically unstable and socially unequal country. 24 years after the political “miracle on the Cape” for many South Africans the question: What is wrong?
“White people are good come of it”
“In the political negotiations with the apartheid government of Mandela took office, concessions had to be made, difficult decisions,” says Tessa Dooms, a sociologist and staff member of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung in Johannesburg. However, the consequences of these concessions were serious, she says Interview in a DW-“The white South Africans have the largest asset share, although they represent the smallest group in the population. They were allowed to keep their wealth and continue to enjoy the current political System benefits. White did a good business, because they dominate the economy of South Africa – you are good to come of it.”
The social inequality in South Africa has increased
Dooms grew up as Coloured in Post-Apartheid South Africa. It was difficult for her to have the time of racial segregation. The impact of Apartheid, she says, influenced the daily life in South Africa today. A reason for this she sees in the hearings before the truth and reconciliation Commission. Two years – 1996 and 1998 – told wine at the end of the victim under the eyes of the Public in the town halls of South African cities and municipalities, their fates. However, the perpetrators were drawn Dooms, at the time, hardly accountable: “you have to bear no consequences.” According to Dooms a sharper eye for equality, and more will of the government and civil society, the issue of “race” in South Africa would be to address in a direct, helpful. “Equality in the social sense – in this point, we are not there today, where we should be.”
South Africa has made mistakes
29. October marks the anniversary of the end of the hearings before the Commission for the twentieth Time. The policy instruments, which should then drive the social change, have failed, says Verne Harris. He is archivist at the Nelson Mandela Foundation and was in the 90s, even for the truth Commission: “If we would have given to the recommendations of the Commission’s priority would be South Africa today is quite different,” says Harris Interview at the DW. “Although much had been achieved, such as freedom of the press. “But white South Africans could take part in the Denial mode,” criticism of comrade Mandela
Not only to the truth Commission, the political negotiations prior to 1994, had the error been made, says Harris. But did the government at that time, what she could: “South Africa was on the brink of civil war.” He, too, had been seduced – as the government – intellectually, in the assumption that every Problem could be quickly solved. “We have often adopted strategies that came out of the global North, instead of learning lessons from the southern countries were in a position similar to that of South Africa. We believed that we were unique.”
South Africa’s new President, Cyril Ramaphosa is considered by many as a beacon of hope
A spirit of optimism in the country
Mandela put with its counterpart, the Foundation stone for the independent judiciary and a modern Constitution. The following government years under Thabo Mbeki brought according to Harris, but a centralization of Power: “The abuse of state institutions to the political fights, the battles prepared the ground for the Zuma Era in which state institutions have been corrupted.” For the future it is not enough simply to hope for improvement, he says. Instead, now the right actions need to be taken. After all, was opened by the coming to power of President Cyril Ramaphosaim the past year, a kind of space. “This shows that we can get to where Mandela wanted us to have. We may not make it into the next Generation, may I experience the. There is much to do, but it is a good energy in the country.”
Mood of optimism in South Africa also feel Tessa Dooms. For you young people play an important role in the process that will now bring the country back on the “right” way: “We have become a politically-conscious society, even through the protests of the youth for a better future. We are to become responsible citizens, self-questioning, critical questions and not just waiting for their dreams of self.”