When Juju and his supporters sing about killing farmers, I am sure the image they have in their minds is a man like Eugene Terre’Blanche. The so-called “boer” — stuck in his verkrampte politics. A man who defines himself by racial rhetoric and old ideas. When the AWB talk about tooling up for the third Boer war and Steve Hofmeyr writes letters to Juju, these images of the farmer are reinforced. When the newspapers show photos of AWB supporters in their two-tone shirts and short shorts, people see farmers. Even if half these men are mechanics from Benoni or accountants from Centurion, all people see is farmers
The image of the white South African farmer has been stolen by the right-wing and perverted into their mythology. It has been twisted by Juju and his cohorts into the perfect deflection from their own failings. It has been muddied, misused and abused. Well, it is time for good farmers to take it back. To kill this image that so many people have of the farmer. It is time for farmers who don’t prescribe to the Neanderthal politics of ET to say to the fringes: we have had enough. You don’t speak in our name.
The rural communities of South Africa are crying out for a solution to their problems. And the government has quite frankly failed them. From the poorest farm worker to the richest farmer, no one seems to be satisfied with rural reforms. Farm production is down — we are now a net importer of food rather than an exporter. Land reforms are too slow. Farm wages remain chronically low and living conditions of the rural communities have not changed much. And there is the ever-present threat of farm attacks that make slasher films look like Disney flicks.
But as the old cliché goes: in crisis, there is opportunity. And the rural crisis is the perfect opportunity for good farmers to step up to the plate. Not with an R5, a bullet-proof bakkie and a bottle of klippies. But as producers of solutions. Because that’s what farmers do, they grow stuff, they make things happen. They have the land, the cash, the power and the organisation to change their communities. They have the opportunity to be seen to be doing good where for so long there has only been bad. And this doesn’t need to be some paternalistic thing, the great white man coming down from his castle to help the poor natives. Nor does it have to be some hippy shit. All of us sitting round the fire smoking bongs and singing Kumbaya (though that could be nice). But rather it can be as simple as one neighbour helping another neighbour, because at end of the day, it is going to help him. I know the murders are not going to disappear overnight. I know the anger and years of neglect will not be washed away in a day. But I also know that if nothing changes, things are only going to get worse.
If I was to draw a parallel, I think of the end of apartheid when the cricket board and the rugby board needed to change. The cricket board embraced change. While the rugby administrators dragged their heels. Cricket saw opportunity. Rugby saw crisis. And rugby is still paying the price of that call today.
The farmers of our country could go either way. For their sakes, I hope they make a game-changing play. And show the world what the word Boer really means: farmer.
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