We have no white leaders

It is frustration with so-called white leadership, or lack of it, that has made me ask: What has happened to men and women of integrity in our white community?

I am talking about leaders of the calibre of Beyers Naude, Braam Fischer and Ruth First.

It may just be ignorance on my part but I do not see any significant white leader who is concerned with framing the right issues in the country today.

After 20 years into freedom and democracy, there is no outspoken white leader who is helping the privileged community to focus on the right issues.

Well, I understand the plight of blacks and the frustration they experience around issues like unemployment, poverty, Aids, government corruption and the hopeless black middle class, for example.

That is something that black leadership deals with every moment of every day, especially at a political level.

But my concern with raising this question is to focus on what has happened to white leadership in South Africa.

Of course, I do not want to concern myself with traditional white organisations and their power-hungry personalities that have grown out of the self-same communities.

These comprise of people who have been deeply influenced by the old system of apartheid mentality, which espouses white paternalism and superiority.
I am talking about leaders who understand that what we need, more than anything else, are men and women who go beyond dealing with the EFFECTS to focus on the CAUSES.

Unfortunately, we are destined to be a nation that experiences social upheavals at regular intervals as we go deeper into the 21st century.

This is for a simply fact: WE are the most unequal society in the world.

So, where are white leaders whose stirring words will get us to focus on the three primary problems in this country: land dispossession, economic inequality, wealth monopoly and widespread prejudice and discrimination?

The problems of this country would, suddenly, be solved if there were white leaders who make passionate appeals for sharing the land, redistributing the scarce resources and eradicating racism.

Of course, these leaders would need to be reasonable. They would not ask the whites to give up the entire land. They would not expect them to give up ALL their wealth. Also, they would not ALL be charged with racism.

But these are the biggest white-created problems that are rarely spoken about in the country today, especially in white circles.

Yet we should understand that there is a low-key war that results in crime, social upheavals, xenophobic explosions, unemployment, poverty and migration, among others, simply because far too few whites have everything while far too many blacks have nothing.

The land and wealth is STILL in white hands. In fact, what the blacks are fighting each other for are the crumbs of what has fallen from the white table.

There must be some leaders like Naude, Fischer and First in the white community who know that the problems of this country will NOT go away until the issues of land and wealth have been addressed.

But it would seem nobody is willing to come forward to tackle the real issues because this would threaten and compromise relative white control of what matters most in this country.

If truth were to be told, the essence of the black struggle was for regaining SOME of the land dispossessed and redistribution of SOME of the resources.
It is now an open secret that political freedom has NOT resulted in social and economic justice.

The last 20 years have only brought us to a situation where it is becoming clear to everyone with eyes to see that “freedom for some is freedom for none”.

We do need white leaders to stand up and be counted as people who are not only interested in collective white self-preservation but in social and economic justice for ALL.

When there are deep rumbles of discontent, there have been numerous in the last few month, we need to rely on white leadership to speak truth to the people who not only own the land but control the wealth in it.

It may be naïve and unrealistic to expect whites to tackle the issue of the land and its wealth. But talking about these issues, at least, would get us to begin to focus on the real issues that hold the key to nation building, justice, equality and peace.

After all, it is a time of ferment and rising consciousness for blacks. Whites might as well lead in framing the issues.