September 25, 2011
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First Boer elections in a hundred years
First #Boer #election in hundred years
Self-determination
On 24 September 2011, I participated in the elections of a small group of #Afrikaner people. The purpose of the election to select seven leaders with a mandate to engage with the Government of South Africa for it independence. This is one of the anomalies of my life. In the one sense I am seen as a conservative who align myself with the plight of the people and on the other side I am seen as far to liberal by the people with whom I align myself. In the end I am neither hear not there. What is most important to me is that the efforts are peaceful and legal. It is truly the first elections held in a 100 years that is only by Boer people for the Boer people. In total about 30,000 people are to vote. This is a small number of people given a total population of over 50,000,000 people.
I really enjoyed the spirit with which my people organised themselves to set up everything needed to runs such an election across South Africa at 150 election points across the country.
The group itself is under fire from various sides. Some say the group wants to return to apartheid. In reality it is just a group of people in the minority that wants, as a minority group wants to protect their own culture, history and beliefs. This is not Afrikaans speaking people but people who associate with the Boer history. Being aware of my own genealogy I am firmly rooted into the culture although my beliefs might differ from the mainstream belief system.
On the one side I defend the right of my people to be free. The right to rule themselves and not by the majority. On the other side I am fighting to open my people's mind to look wider and gain more perspective. I must also acknowledge that it is unfortunately true that members of my people are racist. Independence can not be built on a racist foundation. The flexibility to adapt should always be their. I am proud to have been part of the elections...as a matter of fact I managed one of the elections points as the head official at the elections. I am however forced to ask critical questions about my participation. Am I fostering racism when I support the independence of a group that is under constant threat, who is in a minority? Is this the solution against racist policies like affirmative action and black economic empowerment? I am sitting with many questions unanswered, as I struggle to bring together my heritage and roots with my own believes in freedom and respect for all.
Here is the team that support me with the Strand election point. In the back row from right to left the first three people were responsible for safety, the lady in the back and the gentleman in the front row were election officials. My daughter in the back ensured that everybody was entertained and helped with the cleaning up.The election station was open from 7:00 till 21:00 and we got 96 votes of which over forty was new registrations. Altogether it was one of the more quiet elections points since the traditional area of the Boer people are not the Cape but in the old Transvaal and Orange Free State Republics. Most election points had more votes and some point had up to 750 votes. I am looking forward to the outcome and would be interested to see the total number of votes. We will see where this process ends up.
Comments (9)
Very interesting, all sides of this equation. Thank you for sharing, and please let us know how it turns out.
Interesting post. I've actually done a bit of reading about South Africa since I watched Skin and recently met a woman who was born there. It's sad to know what people go through there, but people struggled in America for a very long time and it is still happening today.
In my state Pennsylvania, for example, the state and government refuses to recognize the Native Americans that live here and won't give them any of kind of help or funding for their nations and communities. According to the state and government, there are no Native Americans in Pennsylvania. If that is the case, then am I and countless other Native Americans in Pennsylvania? It's just sad to see there is still racism. I hope one day things change and everyone realizes that we are all the same no matter the color of our skin.
This is very interesting and see some parallels with the Maori situation here. They are also a cultural minority, but have their own political party. They have national recognition with cultural matters and support programmes, both to help preserve their language and their cultural lifestyle and respect.
Maybe the Boer could look at how this being achieved as a template for their own development.
As your commenters have noted, the problems of minorities - especially in a new nation - can be profound.
South Africa has a number of different tribes and the Boers have often been called "Africa's White Tribe". As White/European dominance has receded in Africa, so has the white population ,except in South Africa, and to some extent Zimbabwe. Recent history has shown that it is a mistake for the remaining whites to attempt to stay out of politics and you are probably doing the right thing for the future of Boers by political organizing. In South Africa today, is there much tribal political organizing? How are such tribal organizations handled politically?Is there any hope that the very conservative rural Boers and the more moderate urban Boers, such as yourself, can organize into a significant political bloc? You do represent more than 13% of South Africa's population and are a significant economic power, so if you can organize, thing may well be better both for the Boer population and the Nation.
@songoftheheart - Yes, I am blogging every now and them from my Afrikaner perspective and will do so if anything significantly happens. It was not considered a newsworthy event in South Africa and none of the newspapers carried any story of the elections.
@Shining_Garnet - Racism is really not a good thing. My forefathers were to blame for instituting a racist policy. It is wrong for one race to see itself as superior to another.
@FrenzElectric - The Maori model should be looked at, thank you. Part that makes our case unique is that the history is where this minority dominated the majority. That domination came with racism. Now the majority has all the political power and they are not really fond of the minority. The minority feels threatened.
@tychecat - Thank you for your insight. It helps a lot to see the world from other people's eyes. It is a bit more complex. Roughly 9% of the people in South Africa is white or caucasian. The majority of the white people do not want independence. These include English speaking people as well as Afrikaans speaking people who prefer to be part of South Africa and who participate in the politics via the normal political processes. The group that want independence is a minority within the minority. It is in terms of numbers it is probably only a 100 000 people. 0.25% of the population. What binds these people is their history, religion and language which is unique to the Boer people. Boer means farmer and they want their independence to be connected to land and to live their own culture without fear of it being absorbed into the culture of the majority.
Effecting change is not easy. Best to try then not do anything. I applaud your commitment and your participation in this effort
I wish all the best to you and hope that all the dreams and the changes will come true.
Regarding Boer independence, is there any geographic section of South Africa where the Boers make up a majority of the population? Unless such an area exists, I think it would be very difficult for them to persuade the SA government to grant them territory. The state of Israel is a pretty good example of such difficulties - their independence only came after extraordinary efforts and world contrition over Jewish losses in World War 2
@The_Eyes_Of_A_Painter - It is effecting change both ways....dealing with a measure of narrow mindedness and racism within my own people and on the other side dealing with the racism and anger of the majority....seems that whatever side I find myself in...change and influence is needed. In the end we are all one human species.
@RestlessButterfly - The hope lies in the battle more than in the victory
@tychecat - Unfortunately there is small pockets where there are majorities but not in a single area. The Boer people are distributed across the country....almost always in a minority. With that comes all the challenges you have mentioned...and that means an unsolvable problem. For me personally it would be enough just to see Affirmative Action and Black Economic Empowerment being dismantled. Redistribution of land is still needed. Apparently 90% of usable land for agriculture is still in White hands. However in terms of business 75% of top management positions are now occupied by Black people. The richest black person is richer than the the second and third place people put together. White poverty has increased with 150% since 1994, however the biggest portion of business on our stock exchange is still in the hands of a few rich people. So there are places where some policy is still needed but the time has come to scrap affirmative action and black economic empowerment. The first reserve positions exclusively to be filled by black people, based on skin color, the second rules that business may not be given to white owned business's which means white people are denied access to create their own small business's in a viable fashion.
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