Angella Johnson
Pity Philippe Troussier. The Frenchman with the poor interpersonal skills has emerged as the national scapegoat for Bafana Bafana’s less- than-sparkling performance in the World Cup.
The charges: that as a foreigner he lacks any real understanding of the way football is played in this country; and that he deliberately sabotaged the first game against France out of a twisted sense of nationalism.
Local passions have been inflamed as national pride and inflated hopes of beating the rest of the world and bringing home the coveted trophy were dashed.
The Pan Africanist Congress even went so far as to point out that Troussier’s European background (he is a white colonialist) made him untrustworthy as a coach and argued that it was time a true son of Africa was appointed.
Former Moraka Swallows coach Mike Mangena said South Africa’s downfall at the World Cup was directly linked to the South African Football Association’s (Safa) decision to employ a foreigner.
“People are saying he is a good coach, but I think the guy is very arrogant. He did not know his players’ strong points and weaknesses. Some of his tactics were foreign to the players,” Mangena said.
“I don’t know why Safa employed a foreigner when we have good local coaches who can do good job. And I question Troussier’s motives for taking the job to coach Bafana Bafana. I only hope that Safa has learned a good lesson about foreigners.”
But the rash of anti-foreign sentiment sparked by Bafana Bafana’s poor showing on the football pitch reveals an ugly side of the new South African psyche – the rising tide of xenophobia.
Apartheid may have officially ended with a democratic election in 1994, but it has been replaced by this equally ubiquitous form of social injustice normally the reserve of far-right political groups.
“Xenophobia has clearly become one of the defining features of this country,” agreed Hein Marais, author and social commentator. “There is a blatant hostility to anything that is not South African, which betrays the country’s ongoing search for a national identity.”
Fuelled by high unemployment, this hatred and resentment are usually directed against black foreign workers, who are viewed as economic interlopers. But increasingly blacks from Europe and the United States have found themselves facing similar resentment and labelling as amakwere-kwere (foreigner).
“I was once told that I had no right to be working here and reaping the rewards of the struggle local people fought,” recalled Olivia Ridley, an African-American model from Texas.
“I have worked all over the world and this young girl had never even left South Africa. Her mind was closed to the concept of a global economy. She felt I was taking jobs which belonged to her.”
As a Caribbean-Brit I have a fair share of xenophobic sentiments levied at me. “Why don’t you go back to your own continent? This is my continent. You don’t come here and tell me what to do,” a black female colleague recently spewed at me.
These are the kind of people who talk incessantly about a “flood of illegal aliens” bringing disease and crime to the country; who view other Africans as a threat to the country’s social and fiscal stability.
They are aided and abetted by media reports of police rounding up and arresting “illegal immigrants” – usually hard- working men and women eking out a living selling goods on the streets.
The use of these terms by officialdom and the media to describe people from neighbouring states contributes to the growing xenophobia in the country.
So it was not surprising that, in a move similar to that of neo-Nazis, a group calling itself the Unemployed People of South Africa threatened to take the law into its own hands and kick out illegal immigrants.
This ugly face of nationalism has been demonstrated in Johannesburg on several occasions in recent times, when non-South African street traders were assaulted and their goods stolen or destroyed by South African hawkers.
Yet according to two recent studies conducted for the Southern African Migration Project, numerous misconceptions exist about Africans who are living and trading in South Africa.
For example, most of the people who sell on the streets are here legally. They are more likely to be providing jobs for local people, and usually sell goods which are otherwise unavailable in South Africa.
Traders from the region are mainly migrants, not immigrants. They are involved in a cycle of cross-border trade, where they invest their profits from sales in South Africa buying goods which they take to sell in their home countries.
They bring the profits from those sales back to South Africa (as goods or cash) to invest in trade here, and again buy (mainly South African-made) goods to take home.
While here, they contribute to the South African economy by paying rent and buying goods and services. More than 50% of the income of regional street traders is spent on living in South Africa.
Many hold university degrees, over 90% have some secondary education and two-thirds have some form of tertiary training. They have much to offer a country short of skills.
But given the attitudes of South Africans to other Africans, it is perhaps not surprising that the study found less than 5% of those questioned wanted to stay in the country permanently.
Which might also explain Troussier’s recent outburst: “I have received the message back from South Africa that they don’t want a foreigner as coach. Perhaps it is time for me to go now. Maybe then they can open the champagne.”