We were laughing at the office the other day when we realised that in an article on media in Africa, we kept on referring to local companies operating outside the borders as having gone “into Africa”. Hello?! South Africa is part of the continent.
Reading a lot of publications and listening to other people speak, I realise that this is a common mistake among South Africans. Or is it a commonly held perception, that there is South Africa and there’s Africa?
We are not like the rest of the continent, seems to be the impression when reading between the lines.
You see this in the way South Africans generally treat or even perceive their fellow Africans – as backward, corrupt and in South Africa to dry up our land of milk and honey.
After all, why not, when they come from war-torn countries led by dictators with dilapidated buildings and outdated infrastructure and with vehicles that we only see in our grandparents’ photographs? Okay, maybe I’m exaggerating but you get the picture.
We were chatting about this misconception with a colleague who is trainer in broadcasting and film productions.
She said whenever she has a class of producers from the SADC region, she starts by calling South Africans aside to tell them she will not tolerate any arrogant behaviour.
“I tell them that there is so much South African broadcasters can learn from their African counterparts, such as this whole media convergence thing.
“While we are only now waking up to this, running around like headless chickens trying to come to grips with this concept; holding workshops and training, the rest of Africa has been doing it for ages.
“If only South African could stop being so snooty and realise that they can learn a lot from their fellow Africans, who have nearly 40 years of independence behind them with the free education that goes with it. That is why Africans actually perceive South Africans as being of lesser educational status. ”
I remember when I was working for a children’s rights non-governmental organisation and visiting Mozambique, I invited a new found friend to visit me in Joburg, telling her about the abundance of glitz and glamour. Nothing prepared me for her response.
“What makes you think we don’t have such shopping malls, cinema houses and nightclubs in Mozambique? That’s the problem with you South Africans, you’ve become as arrogant and self-absorbed as the Americans. You think the rest of us want to be like you,” she said.
“I live in Xai Xai because I want to, not because I can’t afford to stay anywhere else.”
This made me realise that the media has a lot of educating to do, especially here at home. South Africans, and yes I am generalising, have a very simplistic view of the rest of the continent.
I just hope we don’t get to the point where we’ve become a joke like the Americans who still think we have lions in our back yards and Soweto is the name of a famous nightclub.