/ 23 September 2009

Waiting for the aliens

It would seem that Vancouver — and one should think of this western Canadian city as Cape Town with more wind, more rain and more weed smoke — has it in for South Africa.

First, it provided Neil Blomkamp, the director of District 9, a pleasant home from which to render his ghastly vision of alien-invaded Johannesburg. Second, it offered the world’s most famous refugee — 31-year-old Brandon Huntley, erstwhile citizen of Mowbray — a safe haven from which to contemplate racial persecution by way of mugging. Like one of Blomkamp’s spacemen, all Huntley wanted was to move as far away as possible from ”African South Africans”, who appear– from the perspective of certain Vancouverian South Africans — to have a penchant for semi-automatic weaponry and setting things on fire.

Here are the unhappy facts. After allegedly suffering seven attacks and four stabbings at the hands of African South Africans between the years of 1991 and 2003, Huntley found himself before the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) of Canada, with an immigration lawyer named Russell Kaplan fighting on his behalf.

According to a Foreign Policy blog post, Kaplan — a white ex-South African himself — had long been looking for a ”test case” on which to balance the following rhetorical construction: All violence in South Africa suffered by the minority white population is racial violence, which is de facto persecution, ergo worthy of refugee status.

Huntley’s attackers reportedly called him a ”white dog” and a ”settler” — pejoratives, rapt IRB committee members soon learned, that referenced the years-ago colonisation of South Africa by European folks from afar. European colonisers are not called ”white dog” and ”settler” in Canada — the northern aboriginal population is far too polite, along with being mostly dead. Thus, the panel’s chairperson, William Davis — never having enjoyed brunch at the Rosebank Mall– was moved to state that Huntley would stick out like a ”sore thumb” in most parts of South Africa because his skin colour. Refugee status granted. Case closed.

Less wowed by Huntley’s claim was the ANC. ”We should reject these ridiculous allegations that have been levelled against our people and the country,” insisted home affair spokesperson Ronnie Mamoepa. An indignant official ANC statement viewed the granting of refugee status to Huntley on the grounds that Africans would persecute him as — wait for it — ”racist”.

Whoa! The R-word? This is the part where the few Canadians following the story gave a low, sad whistle and checked out. Canucks are unused to the race card; they prefer televised games of Texas Hold ‘Em. Canada is, after all, a multicultural country where difference is celebrated by eating at ethnic restaurants and enjoying the annual Tutsi/Hutu Cook-off or the Bosnian National Pride Breakfast Picnic.

It’s a Rainbow Nation where people don’t burn down the houses of the other colours of the rainbow. How did the gentle land that champions diversity become a standard bearer for racism?

Some context, perhaps? Under Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Progressive Conservative minority government — and one should think of Harper as a dour, less athletic John Howard — the Canadian government has perfected a now decade-long unbroken navel gaze.

Recent examples of this are a massive contretemps with Mexico (a trading partner whose citizens must now apply for an expensive travel visa to come and buy cheaply the stuff they make back in Mexico), a similar flap with the Czechs, and — most egregiously — a willingness to abandon Canadians of colour should they run into trouble in foreign countries that Harper-ites can’t find on Google Earth.

The fact that the IRB is a stand-alone entity separate from government shouldn’t confuse one into thinking that it escapes this larger trend; most Canadian institutions now drink from the same deep well of parochialism. Long gone are the days when Canadian leaders stood up for the internationally disenfranchised while red-faced G8 leaders shuffled with embarrassment. When the Canadian government looks south, it sees only two things: stars and stripes.

Canadian soldiers may be fighting and dying in Afghanistan; the war has barely nicked the Canadian psyche. The myth of a connected world remains exactly that. William Davis and his fellow IRB committee members, in making their decision, may have dimly recalled last year’s coverage of the xenophobic violence — or caught a recent matinée screening of District 9 — and decided to give Huntley a break.

That the Canadian government will appeal the IRB ruling as a sop to the South African consul matters not a jot: Vancouver is unlikely to become any kinder to South Africans. Indeed, Huntley may find after his first long dark winter that the weather persecutes all, equally. Sadly, Florida isn’t so amenable to refugee claimants.

Richard Poplak is the author of Ja! No Man: Growing up White in Apartheid-era South Africa. He lives in Canada