SIKONATHI MANTSHANTSHA: Defining white privilege
Recognising the injustices of our past should begin with the restoration of justice to the majority
The much-vaunted constitution of SA opens with a lie: "We, the people of SA, recognise the injustices of our past; honour those who suffered for justice and freedom in our land ..." This document, written during the first two years of the democratic order, was meant to provide closure, settlement and peace among enemies. It was also meant to lay the foundation on which the new nation of SA would be forged. Alas, it has failed. The 1994 settlement was to end a series of wars that had raged in what is now SA for more than 300 years. During that time, black people had lost everything to white, European conquerors who had invaded and violently taken over the country. The conquerors’ descendants, in various guises, went on not only to inherit their ill-gotten gains, but also to visit upon the vanquished one of the worst forms of dehumanisation and humiliation ever seen. Colonialism and then apartheid, built on black dispossession through a series of armed robberies, were to formalise thi...
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