What drives the ideal of democracy? One aspect stands out more than any other... freedom. Freedom is the exact opposite of oppression, thus it can be said that where oppression reigns, democracy is absent, and vice versa.
When viewed in the above mentioned manner, few African countries have ever been democracies. At best it could be said that they are, or were, failed democracies. Even the last statement seems overly-optimistic, since most "democratic" countries in Africa are usually dictatorships or one-party states. Again, Mugabe has to bear the brunt of our criticism. Zimbabwe claims to be a democratic country, due to the fact that they hold so-called elections. It is, however, a well-known fact that Mugabe manipulates the outcome of each election in favour of himself. Zimbabwe is thus a dictatorship rather than a democracy.
A country not far behind the likes of Zimbabwe concerning oppression, but much more refined in their tactics, is South Africa (the ANC). Here, the votes of the biggest nation (the Xhosas) is used to render smaller (indigenous) nations, like the Boer-Afrikaners and the coloureds, utterly powerless. And of course, the ruling party's discrimanatory laws favours their supporters - the Xhosas. South Africa, is currently in effect a one-party state. There is countless facts that demonstrates the degree of freedom, or rather the lack of it, in South Africa. Among them would be the high crime rate (the highest in the world since '94), genocide, mass-emigration and more. Minorities, in effect, have no vote against the two-thirds majority of the ANC (thus, the Xhosas). The popular argument of the ruling party's supporters seems to be that "the will of the people" governs matters, but that is sadly not the case. It is ironic, since the only "people" who's votes do count are the ANC's supporters's, and the rest of the people are trampled on like animals. Germany was superior in numbers to Poland, yet nobody (except some of the Nazis) saw that as a legitimate reason for the Germans to rule and oppress the Polish. Why should the same be tolerated in South Africa, Zimbabwe or any other country, for that matter?
Minorities within South Africa now feel that self-rule is the only way of achieving both freedom and peaceful co-existence with some of the other nations in Africa. The Boere-Afrikaners and coloureds, both indigiounous to South Africa, are now demanding that they be granted self-rule. Maps of possible "Volkstate" (which refers to a piece of land governed by the nation itself) have been drawn up, and debate surrounding the topic is now more heated than ever. The Afrikaners in particular have taken several steps to put a government of "their own" in place, to rule themselves and only themselves. One such a step is the recent Afrikanerraad referendum, and the Afrikanerraad elections that is planned for next year.
For more information regarding the Afrikanerraad, see www.afrikanerraad.org
Other related sites: http://capepeoplesorg.mysite.wanadoo-members.co.uk , www.praag.org
