Nelson Mandela’s vision awaits reality
Things have actually gotten worse.
"Race equality remains elusive in South Africa; Despite work of Mandela, nation is still stratified" by Lydia Polgreen and Marcus Mabry | New York Times, December 08, 2013
BLOEMFONTEIN, South Africa — Nelson Mandela, the man who led South Africa out of apartheid and into an era of democracy....
He was chosen to do that in elections.
Freddy Kenny’s comfortable new life, with the perks of privilege of his white counterparts, is a testament to the commitment that Mandela, who died Thursday, placed on making racial reconciliation the centerpiece of his presidency.
He led a party that fought an armed insurgency against the apartheid government, yet when he emerged from prison he preached forgiveness and harmony. Mandela negotiated a peaceful end to white rule, giving birth to the Rainbow Nation.
But racial equality at the ballot box has proved much easier to achieve than social and economic equality. Although Kenny, a regular at the bar of the Schoeman Park Golf Club, a formerly all-white watering hole, has caught up with and surpassed many white South Africans, he is an exception to a rule of lopsided opportunity and advancement that remains one of the most daunting challenges facing the nation.
And yet he gets an article that features him as an example of Mandela's success.
See: Sunday Globe Special: South African S*** Shovel
Another one headed your way in a paragraph or two.
Since the abolition of apartheid, the government has built more than 2 million homes and brought electricity to millions of households.
The average annual incomes of black-led households almost tripled from 2001 to 2011, according to census figures released late last year, and a growing percentage of the adult black population has gone to high school, with an increasing sliver going to college.
But black South Africans are still very far behind whites, and by some measures falling further back....
Because it is about cla$$ now.
Whites have advanced to college and beyond at higher rates since apartheid ended.
The nation remains deeply divided in social spheres as well. According to the SA Reconciliation Barometer, a survey of racial and social attitudes, less than 40 percent of South Africans socialize with people of another race. Just 22 percent of white South Africans and a fifth of black South Africans live in racially integrated neighborhoods. Schools remain heavily segregated.
Mamello Tlakeli, 27, a recently unemployed waitress who now volunteers at a charity, said, whites in South Africa continued to prosper as they did during apartheid, but blacks remained in the rear.
“There is a huge gap between black and white,” she said. “The Rainbow Nation is a dream, not a reality.”
Looks to me like it is more about money than skin color.
--more--"
Related: South Africa's New Apartheid
Worse than the old apartheid. Maybe that is what killed him.
"In Nelson Mandela prayers, angst suffuses pain; Migrants worry about future as world mourns" by Lydia Polgreen | New York Times, December 09, 2013
JOHANNESBURG — South Africans on Sunday began a week of commemorations to the man who embodied the battle against apartheid.
I find the Zionist press honor a bit hypocritical given the situation Palestinians are in.
For the country’s politicians it was a time to urge unity and continuity....
In the vast squatter camp of Diepsloot north of central Johannesburg, where thousands of South Africans and immigrants from neighboring countries live in tin shacks with no plumbing and often no electricity, people gathered in tin-walled churches, under copses of trees, and in open fields to offer prayers for Mandela....
It's because greedy money junkies rise to power in any society and their class rules the planet. That is the only explanation for such immense suffering
About 60 world leaders, including President Obama, and other eminent persons are due to travel to South Africa this week to mark Mandela’s death.
Thanks for contributing the the greenhouse gas and global warming problem.
On Tuesday, tens of thousands of South Africans and foreign dignitaries will gather for a national memorial in a World Cup soccer stadium in Johannesburg. Mandela’s body will then lie in state for three days in Pretoria at the Union Building. He is to be buried Sunday in his rural hometown of Qunu in Eastern Cape province.
Many migrants living in Diepsloot worried that Mandela’s death would leave them more vulnerable to the xenophobic attacks that have wracked the community in recent years.
With rising crime, joblessness, and deteriorating living conditions, South Africans have frequently turned on those from other countries. Mandela and his foundation had sought to reduce such violence.
“Rumors have been passing through the town that once Mandela dies we immigrants will be attacked,” said Nkosi Nkomo, the pastor of a church with a largely Zimbabwean congregation. He spent the weekend outdoors with a small group of followers, praying by a campfire shaded by trees....
In other parts of the world, too, people congregated to mark the death of a man whose long incarceration and subsequent election as South Africa’s first black president inspired a following far beyond the frontiers of his land....
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They call him a “a model of forgiveness” and I guess that makes him a better man than me. I simply can not forgive the war criminal world leaders who are unrepentant.
Celebrating Nelson Mandela, far from home
Remembering Nelson Mandela’s visit to Boston
Nations’ leaders flock to Nelson Mandela service
Remembering Nelson Mandela’s visit to Boston
Nations’ leaders flock to Nelson Mandela service
George W. Bush, Hillary Clinton join Obamas
Bush, the architect of indefinite detention. How ironic is that?
"While the pope said that former president Nelson Mandela of South Africa, who died last week, will “inspire generations,” Bishop Thomas J. Tobin of Rhode Island issued a statement declaring that appreciation of Mandela’s admirable qualities should be tempered by his “shameful” promotion of abortion in his country."
There is always someone who poops on the party. I suppose it is better than pumping a pooper.
NEXT DAY UPDATES:
"Leaders from across globe pay tribute to Mandela; Obama delivers eulogy at stadium drenched by rain" by Lydia Polgreen and Nicholas Kulish | New York Times, December 11, 2013
SOWETO, South Africa — Sheets of driving rain swept across this former segregated township — an urban sprawl within sight of the glittery high rises of downtown Johannesburg — keeping some mourners away....
“Even heaven is crying,” one woman in the crowd declared as the deluge continued....
That is one way of looking at it.
[It] was a moment that fused revolutionary memories of the fight against apartheid with appeals for the values of forgiveness and reconciliation. Songs of the struggle, as the antiapartheid campaign is known, blended with hymns and prayer.
Some stomped their feet as young protesters did during the years of protest that led to Mandela’s release from prison in 1990 after 27 years of incarceration.
As we have seen below, some protests good, other protests bad.
As much as visiting dignitaries sought to underscore their association with Mandela, their presence here also reinforced South Africans’ pride in him....
The moment was not immune to more recent political undercurrents in advance of elections next year.
President Jacob Zuma was greeted with boos and whistles from a crowd that cheered President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Thabo Mbeki, former South African president, and, loudest of all, Obama.
My goodness how things have changed, especially for Mugabe! He's liked because he's an African nationalist who doesn't take any $hit from international in$titutions.
Using Mandela’s clan name, Obama declared: “It took a man like Madiba to free not just the prisoner, but the jailer as well; to show that you must trust others so that they may trust you; to teach that reconciliation is not a matter of ignoring a cruel past, but a means of confronting it with inclusion, generosity, and truth. He changed laws, but also hearts.”
Does that mean the drone missiles strikes have stopped?
Striking a deeply personal note, he went on:
--more--"
"Obama’s greeting of Castro sparks Cuba speculation" by Michael D. Shear | New York Times, December 11, 2013
SOWETO, South Africa — President Obama shook hands with President Raúl Castro of Cuba on Tuesday, offering a friendly gesture freighted with symbolism to one of America’s most enduring Cold War foes.
The brief handshake was delivered with the world watching as Obama greeted leaders assembled to make remarks at the memorial service here for Nelson Mandela. But the image — captured by photographers and television cameras — instantly raised questions about its deeper meaning.
Was Obama trying to signal a new effort to reach an accommodation with Cuba 50 years after the Communist revolution that put Fidel Castro, Raúl’s brother, in power? Or was Obama simply trying to avoid delivering a diplomatic snub at a memorial dedicated to forgiveness?
The president’s aides would have known in advance which world leaders would be at the podium when the president approached for his own remarks. But White House officials declined to offer any explanation of the handshake or confirm that there had been a discussion about whether to offer one.
Still, Obama’s own remarks, delivered just moments afterward, offer tantalizing possibilities about what was going through the president’s mind when he approached Castro.
Obama talked about the need for trust and reconciliation and forgiveness. He was talking about Mandela — widely known by his clan name, Madiba — but his remarks might also apply to the diplomatically frozen relationship between the United States and Cuba.
Or Iran.
“It took a man like Madiba to free not just the prisoner but the jailer as well; to show that you must trust others so that they may trust you,” Obama said, “to teach that reconciliation is not a matter of ignoring a cruel past but a means of confronting it with inclusion and generosity and truth. He changed laws, but he also changed hearts.”
Yeah, I saw that quote in another article. Nice speech, but it's an actions not words world now.
The question is whether Obama was trying to signal a desire to change hearts by shaking Castro’s hand. If so, the Cuban president would become the latest adversary that Obama has sought to turn into a friend — or at least a less dangerous opponent. Obama’s efforts to negotiate a nuclear deal with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani is another example.
A handshake like the one Obama offered Castro has the potential to become a political problem for the president, much the way that Obama’s handshake in 2009 with Hugo Chávez, then the Socialist president of Venezuela, was criticized by Republicans.
God rest his soul, but what an incredible piece of shit paragraph is that!
First of all, how did that handshake hurt Obama? I never remember it coming back up and he was reelected president. As for the problem now, why? He's in his final term.
Again, I shouldn't be surprised or angry. This is standard fare for the slop that the Jew York Times trolls out day after day after day.
Obama was also attacked for bowing to Emperor Akihito of Japan that year.
Did he also apologize for the unnecessary use of nuclear bombs on them?
That was 20 years after President George Bush had generated criticism by bowing at the coffin of Emperor Hirohito, Japan’s wartime leader.
Show you the elite and dictatorial mindset of the Bush crime family. It was H.W.'s dad Prescott who was involved in the plot to overthrow Roosevelt and establish a dictatorship in the 1930s, a plot that was exposed by whistleblowing general Smedley Butler.
But such a gesture can also mark the beginning of a thawing of relations, something many Cuban-Americans would be wary of.
Yeah, gotta be wary of peace and good feelings.
--more--"
Also see: Obama-Castro handshake: Civility and nothing more
Too bad.
NEXT DAY UPDATES:
"Leaders from across globe pay tribute to Mandela; Obama delivers eulogy at stadium drenched by rain" by Lydia Polgreen and Nicholas Kulish | New York Times, December 11, 2013
SOWETO, South Africa — Sheets of driving rain swept across this former segregated township — an urban sprawl within sight of the glittery high rises of downtown Johannesburg — keeping some mourners away....
“Even heaven is crying,” one woman in the crowd declared as the deluge continued....
That is one way of looking at it.
[It] was a moment that fused revolutionary memories of the fight against apartheid with appeals for the values of forgiveness and reconciliation. Songs of the struggle, as the antiapartheid campaign is known, blended with hymns and prayer.
Some stomped their feet as young protesters did during the years of protest that led to Mandela’s release from prison in 1990 after 27 years of incarceration.
As we have seen below, some protests good, other protests bad.
As much as visiting dignitaries sought to underscore their association with Mandela, their presence here also reinforced South Africans’ pride in him....
The moment was not immune to more recent political undercurrents in advance of elections next year.
President Jacob Zuma was greeted with boos and whistles from a crowd that cheered President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Thabo Mbeki, former South African president, and, loudest of all, Obama.
My goodness how things have changed, especially for Mugabe! He's liked because he's an African nationalist who doesn't take any $hit from international in$titutions.
Using Mandela’s clan name, Obama declared: “It took a man like Madiba to free not just the prisoner, but the jailer as well; to show that you must trust others so that they may trust you; to teach that reconciliation is not a matter of ignoring a cruel past, but a means of confronting it with inclusion, generosity, and truth. He changed laws, but also hearts.”
Does that mean the drone missiles strikes have stopped?
Striking a deeply personal note, he went on:
--more--"
"Obama’s greeting of Castro sparks Cuba speculation" by Michael D. Shear | New York Times, December 11, 2013
SOWETO, South Africa — President Obama shook hands with President Raúl Castro of Cuba on Tuesday, offering a friendly gesture freighted with symbolism to one of America’s most enduring Cold War foes.
The brief handshake was delivered with the world watching as Obama greeted leaders assembled to make remarks at the memorial service here for Nelson Mandela. But the image — captured by photographers and television cameras — instantly raised questions about its deeper meaning.
Was Obama trying to signal a new effort to reach an accommodation with Cuba 50 years after the Communist revolution that put Fidel Castro, Raúl’s brother, in power? Or was Obama simply trying to avoid delivering a diplomatic snub at a memorial dedicated to forgiveness?
The president’s aides would have known in advance which world leaders would be at the podium when the president approached for his own remarks. But White House officials declined to offer any explanation of the handshake or confirm that there had been a discussion about whether to offer one.
Still, Obama’s own remarks, delivered just moments afterward, offer tantalizing possibilities about what was going through the president’s mind when he approached Castro.
Obama talked about the need for trust and reconciliation and forgiveness. He was talking about Mandela — widely known by his clan name, Madiba — but his remarks might also apply to the diplomatically frozen relationship between the United States and Cuba.
Or Iran.
“It took a man like Madiba to free not just the prisoner but the jailer as well; to show that you must trust others so that they may trust you,” Obama said, “to teach that reconciliation is not a matter of ignoring a cruel past but a means of confronting it with inclusion and generosity and truth. He changed laws, but he also changed hearts.”
Yeah, I saw that quote in another article. Nice speech, but it's an actions not words world now.
The question is whether Obama was trying to signal a desire to change hearts by shaking Castro’s hand. If so, the Cuban president would become the latest adversary that Obama has sought to turn into a friend — or at least a less dangerous opponent. Obama’s efforts to negotiate a nuclear deal with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani is another example.
A handshake like the one Obama offered Castro has the potential to become a political problem for the president, much the way that Obama’s handshake in 2009 with Hugo Chávez, then the Socialist president of Venezuela, was criticized by Republicans.
God rest his soul, but what an incredible piece of shit paragraph is that!
First of all, how did that handshake hurt Obama? I never remember it coming back up and he was reelected president. As for the problem now, why? He's in his final term.
Again, I shouldn't be surprised or angry. This is standard fare for the slop that the Jew York Times trolls out day after day after day.
Obama was also attacked for bowing to Emperor Akihito of Japan that year.
Did he also apologize for the unnecessary use of nuclear bombs on them?
That was 20 years after President George Bush had generated criticism by bowing at the coffin of Emperor Hirohito, Japan’s wartime leader.
Show you the elite and dictatorial mindset of the Bush crime family. It was H.W.'s dad Prescott who was involved in the plot to overthrow Roosevelt and establish a dictatorship in the 1930s, a plot that was exposed by whistleblowing general Smedley Butler.
But such a gesture can also mark the beginning of a thawing of relations, something many Cuban-Americans would be wary of.
Yeah, gotta be wary of peace and good feelings.
--more--"
Also see: Obama-Castro handshake: Civility and nothing more
Too bad.
