South Africa’s latest xenophobia—they call it Afrophobia now, flare-up appears, at first glance, to be about foreigners.
It is not.
Foreigners are simply the easiest target. They run the spaza shop. They sell
on the pavement. They compete in the informal economy. They are visible in
communities where unemployment, poverty and frustration have become daily
realities.
But the anger is not really about them. It is about a promise made in 1994
that remains largely unfulfilled.
Political freedom arrived. Economic freedom did not.
"When apartheid ended, South Africa faced a historic challenge: how to dismantle centuries of economic exclusion that doomed the black majority to serfdom and give them a genuine chance at climbing the social ladder...
Apartheid had not only denied people the vote. It had denied them land,
quality education, capital, networks, decent housing and the ability to
accumulate wealth across generations.
The new democratic state therefore needed urgency.
It needed to build schools that worked and boost job creation by expanding
infrastructure, support entrepreneurs and ensure that millions who had been
deliberately excluded could participate meaningfully in the economy.
Because political freedom without economic progress was always going to
create disappointment.
Black Economic Empowerment was part of that response. It was necessary. A
country that had excluded black people from ownership and leadership could not simply
pretend the past did not exist.
But BEE was never going to solve everything.
A few people entering boardrooms could not compensate for millions of
children receiving poor education. A handful of black billionaires could not
transform communities where unemployment remained high, electricity unreliable
and small businesses struggled to survive.
The problem was not that some black South Africans became wealthy. Every
functioning economy creates winners. The problem was that too many people saw
no realistic path to becoming one of them.
That is where resentment grows. Inequality becomes dangerous when people believe the ladder has been removed...
And South Africa is not merely unequal. It is almost in a category of its
own.
The World Bank has ranked it as the most unequal country in the world, while
the World Inequality Database shows that the richest 10 percent take roughly
two-thirds of national income, leaving the bottom half with only a tiny share.
In Sweden, by contrast, the bottom half takes about a quarter of national
income.
That comparison matters.
It shows that South Africa’s problem is not just poverty. It is the
architecture of opportunity. In a more normal society, inequality can be
softened by the belief that the system is open, schools work, capital is
accessible and effort can still move a family from the bottom to the middle. In
South Africa, too many people do not see that path.
The legacy of apartheid did not end with apartheid.
It compounded.
It compounded through land ownership. It compounded through education. It
compounded through access to capital. It compounded through where people lived,
which schools they attended, what networks they could enter and what assets
their parents could pass on.
That is why South Africa’s Gini coefficient remains among the highest ever
recorded for a major economy. This is not accidental inequality. It is
inherited inequality, reinforced over time.
A poor person can accept that someone else has a bigger house or a better
car if they believe their own child has a fair chance of achieving the same.
But when opportunity appears reserved for those with political connections,
wealth begins to look less like success and more like privilege.
This is the uncomfortable reality of post-apartheid South Africa.
The country moved from a system where race determined economic opportunity to one where political access often became a powerful advantage. The rise of a connected black elite was an important correction to apartheid exclusion, but it also created a new frustration among ordinary citizens who feel they were left behind....
Many fought for liberation together. Yet decades later, some live in first-world
luxury while others continue to grovel
under sub-human conditions.
That gap is politically explosive.
The statistics explain the anger.
South Africa’s unemployment rate remains among the highest in the world,
with young people carrying the heaviest burden. Millions of young South
Africans have grown up after apartheid, hearing that freedom had arrived, only
to discover that economic opportunity remains painfully limited.
They see politicians and businesspeople with access and influence moving
ahead while they struggle to find work.
Then someone tells them the problem is the foreigner.
And the match is lit.
"This is why xenophobia keeps returning. It is not because migrants suddenly become the cause of South Africa’s problems. It is because they become a convenient explanation for problems that are much deeper...
The foreign shopkeeper becomes a symbol of economic frustration.
The reality is more complicated. Migrants are a small share of South
Africa’s population, and there is little evidence that they are responsible for
unemployment, crime or failing public services. Many migrants are simply doing
what South Africa has struggled to encourage enough of its own citizens to do:
start small businesses, take risks and compete in difficult conditions.
The tragedy is that their success often becomes a source of anger rather
than a lesson.
A society with millions of unemployed young people cannot survive on blame.
It needs opportunity.
When leaders fail to provide answers, scapegoats become attractive.
This is where politics enters.
The African National Congress (ANC), once the unquestioned symbol of
liberation, has lost much of its dominance. Its loss of a parliamentary
majority in the 2024 election reflected growing public frustration with
unemployment, corruption and poor service delivery.
A weakened liberation movement faces a difficult temptation: to explain
failure or to distract from it.
"foreigner becomes useful because he shifts attention away from the broken municipality, the failed school, the corrupt tender and the political insider who became wealthy without creating broad prosperity...
But South Africa cannot build a future by attacking people who are also
trying to survive.
The real challenge remains the same one that existed in 1994: turning
political freedom into economic mobility.
And like every unpaid bill, the longer it is ignored, the more painful the final payment becomes.
