The 44, and the question of loyalty

I don’t think that when Charlise Theron said only 44 people speak Afrikaans, and that it’s a dying language, that she meant the 44 who signed the “Not in Our Name” letter, but she may as well have. A list of academics, journalists, and state operatives with ANC membership signed a missive last week condemning the Solidariteit for engaging Washington in criticisms of the South African regime, and of Donald Trump for offering refugee status to Afrikaners.

Most of the more well-known names include people who have a long history of attacking their own ethnic background as an evil to be eradicated through assimilation or dispersal, and many have been particularly ascerbic in doing so. Others are actual high-ranking ANC members, including former NP member Gerhard Koornhoof.

Reactions form the usual suspects were ecstatic, as News24 and other pro-government media outlets trumpeted their message from the hilltops, and the government included it in their public statements, praising them for their “bravery” and “principled stance”.

Even those in the DA inner circle were getting excited, though no prominent DA members have yet made a statement. Gareth van Onselen, the DA’s favourite pollster, certainly had some interesting reactions:

“Current Afriforum online battle: ‘You aren’t real Afrikaners, we are real Afrikaners’. When push comes to shove, all nationalists spend their time doing is trying to polish archetypes so they best reflect their own world view. Can’t handle or process difference, ‘the other’.”

“God I love how this whole pseudo Afrikaner debate is revealing the anti-individual ethnic nationalism that defines so much ‘Afriforum’ thinking. These people are ‘traitors’ now, cause they don’t think like the Afriforum stereotype demands. Afriforum=ANC. Two peas, one pod.’

This lip-smacking and gloating is not atypical. The DA generally see Afrikaners as part of their loyal base. But the loyalty seems to extend in only one direction. At the moment, they are likely thinking quite carefully how to respond, given that they can’t afford to alienate Afrikaners any more than they have already.

But from backing mandatory CRT re-education courses for white kids at Fish Hoek to getting involved removing Afrikaans from Elsensberg agricultural college, the DA are no friends to Afrikaners. The Maimane years saw a full-throated endorsement of pretty much every aspect of the ANC’s programme and historiography, including glowing support for Winnie Mandela. John Steenhuisen has pushed AgriBEE programmes without consultation. Their glowing reviews of the pilot project for the BELA Act in the Eastern Cape, where they promote “indiginous language” education, which is explicitly defined as excluding Afrikaans, says quite a bit too. Helen Zille’s proclamations about the need for the eradication of nations and nation-states so that all people can live as atomised individuals under a single global government with a centrally-planned economy don’t exactly gel with Afrikaners’ cultural values of self-determination and solidarity.

But AfriForum got their own back.

Rather than being the work of some grass-roots network of earnest conscientious objectors, the open letter was drafted by Burger herself, who then recruited a handful of rabid antichristian and anti-Afrikaans Afrikaners, including Piet Croucamp, Max Du Preez, Pierre De Vos, and the two most aggressive regime apologists in the NG Kerk (the leaders of the “Betereinders”) via private WhatsApp.

This mess will discredit that list of names for a long time to come. Whenever a progressive Afrikaner rises from their seat to proclaim their opinion on the latest issue, they will be forever remembered as a stooge of the ANC, and their credibility will forever be tarnished.

But an important lesson is learned here. People broadly recognise the government as the enemy, and for good reason. Loyalty matter a lot, and those who choose the state over their own people are never seen in a good light.

News24 in particular fell afoul of this, when they attempted to can the entire staff of Beeld and Rapport last year, and the threatened staff flooded the inboxes of Maroela Media with job applications. Solidariteit stepped in to save their jobs, and the two newspapers are still running, with much of their staff intact despite loss of profits from the mismanaged state-affiliated media house that owns them.

Had they not done this, it is quite likely that Rapport wouldn’t have even thought to look into Karen Burger, or to collaborate with AfriForum on gathering evidence for the operation in the first place, and the PR exercise may have gone off without a hitch.

But as it stands, Solidariteit has gained credibility, and the establishment has been exposed as sleazy and resentful little club of hensoppers.