KEY INFORMANTS
7.1. KEY INFORMANT'S VIEWS OF SOUTH AFRICAN INDIAN MIGRATION
CHAPTER 7
Countries like New Zealand offer South African Indians opportunities (like employment) which they no longer have access to in South Africa. Mr.
Rajbansi said that this contribute to the brain drain in South Africa.
He also highlighted the unique situation that South African Indians are occupying. Unlike the rest of Africa, the largest component of South African Indian genealogy is rooted in indentured labour. Through the years (Indians like Madaree Mahuzoo - Chapter 5), loose contact with their family and have no-where else to go and remain in the new country. The end result is the formation of a strong South African Indian Diaspora with the emergence of new class structures within that group. Today there is a large upper class wealthy elitist sector (whose forbearers may have been indentured labourers), a stable middle class and a large number of people who just manage to get by.
Mr. Rajbansi said that professional Indians cannot stand the trauma of the transitional government and are "hypocrites and cowards" to run away from the country and Black rule, (and migrate) especially if they were involved in the freedom struggle. Migrants, on the other hand, who are departing because of crime escalation or who are concerned about the security of their children are "not begrUdged." Mr. Rajbansi said that he understands and appreciates the concerns of Indians in this category, because the government has failed in dealing with crime and "people have become prisoners in their own homes"
(Personal interview with key respondents).
Mr. Kay Makan agreed that crime is a leading concern in this country. His family have been severely affected by crime (murder, theft and car hijacking).
He believes that South African Indians can cope with affirmative action and unemployment because of the extended family structures that provide strong emotional and financial support. Crime is the only "excuse" people have to migrate. A few members of his family have migrated to New Zealand and have returned to South Africa because they were disillusioned with New Zealand.
Mr. Makan believes that an understated push variable for South African Indian migration is "brainwashing" (Personal interviews with key informants). South African Indians who have migrated only narrate the positive and honeymoon experiences of their exodus. The adversity and destitution they experience is never conveyed because they do not want to admit failure, perhaps. Makan considers this an important influence in the person's assessment to actually migrate.
The pressures that encourage migration are growing and fundamentally rise from disparities in opportunities. South African Indians are realising that there are opportunities elsewhere, if not in South Africa. Daily, the newspapers advertise and search for skilled people from South Africa. It is luring in the face of political instability, poverty, unemployment and high crime velocity.
People are seeking safety and security in more prosperous nations.
However while migration might lower population pressures and
unemployment at home, the repercussion for host countries are the opposite.
Xenophobia, racism, intolerance and saturation of the employment markets are set in motion in the new Diaspora. Chapter 5 highlighted some of the setbacks and predicaments of the new migrants. Makan stressed that people underestimate migration expenses and are caught up in the adventure more than the financial reality of migration. Consequently, depression and
melancholy was the primary experience of all the respondents in New Zealand. I added to their sadness - I was a symbol of their past and most respondents held on to me - clung to me - some cried - and missed home.
Immigration created a variety of cultural fears for them. The fear that there is no control over national boundaries, the fear that an ethnically homogeneous race will be altered through intermarriage and western influence and fear of changes in the home and the family structure is real. The fears expressed by New Zealanders are that the influxes of new ways of life are altering their landscape. Religious rituals and cultural habits and the fear that ne~omers will encroach upon property, clog the education system and deplete social benefits owned by them, is escalating in New Zealand.
Many respondents expressed concern that migrants bring too may of their own problems into New Zealand like, racism, crime and AIDS, which strain their country and create resentment among the residing citizens.There is a fear in Auckland especially that immigrants are becoming a statistical equal (or perhaps majority) rendering them less powerful in their own country.
South African Indian migration, if it continues at this rate will have a profound affect on the entire population in years to come. The growing number South African Indian migrants and their children will shrink the numbers of native born South African Indians.
Mr. Ashwin Trikamjee asserted that many Indians have to be more
introspective. To most Indian people, Blacks are "bad and evil", and ignorantly think that there lives were better under the old government. He substantiated by asking if people can actually claim to have been more content with their lives and standard of living (during apartheid) while they were oppressed?
He claimed that crime rates have not necessarily increased - "crime has increased in relative terms". Crime is just redistributed more evenly among all race groups now. He purported that the old government did not publish accurate crime statistics and that crime was just as high then. While White, Coloured and Indian areas had the services of numerous police stations Black areas, which had a higher population of residents, had only one police station.
Therefore former Indian areas were more protected at the cost of the Black people. This is not the case any longer - and this (lack of abundant policing) is being used as a reason for migration (Personal interviews with key
informants).
According to Trikamjee there has been a drop in crime!! The media has misled and is continuing to feed people with incorrect, sensationalised reports.
He summed up by saying that South African Indian migrants are assessing South Africa from a very narrow perspective.
President Thabo Mbeki, believes that South Africa stands on the brink of a brighter future. He believed that 2002 ended on a positive note for South Africans and the economy has grown beyond expectations. He asserts in his speech that one of the biggest challenges will be to ensure higher rates of economic growth and development and greater confidence in South Africa.
He believes that in 2003 South African people will continue to build a non- racial, non-sexist, democratic country. In the next breadth he pleads thatwe, the people of South Africa, must make real advances "for the sake of the African woman and for the future of the African child"
(Hope and Confidence. Africa stands on the brink of a brighter future, writes President Thabo Mbekj).
South African Indians (based on the personal interviews and the survey) do not feel a shared sense of this nationhood and South African solidarity. In truth they know that the African \\Oman is the Black woman and the African child is not their child. The security of would be migrants are being searched for elsewhere, and the government ignores this. Nelson Mandela during his presidency referred to migrants (who are predominantly non Blacks) as
"cowards" and said that the country can do without them (Why I'm fleeing South Africa by Anne Paton [widow of Alan Paton]. London Sunday Times - Dispatches, Sunday, November 29 1998).
"Cowards" are leaving though. Crime is rampaging through the land; the government has many excellent schemes for improving the lot of the Black people, who have been disadvantaged for so long. A great deal of money is spent in that direction. Eight years after South Africa's transition to
democracy, government has made promises, increasing integrated mechanism government, determined to alleviate poverty, create jobs, and prioritise African development as a prerequisite for Africa's own progress.
The South African Indian asks, where is that progress?
Black empowerment pressures come to the fore, and socio-economic development within other sectors of the population is ignored. Crime is addressed constantly but never empirically decreases.
Helen Clarke (Prime Minister of New Zealand) says, "yes, the crime (in South Africa) is a problem, there's underdevelopment but there's a lot of hope"
(Conversation with Helen Clarke and Time Modise. SaFm. Tim Modise Show, September 62002, 9-10am). Does she mean that there is a lot of hope for her - for New Zealand, the new Diaspora? Each day professionals and other highly skilled people are leaving South Africa for New Zealand.
She suggests that one way in which New Zealand is thinking at the moment, which might be relevant to South Africa, is to keep the talents and expertise of the expatriates, through networking with them all over the world. New Zealand has about 50 000 South African birth rate there. She further stated that
migrants feel 'out of sight, out of mind'. She was trying to educate our government to refrain from merely calling them cowards, and to appreciate that migrants are a tremendous resource to their homelands. They have new networks in the host country, and the home country can tap into those
networks for investment, whether it is professional, enterprise or to upgrade skills at home. She encourages South Africa to turn the situation around, and appreciate the expatriate community because they could contribute to the development processes at home.