The endless pursuit of separate turf

BRITAIN’S referendum on whether or not to remain in the EU has brought the issue of isolationism to the fore. Throughout history, people have always yearned for their own enclaves where they can govern themselves and preserve their culture, traditions, religion and language. They all failed. Some built walls: the walls of Jericho in the Bible, the Great Wall of China, the Berlin Wall, the wall separating Israelis from the Palestinians, and Donald Trump’s Great Wall of Mexico.

Then there were people who could not stand being among their neighbours, opting to move away. The great king of the Basutho, Moshesh, went as far as building his sanctuary on top of a mountain.

In the 1960s, there were bloody secession attempts like Katanga in the Congo, Biafra in Nigeria and the Caprivi in Namibia.

The Afrikaners’ Great Trek, the Dorstland Trek and a small group trekking to Argentina, were all flights from “oppression” to new, elusive freedoms. The Orania group has been busy carving out their own little island. America’s Amish groups have also shut themselves off. What if our own “Boko Haram” Boeremag splinter group succeeded with their evil plans? At the beginning of World War II, powerful America in cowardly fashion stayed out of the conflict, claiming it was “Europe’s war” until the attack on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese. What if Hitler had succeeded with his evil plans for world domination?

The land of the brave, which always boasted that none of their many enemies would ever again succeed in crossing the Atlantic to harm them, was rudely awakened by 9/11 in 2001.

Closer to home, the dangerous move to create a Western Province enclave for specific groups already failed under the Nats. Remember the Transkei, Bophuthatswana, Venda and Ciskei states, the so-called tribal “homelands”. The Zulus also tried to grab Natal and Zululand in a “federal” system.

The attempts by rebel and terrorist groups, even our own gangs, to carve out turf for themselves are examples of the relentless fight for territory by those who do not want to be part of the bigger whole.

And the security complexes going up like mushrooms, some even gated? Aren’t religions and “Mickey Mouse” political parties, fighting for bigger flocks, also building on sand?

Last, what of the would-be Martians who will be leaving this planet in the next decade to start colonising that planet in a giant leap to heaven? KOERT MEYER Welgelegen