Leaders should be careful of playing with matches

WHEN someone prepares the kindling, chops the logs and sets the fire, it’s more than a little galling to hear them complain that the fire brigade is too slow to arrive when the inferno ensues.

That’s what we’ve had to endure this week in the tragic, though absolutely predictable, slaying of Elvis Nyathi in Diepsloot on Wednesday night. A mob was going through the informal settlement literally forcing people to prove they had papers allowing them to be in the country.

Those who didn’t have papers were robbed of their wallets and cellphones. Nyathi, a father of four from Zimbabwe, was beaten, doused in petrol and burnt alive.

The typical hand-wringing and platitudes spewed forth from those who should know better. It was abject hypocrisy. Post-apartheid South Africa has an appalling record of xenophobia that all too often spills over from lazy political utterances to mayhem, terror – and murder. Johannesburg is a hotspot because of our cultural melting pot and the toxic stew of fear, poverty and hatred that simmers in our townships.

The politicians are never held to account, from late Zulu king Goodwill Zwelithini to EFF leader Julius Malema and, latterly, Herman Mashaba and Nhlanhla Lux Dlamini. Our government is as culpable, because even if it has not openly backed xenophobia, it has tacitly supported it by tolerating it.

This week Police Minister Bheki Cele made his way to Diepsloot promising more police vans. It’s an empty platitude from a man on whose watch our country was almost upended by insurrection 10 months ago. The police should be arresting the vigilantes and charging politicians who utter inflammatory statements. Law enforcement agencies should be controlling access at our borders.

But that’s hard work. So, what will happen is that migrants will protect themselves – because obviously South African authorities simply couldn’t care. And when that happens, our president will have another reason to be shocked.