Scarecrows are having a field day

If the peddlers of scare rumours are to be believed, South Africa must hope and pray for a fairy tale to become true, one in which the 2010 Fifa Soccer World Cup becomes frozen in time and never ends. If all the stories and rumours are to believed, before the plane taking the last of the participating international teams and supporters has disappeared over the edge of the horizon, the country will go over an edge of its own – becoming a bloodbath, and carrying an unbearable debt burden. Separating legitimate concern from malicious fiction is becoming increasingly difficult.

To add insult to injury, an ill-timed move by the government to ban Zimbabwean-born rugby prop forward Tendai "Beast" Mtawarira from being selected for the Springbok team – after he has already legally played in 22 Tests for his adopted country – has given rise to a brand new rumour about officially sponsored xenophobic attacks on foreigners after the World Cup. This is merely a part of a wider campaign by “South African authorities,” according to the rumours.

A mainly e-mail-driven scare campaign from right-wing circles has been around for sometime. According to these e-mails, large-scale attacks on whites are to follow in the wake of the World Cup.

In the latest version, thezimbabwemail.com on 5 June reported that “South African authorities have secretly kickstarted (sic) xenophobic attacks on foreigners and they are on course to launch Zimbabwean-style violent farm invasions after the Fifa 2010 World Cup”, and insinuated that the banning of Mtawarira is part of that campaign.

The report goes on to state that “a secret committee made up of ANC and government security agents is co-ordinating the country’s post-Fifa World Cup cleansing activities and it is already in full swing, identifying targets and preparing use of hit squads, sources said.”

If one analyses the scare mails and half truths used to build full-blown lies, as right-winger Dr Dan Roodt does, it is clear that the zimbabwemail.com and Roodt’s misinformation generically comes from the same DNA.

Roodt, for example, recently e-published and distributed via e-mail a story that Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and communist China had built a secret airstrip in the Marange district near the Chiadzwa diamond fields in Eastern Zimbabwe, with the intent of launching attacks into South Africa from there to wipe out the white farming community specifically and murder white South Africans in general.

However, Western diplomats and intelligence analysts are aware of the airstrip long enough to accommodate large aircraft and believe it is intended for arms shipments from China to Zimbabwe. Its location near the diamond mines is probably so that Mugabe’s military henchmen can pay the Chinese on the spot with diamonds.

At the same time, however, respected commentators such as Jacob Dlamini, author of Native Nostalgia, has been reporting for sometime about rumours surrounding possible xenophobic attacks in the wake of the World Cup. In a recent column in Business Day, he wrote: “July 12 will be the first day after the end of the World Cup. The day will mark what some see as the resumption of normalcy. By normalcy they mean a life in which government services are iffy, corruption is rampant, xenophobia reigns supreme and competitions for trade (in the townships) is as keen as ever. July 12 will mark the restart of life as many South Africans have come to know it over the past 16 years.”

He goes on to state that we “must hope that security agencies are investigating the rumours for the right reasons. They must investigate because the rumours hint strongly at the commission of a crime. They must investigate to spare lives and property. They must not investigate simply to save President Jacob Zuma’s administration embarrassment. South Africa’s security agencies must be concerned about the rumours because they threaten the stability of the country”.

Professor Michael Neocosmos of the University of the Western Cape’s Centre for Humanities Research recently wrote about reports about the activities of the Red Ants vigilante group in Gauteng: “The language of the cleansing of cockroaches is identical to that used in Rwanda in 1994 and elsewhere.

"While the actions of the rumour peddlers are irresponsibly reckless and in itself can help create an atmosphere conducive to instability, it would also be unwise to put head in the sand and ignore the challenges of competing claims to restricted resources and inadequate infrastructure and services."