Show humanity to foreigners

One of the most disheartening news items to come out of this past week was the looting of foreign owned shops in Soweto.

One of the images that has remained in my mind is that of a man crying uncontrollably after his shop was ransacked by looters who literally stole his entire livelihood.

When I saw that I was reminded of one of the biggest misconceptions about foreigners in this country: that they have it easy when it comes to making a living here.

Some people even claim that foreigners use magic to make their businesses tick, hence it is common to hear some begging foreigners to give them these “magic concoctions” to make their own businesses function.

Contrary to this belief, many foreigners actually work like slaves just to put food on the table.

Many of you may agree with me that foreigners even create opportunities where there were none.

Many small businesses like grocery shops, salons, clothing shops and shoe mending stalls that are owned by foreign nationals represent stories of hunger, sweat and sacrifice behind their existence.

For example, in Molteno one Ethiopian national started his business through the tough path of selling blankets door to door.

What made it even tougher for him was the fact that he had to carry big loads of blankets from one house to another, only managing to sell one or two blankets each day.

It was really heart wrenching to see the sweat running from his face and the dust in his shoes as he walked up and down the rugged paths of the small town.

He was not deterred even when some of his debtors hid from him when he came to collect his money.

The remarkable part of this story is that he managed to save enough money to start a humble grocery shop, which he still runs and which serves the community.

It is unbearable to imagine such a person, one who has persevered under conditions of extreme hardship both in his home country and his new home, losing his newly found livelihood because of looters.

Just like this Ethiopian national, many of the foreigners whose shops were ransacked in Soweto were ordinary people who had worked very hard to put food on the table for their families and are without the social benefits that the state offers locals.

Although it is understandable that people were angered by the shooting of a child by a foreign national, the indiscriminate looting of foreign owned shops is unjustifiable.

Surely, if the attacks were based on anger against the one who shot the teenager, the looting should have been restricted to the one viewed as being guilty of the offence.

It is clear that most of these looters were not good citizens acting out of genuine anguish over the child’s death, rather they were opportunists who grabbed this chance to solve their grocery woes.

The result is untold suffering for many shop owners who have in some cases lost both their livelihood and their homes since some literally live in their shops.

Surely the government has to do much more to protect these vulnerable people. Ubuntu encourages kindness to others.

Fortunately we still have many South Africans who have kept the spirit of ubuntu burning by living peacefully with foreigners as their own brothers and sisters.