Peachy,
I used to live in South Africa, all 36 years and if you haven't lived in that country, experienced what in fact is being withheld from the media, you are in no position to comment on who is ignorant, you have already stated in which country you have been residing in, on the African continent and just like most of the other countries north of South Africa, the arrival of 2010 will indeed prove my point in the demise of a once beautiful country..the seething hell hole which I speak of, will happen in South Africa over a mere few weeks, when the world cup opens in Port Elizabeth, every nation north of South African borders will be handed a little card, for them to cross borders as they feel, do you actually think the hoardes of people will return to their respective countries?...DREAM ON! (Other than that, everything is just Peachy)

SPANKY
How do you reconcile that this disease ridden hell hole you speak of has been shaped by European colonization? Most of these praetorian states you speak of are a construct of conquest and greed. No matter how bitter you may feel now about the situation in South Africa the important thing is that these people are doing it for themselves, remember it was only a decade ago that the minority white population held 87% of the land (maybe "one a beautiful country" to the whites), the same people whom brought the native population to their feet through disease (summed up by Jarred Diamond’s, Germs Guns & Steel) and segregated the blacks based on the perception of their lesser being. I think it’s prudent to assume that this disease ridden hell hole your referring to occurred a long time ago from which these people are still feeling the ramifications.

Peachy,
This is what one will hear from the older black folk, the ones that lived under the so-called suppression "I wish it was the way it used to be, at least we all had jobs and food on the table"

The way things are over there at present, has nothing to do with racism, it's the government out-doing their own people out of money and relief, sent from overseas.

Due to this, whites are left in the backgound, dwindling half-way between "should I stay or should I go" and living in fear of going outside their garden boundary wall, during the day, never mind at night!

I've said this before and here it is again, goodbye South Africa, hello Zimbabwe no.2
Hello again to more violence, to be blamed on racism and goverment getting fat, just like Mugabe. Zimbabwe were also warned by the world powers that be, by people who used to live in Zimbabwe, now all gone.

Sureptitious, continual milarky amongst government officials, they all work together, Mbeke is with Mugabe all the way and getting richer each day on his own people, but no-one listens. These buggers will take over the world one day and that is when we have "the end of the world as we know it

Spanky, what you wrote is so true.

Anyone who denies this should read 'Government by Deception' by Jan Lamprecht or visit

http://www.africancrisis.org/default2.asp.

Clark Kent wrote: "We can thank European support for the terrorists Mugabe and Mandella for the mess in Southern Africa. All those unwashed lefties that chanted Free Mandella should be made to go live with him. See how they would like that. They would soon whinge for a return to the old systems."

I agree with what other's have said about how throwing money at the problem will not work because of the corruption and the general state of chaos in African society, but I don't think a return to the old systems (apartheid) is desirable at all. My Grandfather has lived in Kenya for the past 50 or so years, and I have been back there to visit him on numerous occasions. A return to the old system is a return, in my opinion, to more corruption, greed and oppression, the only difference being that in earlier systems this was being done by the colonial government and white minorities. The indigenous populations have learnt only from this example that the whites have set them, and now those who used to benefit from colonial or arpartheid government are saying that these countries were better off under their rule? What a joke.

While a return to apartheid is undesirable, neither is a starving population. The black Zimbabweans are now saying that they were much better off under Ian Smith than Mugabe. South Africa is adopting similar policies to those that destroyed Rhodesia/Zimbabwe's once strong economy and food production. It's only a matter of time until black South Africans are calling out for a return of the old rule.
The future Marxist Southern African bloc will not be able to feed its people.