Africa’s modern story is often framed through one dominant lens: colonial domination and racial oppression. That history is real and consequential. From protracted liberation struggles to the dismantling of apartheid in Apartheid in 1994, it has shaped economies, identities and entrenched inequalities that persist today.
But history does not explain everything.
Across parts of the continent—most starkly in South Africa—xenophobic violence has surged. African migrants, particularly from Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Nigeria, have become targets of anger over economic hardship. Shops are looted, livelihoods destroyed, and in extreme cases, lives lost—not at the hands of foreign oppressors, but fellow Africans.
This raises a difficult question: if Africa’s defining narrative is oppression from outside, how do we account for Africans turning on each other?
The answer is uncomfortable. While the Transatlantic Slave Trade was driven and industrialised by European powers, it also relied on African intermediaries who captured and sold other Africans. Acknowledging this does not dilute the brutality or culpability of those who profited most—but it complicates the narrative. Exploitation is not always imposed from outside; it can be enabled from within.
Today’s xenophobia reflects a similar contradiction. Economic strain, unemployment and inequality in South Africa are real. But redirecting that frustration toward other Africans does not solve structural problems—it fractures solidarity and deepens vulnerability. It substitutes accountability with scapegoating.
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More troubling is the strategic consequence: division weakens Africa. A fragmented continent struggles to negotiate effectively, industrialise at scale or assert itself globally. Whether by design or default, internal conflict often advances external interests.
Still, dismissing xenophobia as mere ignorance misses the point. It is rooted in fear, competition over scarce resources and, at times, political rhetoric that legitimises exclusion. These are failures of governance as much as of social cohesion.
The way forward demands clarity and discipline. Africa must confront both its historical injustices and its present contradictions. Unity cannot remain rhetorical—it must be operational, especially under economic pressure. Governments must address the conditions that fuel resentment, enforce the rule of law without bias, and actively counter narratives that pit Africans against each other.
This is not only South Africa’s crisis; it is a continental test.
If Africa is to move forward, it must break the cycle of external blame while reproducing internal division. Liberation is not just about who ruled yesterday—it is about how we govern, and how we treat one another, today.