BRING BACK THE BLACK “LOST SHEEP” BACK TO ITS BLACK SHEPHERDS

I think it is about time we asked white people to bring back to us, black people. I’m talking about the black people White society, globally, has used and no longer has use of. Active observation has shown that there’s plenty of such. They’ve gone beyond expiry date. The Black folks could, I bet, find a way for “expired Blacks” to be rehabilitated, and be put back to effective use. Their service can still be of good use to the black cause, if still redeemable.

The never-say-die Black Consciousness (BC) leader, Dr Saths Cooper, does not see difficulty in them “gladly returning non-whites, but keeping close any black that may show a modicum of substance”.

Dr Cooper takes the point further: “Look at a few Clevers who hold forth on neo-liberal claptrap that entrenches white power, who often fall-out with their erstwhile mentors. Have we not seen some BC figures end up in near-penury when dumped?” 

One risks adding salt to self-inflicted injury to the rhetorical question. What good is it not to when the white horse of black abuse has long bolted and its mad hooves are still galloping? As we speak, some are still blind to see their waterloo coming. But the most hopeless are those that remember their wounded blackness only upon being dumped. 

Our post-1994 South Africa is replete with cases that white people have politically been “killing” – literally and figuratively – one by one. 

Look around and see living and politically dead bodies of black leaders that have been dealt with either of their self-inflicted corrupt-making ways or tutored bad students of corruption to do worse, against exemplarity of what the Struggle for liberating power was about.

That the black corruptees are willing victims it may be hard to deny, while white corrupters sanctimoniously point accusing fingers with glee.

The unsaid catechism that goes with this corrupter-corruptee tango is most bizarre but irresistible not to point out. Its peacockish spectacle is too dazzling for non-comprehending and unconscious black bystanders to grasp: Black corruption is white men and women’s business, but white corruption is none of black men and women’s business to poke their noses to raise a stink about. Captured corporate mainstream media seem to abide by that catechism, too.

The same applies to international law by the high priests and priestesses of a rules-based order at home and abroad: “Do as we say, and not as we do,” is their mantra. 

In a May 20, 2024, CNN interview with Christiane Amanpour, International Criminal Court (ICC) Prosecutor Karim Khan was pointedly reminded of this to his face: “The International Criminal Court is for Africa and thugs like Putin.”

Looking for justice from tables where common law is not on the menu to be served evenly is made difficult to obtain.

See what has become of black people in their respective stations of life in a democratic South Africa. Most do not live more than once. And whites, no matter how sordid their sins, always live more than once, politically and figuratively speaking. Economic status influences political strength, and impact. Social Sciences teaches us that this is the framework upon which life-chances are determined. 

Without fail, white people always bounce back with the necessary support that could be mustered for them including shielding, concealment, protective propaganda, double-speak and double-standards, as well as calculated propping up.

And then black folks, conversely, have to endure unending spells that include being demonised and condemned, and once considered irredeemable by their own indefensible ways, they are then returned to their rightly outraged and wounded black society for crucifixion and burial. And the burials are serialised as to believe that corruption is uniquely a black thing and never a white thing. The script is inherently brutal and unkind to the black folks.

This is especially true for blacks battling to do right by black people: Use and abuse them; befriend and betray; promise and regret; value by criterion of dependency of thought and action, and immediately crucify for insisting on independence of thought and action in the direction of their true liberation.

The walking wounded, our people – bruised by the usability of supremacist driven whiteness, must come back home and take stock with their kind. For, their kind – that they had deserted in exchange of vain lifestyles – may still have residual patience, to muster prodigal homecoming. The cause for the re-humanisation of black people is much higher than the lifestyles that selected detractors of the black cause are invited for inclusion poster boys and girls equality. Equality for their constant abuse for the legitimation of an unchanging system. 

The neglect of black people to be human again should be ended by the reinauguration of a new society envisioned and promised by liberation.