S. Africans Try to Unite Two Worlds

When Nicky Liddle announced that she was going to stay with a black family in one of this city’s toughest townships, friends and family thought she was crazy.

But the 21-year-old white woman from the suburbs would not be deterred.

Her hosts, the Tukwayos, lived in Khayelitsha township in a clapboard and corrugated steel house with no running water. She shared a bed with the Tukwayos’ 26-year-old daughter. The family showed her around the neighborhood, included her in community gatherings and gave her a crash course in their Xhosa language. She reciprocated with guitar lessons and explanations of white culture.

By the end of the week, Liddle felt at home.

“I went in with a very different impression about [black] people,” said Liddle, a student at Cape Town University. “I came out thinking that we’re really not that different.”

Liddle’s experience during the summer was part of Masazane, Xhosa for “let’s get to know each other.” The program is part of a growing trend here toward small and very personal efforts launched by average South Africans to bridge the racial divide and come to terms with their nation’s torturous apartheid history.

Though such efforts may touch only a few South Africans, sociologists say they go a long way toward forging better understanding among the races.

“Black people and white people today are learning to live with one another,” said Charles Villa-Vicencio, executive director of the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation, a Cape Town think tank. “We are in the process of learning the process of coexistence.

“Ten years ago we were killing each other,” he added. “Today, we are just screaming at each other, and to me that is an improvement.”

Mari Harris, a director at Markinor, a Johannesburg marketing and opinion research company, said such initiatives are important because improving race relations ultimately falls on the shoulders of average citizens.

“Unless normal South Africans take responsibility for getting to know each other and for getting different race groups together, then it’s not going to happen,” Harris said. “It’s really important that normal people get involved.”

That’s what led Andrew Faull, 21, a white, third-year film and media student from an affluent background, to seek residence in Mandalay township for almost a month last year. So powerful was the experience that the Cape Town student decided to launch Masazane.

“I just have a deep frustration with South African society, but at the same time there is the desire not to run away but to change it, to try and bring people together,” Faull said. “I think there is a desire on the part of many South Africans to get to know other communities, but we don’t know how.”

Faull finds host families in townships and matches them with prospective guests. So far, the response has not been overwhelming: About 20 people have expressed interest in either accommodating visitors or participating in a home stay.

Liddle signed up because she felt it was important for young South Africans to break down racial barriers behind which many of their parents are still trapped.

“We are living in two different worlds that basically don’t meet each other,” Liddle said. “The blacks come to work in our houses, but we really don’t know anything about the way they live. [Masazane] is an opportunity for the two worlds to interact. If the program takes off, it could be so good for just overcoming misconceptions.”

Siyabonga Tukwayo, 22, a member of Liddle’s host family, agreed.

“Nicky was like a sister to us. But it was not just about her,” Tukwayo said. “We learned some things too. Sometimes you get wrong perceptions about whites. We felt that sometimes whites are not sincere. People [in townships] tend to think that all whites are racist.”

Most Blacks Mistrust Whites, Poll Finds

A June survey conducted by IJR, the think tank, found that the majority of black respondents mistrusted whites, felt uncomfortable around them and could never imagine being friends with a white person. Among black respondents, 68% found it difficult to understand the customs and ways of white South Africans.

The same survey found that only 19% of white respondents said they would find it hard to imagine being friends with a fellow black citizen.

“It’s so scarce to see a white person walking around” the townships, said Tukwayo. “The more you see whites around, people will accept them.”

“If the racial contact is not there, then the possibility of overcoming racism, intolerance and suspicion is not good,” said Villa-Vicencio, the IJR director.

The need to make contact was the impetus behind the Home for All Campaign launched last year with the aim of bringing together whites and blacks around the dinner table. Research by IJR showed that few people of different races had ever eaten together.

In August, about 20 whites visited homes in Khayelitsha. They toured community landmarks and joined residents for a lunch of rice, vegetables, sweet corn fritters, chicken curry and beef stew.

“It felt very good because I was in the struggle to fight to destroy the apartheid laws, and now we come together as human beings, not as a color,” said Monwabisi Maqoqi, 34, a former anti-apartheid activist who hosted the flagship lunch in his yard in a squatters’ camp.

Maqoqi, who spent five years in jail on terrorism charges and a year in exile in Botswana, said the reconciliation process will work only if both sides are committed. “If it comes from the heart, it will be successful,” he said.

Time, Skills, Funds Needed in Townships

Whites nationwide are being asked to volunteer time and skills to promote development in black townships. They also are being urged to contribute money to a fund for reconciliation and development projects.

“The way in which resources are split means that it is very hard to build non-racially, because racism is about distribution and access to resources,” said George Ratcliffe, 37, an executive member of Home for All who is hosting two black teenagers and helping to sponsor their education. “Unless you address this, you will always have racism.”

Kenny Tokwe, 41, hopes that whites who participate in his guided tours through Imizamu Yethu township, commonly known as Mandela Park, also might feel the urge to contribute to the community.

Although the initial goal of Tokwe’s Mfunalwazi, or Seeking Knowledge, program was to attract buyers for traditional arts and crafts made by community members, it soon blossomed into an effort to bring blacks and whites together.

The walking tours of Mandela Park, which is nestled within the borders of the picturesque coastal town of Hout Bay, about 12 miles from Cape Town, include visits to a nursery school, a bar and the neighborhood sangoma, or traditional healer.

Ample time is set aside for the visitors to interact with township residents. The guests are also invited to sample a traditional African lunch.

Mandela Park resident Siphiwe Cele, 42, who invites the white visitors into his home, said he was buoyed by their level of interest in black culture.

“There is a great change from the white side,” he said. “There are those who are keen to come and learn from us. It is better than in the past. It was rare to see white people in our community before.”

However, Tokwe acknowledged that getting white South Africans to participate in the township tours is still a challenge. Although about 100 guests have participated in the two-hour excursions since they began a year ago, most have been foreigners.

“South Africans still have the impression that it is dangerous to go into a township,” said Rykie Barnard, manager of the information office in Hout Bay for the regional tourism department.

Those who venture forth typically are already open-minded and not the people who would benefit most from such an experience, critics say. Detractors also argue that although many whites would not object to participating in a township tour or having dinner with a black, the true test is whether those same whites would be willing to have a black dine in their home or stay the night.

“Racial prejudice still exists,” said Ratcliffe. “You don’t have to scratch very deep to expose it. . . . The challenge is to accept our racism, confront it, come to terms with it and not deny it.”

Research shows that many South Africans are doing exactly that.

A survey conducted by Markinor in May found that 40% of respondents older than 18 believed that relations between the races are improving, while 20% thought they were getting worse. The same poll showed that 42% were “fairly confident” about prospects of a happy future for all South Africans, compared with 7% who were “not at all confident.”

“It is a pretty positive result,” said Harris, the Markinor director.