DAVID SAKS
Among the many who have slammed the proposed measure are the SA Jewish Board of Deputies and the SA Zionist Federation, who in a joint statement charged Bapela with having “undermined the very core value of South Africa’s democracy by proposing a change to our law purely to prevent one sector of our society, in this case, South African Jews, from having a relationship with Israel”.
The statement further asserted that the singling out of any minority group for discriminatory treatment, served only to further inflame divisions in a country which on a daily basis had to battle against racism and xenophobia.
On September 30, the senior leadership of the SAJBD and SAZF met with Minister of Home Affairs Malusi Gigaba to obtain clarity on the issue. The delegation comprised SAJBD Chairman Mary Kluk, President Zev Krengel, Vice-Chairman Jeff Katz and National Director Wendy Kahn, SAZF Chairman Ben Swartz and President Avrom Krengel.
Gigaba, in line with previous statements made by himself and by the ANC, re-emphasised that “no review of dual citizenship was underway or anticipated in the foreseeable future by the Department of Home Affairs”.
He pointed out that in fact the contrary was true, with South Africa having encouraged other African states (such as Lesotho) to likewise adopt the dual citizenship principle.
Gigaba further assured the delegation that as a matter of policy, Government would never make laws that targeted a specific sector of society and concurred that such a policy would serve only to sow conflict and division.
Ultimately, he said, all South Africans belonged to one or another minority group. The challenge was therefore to foster a culture of inclusiveness whereby members of all groupings ultimately felt connected to one another by their shared sense of identification with South Africa and its values.
To illustrate his point, Gigaba referred to the poignant dilemma pinpointed during the xenophobic violence earlier this year by a citizen of Somali origin, who rhetorically asked whether he was required to join other South Africans in fighting Somalis or identify as a Somali and fight his fellow South Africans. No-one, he stressed, should ever feel that they were faced with this kind of choice.
Since making his remarks concerning dual citizenship, Bapela has been replaced as chairman of the ANC’s International Relations Subcommittee. The reasons for his replacement were not discussed in the meeting. However, Gigaba made it very clear that views expressed by an individual within government or the ruling party, even when such a person held a senior position, did not necessarily reflect those of government, nor the collective decisions of the ruling party itself.
So far as the question of citizenship went, this was in any case not an international relations issue, but one that was very much the responsibility of the Department of Home Affairs.
