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Two young men who tried to use a swimming pool at a hotel on Christmas Day said they were told it was “white only. “The violent encounter prompted a rate of attempted homicide and a call from the president to combat racism.
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By John Eligon
CAPE TOWN — A violent attack by an organization of white men on two black teenagers at a hotel pool in South Africa on Christmas Day has sparked widespread outrage, reviving photographs from apartheid days and serving as a scathing reminder of the country’s unresolved race. Tensions
Footage of the phone attack, which the teens said began when they were told the pool was “white only,” spread widely on social media. They showed scenes that may have taken place decades ago, when apartheid-era legislation barred access to South Africa. Black majority of public services for whites.
One video clip shows one guy slapping a black teenager with his open hand in the face, another gray-haired white guy holding a cigarette indifferently while pulling the hair of other young black men, and one of the men wrapping the older young men in one head. Blocking and pulling him into the pool, seeking to submerge the teenager’s head underwater.
Brian Nakedi, an underground veteran who opposes apartheid, said his 18-year-old son, Kgokong Nakedi, one of the teenagers assaulted at the swimming pool in Bloemfontein, a city about 4 hours south of Johannesburg. Both denied online claims that the youths provoked the fight.
Nakedi, who witnessed his son’s attack, said: “I’m furious. We want to relive the pain through our children. “
On Wednesday, police said they had arrested and charged 3 white men: Johan Nel, 33, and Jan Stephanus van der Westhuizen, 47, who gave the impression in court of assault charges; and a third suspect, 48, whose call has not been released and is due to appear in court Thursday on attempted murder charges. None of the suspects or their attorneys can immediately be reached for comment.
Since the fall of apartheid some 30 years ago, South Africans have proudly declared their country a “rainbow nation. “But the meeting, at the Maselspoort Resort and Conference Center, adds to a litany of racist episodes that have sparked introspection and hand. writhing among South Africans.
After a doorman was accused of denying access to an unescorted black visitor last month, protesters descended on a bar in Cape Town. .
Bloemfontein is the capital of the Free State, a province characterized by racial violence. Once an independent Boer republic for Afrikaans-speaking white settlers who ruled South Africa’s apartheid regime, it remains a largely agrarian region. intersection of South Africa’s fiercely racialized debate over land.
White farmers of the ruling class fear being killed or expelled from their land. Black staff lamented the harsh operating situations and broken promises of land ownership that were intended to materialize in a democratic South Africa.
After a video of the violence at the swimming pool was released, President Cyril Ramaphosa called on black and white South Africans to condemn racism.
“Within the framework of the rule of law, we will have to let the investigations take their course,” he said, “but within the framework of the rule of law, we can and will also have to claim that racism has no place in our society and that racists have no position to hide.
Nakedi, 58, said family circle members set aside a three-night space at the hotel for their first gathering since the coronavirus pandemic began. The site is divided into two parts, he said: houses and cabins on one side, where his circle of relatives stayed, and a wooded encampment on the other side that is occupied mostly by white visitors.
The control of the complex did not respond to a comment in a phone message.
Kgokong Nakedi said that in the early afternoon of Christmas Day, he and his cousin, Sipho Khumalo, 13, went swimming in the pool next to the camp. Almost as soon as they arrived, he said, white visitors began asking them. what they were doing there and saying they weren’t allowed. Kgokong said he still entered the pool, but as tensions mounted, he and his cousin left to tell their father.
Mr. Nakedi said he went to confront the men who arrested his son and nephew. It turned out, he said, that they thought the teens were not hotel visitors and therefore not allowed to use the pool. Mr Nakedi said they were indeed visitors and that the stage seemed to be clearing. Nakedi said he explained to the young men that everything was fine and they could return to the pool.
But when they returned, Kgokong said, one of the men closed the door and prevented them from entering. An argument ensued, with Kgokong and the guy slapping each other, according to pool protection footage provided by the Nakidi family, who said the resort control overlooked it.
Kgokong and Sipho jumped the fence. When Kgokong jumped into the pool, almost all the white occupants of the pool, a dozen adults and children, came out, video footage showed. Two white children remained in the water.
Security footage then showed that some of the white visitors and Kgokong started yelling at others. Kgokong swam to the edge of the pool. A white man leaned over and slapped him, and chaos ensued, with the teenagers fighting back.
Kgokong later said that the guy who tried to keep him underwater kept saying, “You’re fighting for water; Now you are going to die. “
Kgokong, who was born after 1994, when apartheid ended in South Africa, said members of his generation, known as “free-born,” “absolutely did not tolerate such racist acts. “However, he said, his parents raised him to be cared for, knowing that as members of an emerging middle-class black family, they would venture into spaces that were once the maintenance of white South Africans who wouldn’t necessarily welcome them with an open mind.
“It made me know and have fun,” Kgokong said of his father.
He said the swimming pool episode had destroyed his religion in South Africa’s non-racial democratic experience. “There are a lot of flaws,” he said. We are a young nation, but wonderful things take time. We’re running towards something big. “
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