One of the most cruel apartheid countries in the world is about to celebrate 250 years of independence from Britain (the grandfather of apartheid) on July 4, 2026. The irony is that despite all the civil rights struggles over the centuries and particularly in the recent decades, it seems they are hell bent on taking the country back to the “good old days” of overt racial segregation and inequality. It is clear from the consistent third of the population that supports the openly racist, pathetic current president Donald Trump, that at the country’s core is ugly racism and white supremacy.
Current attempts to rig the upcoming elections in America by gerrymandering boundaries and disenfranchising people of colour from active representation across the country must never be taken lightly. It’s a critical part of their playbook.
Over the recent decades, America has seen significant shifts in its approach to race, equality and racism. The incredible work and sacrifices of so many in the civil rights movement have shown this. So many lost their lives because of their open and public crusade for equity across the country. Significant changes were made in the legal framework in favour of people of colour. The problem is, although the legal framework shifted, the ingrained ugly racist culture never did. It persisted with a vengeance. To be fair, over the past 5 or 6 decades, America has had some non-racist leaders, however, they were always confronted with a strong deep-seated racist culture that they often found impenetrable in their quest to lift the country out of its apartheid trap.
One of the serious problems the non-white community face is that they tend to relax after some minimal progress in race relations in the society. The racist whites have no such issue. They have shown that they are prepared to go underground, sometimes for decades, and reorganise for future fights. Who can forget when the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) infiltrated the police and security forces nationwide in order to terrorise non-white people on the streets of America for decades? They found themselves in positions of leadership throughout the public and corporate systems with their number one objective being to quietly terrorise people of colour across the country. We should never underestimate the fact that the main reason for the rise in the MAGA movement, and the relevance of Trump to that movement, is that he is the first president in decades to give them permission to be as open and as ugly as they wish to be with their racist agenda. No need to cover their heads and faces anymore while committing their criminal acts in the public domain.
And America’s love affair with systems of apartheid even spreads beyond its borders. Who can forget that they, along with Israel and the United Kingdom, were the three last holdout countries in support of apartheid South Africa in the 1970’s? People of colour in America need to take a chapter from the book of these racists. The chapter dealing with resilience. They need to understand that the fight for serious civil rights is lifelong. It never ends. At best, it just moves to another level of intensity and resilience.
The never-ending struggle by the racist right to ban books is also central to their project of denying the knowledge of American history to the younger generation. Significant segments of the American population are ignorant of the civil rights struggles and successes, not to mention the real ugly history of America. This results in an often lack lustre and disinterested approach to politics and government and the critical need to be involved in the so-called democratic process. All this result in characteristically low turnout at the polls for elections across the country, among the young, who have little knowledge and respect for the bitter struggles of their fore parents for the simple right to vote.
The current efforts at gerrymandering voting blocks across America to favour white representation and disenfranchise communities of colour, is the latest episode in the country’s long racist playbook of making America white (again). What really makes all this so sad is that America is attractive precisely because of the incredible mix of cultures that have populated it over the centuries. It has been successful despite its underlying ugliness, precisely because it has been able to attract some of the best minds and talents from across the globe who decide to make America home. From the looks of things, this once untouchable bully appears to be tumbling under its own weight, and so much of the rest of the world is watching from afar with smiles on their faces.
