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John Stegmann interprets some pregnant lines delivered by former US President Barack Obama in his valedictory speeches; sound-bites that seem to reveal Obama as anxious about the prospect of his nationalist-leaning successor getting a bit extreme on the electorate.
It’s an eminently reasonable reading and a cautionary tale about how South Africa could be going, (has gone?), the same way. Looking back on the domestic front, first we had Afrikaner nationalism, now African nationalism, where our leaders tick all the boxes typifying superiority, chauvinism, jingoism, xenophobia and racism. You could add homophobia and a few other paranoias.
PW, Jacob, Donald – they all fit the bill. Witness the ubiquitous misinformation and distortion campaigns that marked Trump’s campaign (his gross over-estimation of the crowds at his swearing-in ceremony described by one of his spin-doctors as “alternative facts” which turned into a global meme).
