[lg policy] Wa ntlwaela! Lesufi tells Hofmeyr in twar over Afrikaans ‘genocide’

[Harold Schiffman]

Wa ntlwaela! Lesufi tells Hofmeyr in twar over Afrikaans ‘genocide’
Citizen reporter
[image: Panyaza Lesufi Photo: Tshegofatso Ngobeni]

Panyaza Lesufi Photo: Tshegofatso Ngobeni
The MEC says those who don’t support his language policy are the same ones
who run to New Zealand where there are no Afrikaans schools.

Gauteng education MEC Panyaza Lesufi and Afrikaans musician Steve Hofmeyr
were on Saturday morning involved in a Twitter argument over what the
latter referred to as a “genocide” of his mother tongue.

Hofmeyr said: “The greatest modern killer of Afrikaans, second only to
consenting Afrikaners, is Panyaza Lesufi. I’ll fix that at the 2030 TRC”, a
tweet which did not sit well with the MEC.

The greatest modern killer of Afrikaans, second only to consenting
Afrikaners, is Panyaza @Lesufi
<https://twitter.com/Lesufi?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>. I'll fix that at the 2030
TRC.

— Steve Hofmeyr (@steve_hofmeyr) November 29, 2018
<https://twitter.com/steve_hofmeyr/status/1068221173681610752?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>

“Mara Steve Hofmeyr *wa ntlwaela*!” said the MEC, who added that all he was
doing was to call for all languages to be treated equally and for all
children, regardless of race or language, to study under one roof.

“Is that killing Afrikaans? Non-racialism is the future whether you like it
or not, it will happen. South Africa belongs to all of us,” he said.

Hofmeyr, however, said if Lesufi really wanted to improve the education
system, he would build more schools instead of “killing off” good schools.

“You are calling for Marxism and genocide. Your government treats heritage
and monuments the same.”

Eintlik wena wa phapha! Wa speeta! https://t.co/escLx7ejIk

— Panyaza Lesufi (@Lesufi) December 1, 2018
<https://twitter.com/Lesufi/status/1068771511551561728?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>

Twitter user @johanbmi, who was in agreement with Hofmeyr, asked Lesufi why
there were no Afrikaans speaking teachers for all subjects in Soweto
schools if he was really fighting for all languages to be treated equally.

“Why are there not Afrikaans speaking teachers in all English medium
schools? Or is it only Afrikaans medium schools that must be forced open?”
he asked.

But Lesufi said he could not answer the Twitter user’s question, sending
him to his “apartheid monsters who created a divided society and only
prioritised one language” for answers.

Lesufi said his fight was about breaking the “apartheid mentality” which
only sought to promote separate development.

“We don’t have Afrikaans nor English schools in SA, we have South African
schools. Why do you run to New Zealand where there’s no Afrikaans when you
leave South Africa?”

You should then know better. After some Afrikaans speaking people
oppressed, killed and exploited us and even stolen our properties why
should we tolerate them? We do so for peace and reconciliation but you
continue to insult us and refuse to live together. So ironic


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 Harold F. Schiffman

Professor Emeritus of
 Dravidian Linguistics and Culture
Dept. of South Asia Studies
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6305

Phone:  (215) 898-7475
Fax:  (215) 573-2138

Email:  haroldfs at gmail.com
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/

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