Greater Good Rather Than BEE
PLEASE grant me the opportunity to raise my views in your esteemed newspaper with regard to what Job Shipululo wrote in The Namibian of 10 August 2010.
Let me start by saying I believe that all people have their own opinions and are also entitled to them. Thus, please do not see this as an attack. It is merely my view.
BEE, TESEF. Whatever you choose to call it, it will be created for the purpose of enriching our country. I totally see how strongly you feel towards the name, however it is not the name that will bear the strength. It is the good that will come of it. We must also remember that although we see the blacks as the previously disadvantaged group, this statement in itself is discriminatory. On an individual level many whites and coloureds have also suffered.
For a white person growing up in a house where parents have strong beliefs like those mentioned in your quote - can we truly blame them for perhaps feeling the same? I do not believe so, for all that we know and act upon derives from what we have been taught. As the years have passed, people have become enlightened and educated.
I think that ultimately we are the ones holding on to the age-old beliefs of racism and apartheid. Calling it a certain name, that is excluding a certain race from the other, is merely a new form of apartheid.
Are we looking at this the way we should? I believe not. Rather than focusing on race, we should be focusing on individuality. The riches and empowerment that each human, each Namibian, can bring forth in this country. We are causing further pain and separation by what we are doing. The nation and politicians should receive a message of becoming one. In South Africa they call it ‘Ubuntu’.
Our elders and ancestors have fought the good fight. We have come into an independent country. What are we still fighting against? What more do we want? When will the need for more ever stop? The need for recognition, for power, for status?
The greatest leaders of our time have not been fighting AGAINST apartheid, they have been fighting TOWARD togetherness. Our perception has to change. They have fought for a purpose greater than themselves. It is the power of the great I AM.
The higher power that some refer to as God, and others Buddha. In either case, we cease to see the purpose behind what they did. It was not to create more struggle, more war or more fighting.
We have to look beyond ourselves and our egoistic minds, and begin to search for the greater purpose.
May we become unified.
Norah Schimming
Via e-mail