The Afrikaners’ Trek North

Apartheid era South African firms are aggressively foraying into African countries where they were previously banned. And they are finding raw markets, unexplored frontier markets like Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Botswana. Today you can see the almost ubiquitous presence of MTN. Engen, Stanbic, and Alexander Forbes in many African nations.

Is it fair that companies that sustained apartheid for so long should benefit the greatest from the dismantling of apartheid? I think the South African onslaught should be checked since the playing ground is becoming quite uneven.

South African companies relied on cheap apartheid black labor to accumulate capital and build sophisticated business systems. Such systems are now being used to conquer newer African markets. It is unfair to local businesses in those countries and in a way it kills local initiative.

De Beers

This South African diamond concern made billions of dollars from diamond mining in southern African countries and from African wars. In addition it exploited cheap African labor made available by an institutionalized racism. As in other countries where injustice was done, the companies that supported that regime should also stand trial for crimes committed against humanity like in Nazi जर्मनी.