Catholic Cardinal warns of dangers facing SA

Additionally, massive salaries earned by some, together with inherent corruption, could lead to the country’s downfall, he warned.

Speaking after the official opening of the Denis Hurley Centre in Durban, the cardinal said: “For how long are you going to have affirmative action or black economic empowerment in place? Because not everybody is being treated the same way, just as apartheid didn’t. So we have been carrying on the traditions of implementing policies that reflect the injustice of apartheid. Maybe in a reversed form this time. And that I don’t think is doing our country any good.”

He said that children were growing and going to school not seeing colour as a problem until they left school and were confronted with trying to obtain a job in government or trying to gain access to a tertiary institution.

Napier said that he believed race relations were the best that they had been, but that current policies threatened these good relations.

“My own testimony now is that race relations are unbelievably better than one could have ever expected. When I think of 30 years ago, kids actually [are now] not even knowing there are differences of colour and they are friends with each other. That’s what worries me then, is when we get these kinds of policies that are making distinctions where the kids themselves are not even seeing these distinctions.”

He said South Africa had an enormous opportunity to place the racial discord of the past permanently in the past and failure to address current policies could negatively impact future race relations in the country.

He said there was no issue with trying to address the past injustices, but that colour needed to slowly be eliminated.

“I think all South Africans need to have a real good scrutiny of how we are going to make it forward together. If there is going to be classification according to your race, when is it going to stop? It’s not on the statue books any more. How are we being determined that that this one is coloured, that one is African and that one is Indian if there is no legislation saying that? How does affirmative action actually work?”

He said that apart from racial policies, there were a number of other critical socio-economic issues facing the country.

Napier also took a swipe at both government and the private sector over the exorbitant salaries that were being awarded to some people.

Much soul-searching was needed by the private and government sectors, he said.

“Can we continue with people having positions where they get more in a year than a whole community might get in terms of salaries? At the same time, what is government doing when they also have exorbitant salaries that they are being paid?”

He warned that unless the there was a more equitable state of affairs and less corruption, the country could be facing a serious situation in the near future. He said he believed that the #feesmustfall campaign highlighted the ongoing corruption.

“Unless it is dealt with in a way that shows that government, government ministers, people in industry and commerce are prepared to slice the cake up so that more people benefit, I think the fees must fall is going to be the government must fall. I am afraid that’s what’s going to happen. We have got to do something quickly.”

He warned that this dissatisfaction over the current situation could be negatively exploited.

“I fear to think what would happen if this large bulk of young people have no jobs, and worse than that, they have no hope of a job … if they get the wrong leader taking them down the wrong path, we could be in for a very difficult time.”