Afrikaners Have a New Sense of Self-Confidence in 2025 – No Longer Lukewarm, No Longer Victims, No Longer International Pawns

The endless conversations about Afrikaners in recent weeks and months and even years have contributed meaningfully to the rediscovery of an Afrikaner identity. That identify is confident and wants to help build a prosperous South Africa for all its people.

Afrikaners do not like to be dictated to, not by commentators whose opinions are influenced by the prevailing ideology or political correctness, not by the unpredictability of foreign leaders who view us as pawns in a power game, and certainly not by a government that attempts to cast our justified criticism as a longing for the past.

The end of the lukewarm period

In the course of thirty years of democracy, Afrikaners have increasingly found a new identity – one that we embrace unashamedly and cherish with pride. It is no longer the identity of the guilty one, the one who apologises for existing. Nor is it the identity of the victim or the one pleading for alms.

It is the identity of people who know: South Africa is our home, this is where we’ll stay, this is where we’ll build – together with all who want to build with us. For almost three decades, most Afrikaners kept quiet. Not because we didn't care, but because we believed silence was the price for reconciliation. We acknowledged the way we were favoured in the past, we renounced apartheid, through which Afrikaners disregarded the human dignity of others.

We may have naively thought: if we just stand back, the new South Africa will include us too. We held ourselves accountable for a past in which the current and even the previous generation had no active part. That time is over.

The children who are 30 years of age and younger today were born after 1994. They never enjoyed any benefits from apartheid. They can no longer be held responsible for the past – and they refuse to accept it any longer.

Many Afrikaans influencers expected Afrikaners to take the route of loyalty to the new order and reconciliation at all costs, rather than rocking the boat. Systemic corruption, state capture, the Eskom crisis, farm murders, collapsed infrastructure, and poor service delivery over the last thirty years dictated otherwise, however. We can no longer remain silent.

We have had to stand by and watch as the names of towns were changed, Afrikaans universities were destroyed, and Afrikaans education was targeted. Our children — white, coloured, and Indian — are excluded from the economy and marginalised based on race.

Mark Twain said: "Loyalty to country, always. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it." This government blazed ahead with the implementation of transformation as an ideology, and today each and every South African is paying the price.

We won't allow ourselves to be defined by others

We will no longer allow our identity to be determined by the ANC's ideologies or the EFF's rhetoric. Neither will we allow our identity to be determined by American President Donald Trump, the hosting of the G20, or any other foreign voices that think they understand us better than we understand ourselves. Trump's "loudspeaker approach" defined Afrikaners as victims, and that we are not. We must reject the narrative of genocide and large-scale land expropriation.

We are not a tribe on the brink of extinction, waiting for a lifeboat in the form of refugee status in the United States. We are not pawns in a geopolitical chess game between Washington and Pretoria. We are here because South Africa belongs to us too – and we are not about to leave it.

All South Africans experience the worst of the country and its government

If Afrikaners reject the victim mentality by saying there is no “white genocide” and there is no large-scale expropriation of land, that does not mean we deny that South Africa has problems.

Trump has indeed shed light on real problems – farm murders, discriminatory legislation, the expropriation of land – but he does so in a way that highlights and elevates one population group as victims. We cannot accept this version of what is happening in our country.

We must deal responsibly with the facts and approach them with realism. The statistics are clear: black, white, Indian, and coloured people all experience crime in all its horror and brutality. Gang violence, farm murders, gender-based violence, and political assassinations are all symptomatic of a failed state.

Crime is a national crisis, not a race war. But we are not blind either. Farm murders are real and terrible. They have to be seen against the backdrop of Kill the Boer, which is not just an innocent struggle song.

The implementation of the Expropriation Act will affect everyone. Economic consequences know no race. The legislation creates legal uncertainty – not because land is already being taken en masse, but because it creates the potential for it. This is not hysteria, this is a legitimate concern.

To stop the decaying state and a corrupt party, South Africans must follow the democratic processes.

Afrikaners are an inseparable part of the greater South Africa

Afrikaners are not a disconnected group standing on one side, watching the rest of the country burn. We are deeply intertwined in every level of society:

• Our farmers put food on the tables of millions of people;
• Our doctors, nurses, and teachers serve in public and private hospitals and schools across the country;
• Our entrepreneurs create jobs in townships, farms, and industries;
• Our tax money still finances a large part of the state treasury – even if it sometimes feels as though we are being punished for it; and
• Our safety plans involve all communities.

Afrikaners have more in common with our fellow South Africans than not. We share the same love for the country. Dr Frans Cronje's position (read here) is that Afrikaners' conservative values are consistent with those of the majority of South Africans. He writes from the insights he has gained into many opinion polls conducted across the spectrum and concludes that around questions of values, and even around practical government policy questions, there is enormous common ground in the views of South Africans across every historical, political, racial, and socio-economic divide. He argues that Trump, rather than singling out Afrikaners, should focus on the Christian-conservative right wing of South Africa and that this could potentially include seven or even eight out of every ten South Africans.

Cronje believes that from an American foreign policy perspective, commonality can be found with the vast majority of South Africans who share the same values. This is a position that should be strongly supported.

We all want to see the same successful South Africa

Most South Africans would like to live in a South Africa where:

• The promotion of constitutional values and actions is prioritised;
• Communities are safe;
• A functioning government with real service delivery makes a difference in people's lives;
• There is a free and competitive economy with the capacity to lift individuals out of poverty and improve living standards;
• Personal responsibility is valued and merit and initiative are rewarded, and
• Economic growth provides social solutions for minorities and communities.

This applies to many different communities, not just Afrikaners. The Springboks are probably our most powerful symbol: their success shows exactly what South Africa could and should be when we stand together.

That we do have differences is certainly true. However, the differences are not the problem – the problem is the inability to understand, respect, and accommodate differences.

Searching for a just order

Afrikaners accepted the political change in the country. There should be no doubt about that. Today's dispensation with its failures and abuses is being justly condemned from various quarters. However, there are now also repeated accusations from multiple sides about the past and wrong political choices.

On 17 March 1992, white South African voters participated in a referendum on the continuation of the reform process that had begun on 2 February 1990 and was aimed at formulating a new Constitution through negotiation. Some 68.73% of white voters voted “yes”. Some analysts were of the opinion that 62% of Afrikaners had voted “yes” and therefore supported a new political dispensation.

Although redress had to take place, it had to be done within a just constitutional dispensation with constitutional rights and guarantees in which the rule of law was protected, the basic human rights of all were protected, and there was a clear separation of powers between state and non-state institutions.

Nelson Mandela said in 1999: “At different stages of their history, Afrikaners have been conquerors and conquered; victims of oppression and practitioners of oppression. With that background and historical experience, and with their expertise, they can play a special role in building the country into one of prosperity, justice, and peaceful coexistence.”

Thousands of Afrikaners accepted that invitation with open arms. They rolled up their sleeves and went to work: in the civil service, in the private sector, in community projects, in education. They accepted the new dispensation and were ready to go the extra mile to make the country work. However, circumstances began to change dramatically.

The country's economic, social, and political landscape today reflects a weakening state, the undermining of democratic values, low economic growth, and resulting poverty, and an increasing removal and undermining of constitutional democracy and constitutional principles. All of this can be attributed to a greater or lesser extent to the implementation of transformation. Although transformation was initially intended to correct historical inequalities and injustices, there is strong and clear evidence that the implementation of transformation has acquired an ideological basis, with destructive consequences.

Afrikaners still wish to make a difference in the country and in our communities. However, this needs to happen without ideological obstacles being placed in our way or legislative barriers making it impossible. We want to participate in a system where race does not determine your access to education, work, or contracts and where there is no discriminatory legislation and there are no discriminatory measures and race-based quotas. Change must take place by creating opportunities, not by taking them away. That is the intention of a just order. The goodwill of Afrikaners ever since the 1990s, which existed until fairly recently, is now offered conditionally.

Afrikaners are no longer apathetic

The lukewarm period (approximately 2005–2020) is over. The apathy of Afrikaners is gone. In the words of NP van Wyk Louw: "Rebellion is just as essential in a people as loyalty. It is not even dangerous that a rebellion fails; what is dangerous is that an entire generation will pass without protest."

When the state fails, Afrikaner institutions, organisations, and individuals rise up. We do not need burning tyres and looting to express our discontent. We would rather build a new school, start a new business, establish a new cultural festival, plant a new vineyard, build a factory. This is not apartheid. Afrikaner initiatives assist white, black, and coloured children in poverty, Afrikaner farmers share knowledge with emerging farmers, entrepreneurs mentor young people from disadvantaged communities, Afrikaner communities help to halt the decline of towns and restore infrastructure for the benefit of all. Bursary funds have been established that support white, coloured, and black people with their studies.

Afrikaners made the choice. We do not demand special treatment – all we demand is the same rights as other citizens. It is time for us to be unconditionally accepted as South Africans who want to make a difference, who are patriotic towards the country and its people. This patriotism emphasises:

• That we love the country and the land beneath our feet;
• That we have respect for the official languages but that Afrikaans is our heart’s language that we share with so many other South Africans;
• That we are from Africa and that my neighbour's need requires action, no matter his skin colour, because tomorrow I may need him to help me;
• That we pay taxes because we want a working country – but we are also going to hold the state accountable;
• That we no longer need to explain to the world or to the government who we are. We already show it in the way we live every day. We are building a new country and are not waiting for others;
• Respect for the diversity of the country with all its languages and all its cultures and religions. We are in the country with everyone who wants to build with us – black, white, coloured, English, Afrikaans, Zulu, Griqua, Xhosa, Venda. This respect also demands that Afrikaners be recognised and that there should be understanding for the things that bother us.

We have only one country. The chances of fixing it are decreasing every day. If we do not start doing the right things now – honestly, together, and without excuses – there will be no excuses left later, and neither will there be much left of the country. It's now or never.

Bosman is the chief secretary of the Afrikanerbond.