Anti-Immigrant Sentiment in South Africa: Any Dimension from the Commercial Road Transport Workers?

Violence is endemic in South Africa. Many analysts see it as an untoward legacy of apartheid, together with inequality and social discrimination. Anti-immigrant sentiment is a defining feature of xenophobia, which at least in the South African context is but a form of violence and social discrimination targeted at black non-South Africans locally referred to as makwerekwere. Incidentally, this xenophobic act of violence takes on different dimensions and appearances that continue to define the South Africa of today. While much of the development has found its way into academic circle in terms of scholarly interrogation, the critical link between xenophobic attitudes and the culture of violence amongst road transport workers in South Africa has been far less researched. Hence, this paper will focus on the aspect of xenophobia that involves commercial road transport workers in South Africa. In doing this, it seeks to explain how xenophobic tendencies have been intensified by the culture of violence, particularly among commercial road transport workers in South Africa.