April 27 2008 - SAPA picture by Mark Wessels:
A deeply puzzling event occurred again this year in the shark-infested Atlantic at Robben Island outside Cape Town. A courageous group of super-fit male and female swimmers again braved the icy, shark-infested water of Table Bay to swim the dangerous 7.5 kilometres from Mandela's former prison island to the Bloubergstrand beach to 'commemorate South African freedom day.'
What makes the annual event so puzzling is not that it occurred -- but that not one black-African swimmer participated. The participants all sported magnificent tans -- but also were clearly members of the so hated 'previously advantaged race group' which South Africa's leadership most loves to hate.
Surely on Freedom Day, at least one black-African swimmer could be found to also cross these shark-infested waters from Robben Island to Bloubergstrand to commemorate his freedom?