US firms/banks (ultimately consumers and tax payers) sued for apartheid reparations.

In 2002 a coalition of South Africans with the support of the Khulumani support coalition set up to sue 20 multi-national banks and companies for support of, and involvement in apartheid crimes.
The case was approved in the US in April 2009, and the new ANC leadership has officially supported it since September 2009.
Doubtlessly some of the costs will filter down to consumers, and with cross-influence of key banks and companies with governments, perhaps even to the tax-payer.
Is this fair? I would rather they would have sued the Reagan and Thatcher supporters from back then, or certain fundamentalist Christians who produced pro-apartheid propaganda.
Although amounts may vary, how does the US/West feel about this?
www.business-humanrights.org...


[edit on 22-12-2009 by halfoldman]

reply to post by halfoldman

For more on Khulumani see www.khulumani.net...
What makes it suspect is that it is a spin-off of Jubilee 2000 (a celebrity led cause to supposedly cancel 3rd World dept).
It appears like a "little game" for some NWO faction, and I doubt true apartheid victims will see much money. The ruling ANC in South Africa has already proven its ability to pocket vast sums of cash in cahoots with multi-national arms industries.
The bottom of the given site raises some worrying questions on possible law-suits against the ANC - possibly by Aids orphans and Zimbabweans.


[edit on 22-12-2009 by halfoldman]

Originally posted by halfoldman
reply to post by halfoldman

One should consider advised amounts for African American slavery:

"Various estimates have been given if such payments were to be made. Harper's Magazine has created an estimate that the total of reparations due is over 100 trillion dollars, based on 222,505,049 hours of forced labor between 1619 and 1865, with a compounded interest of 6%[7]. Should all or part of this amount be paid to the descendants of slaves in the United States, the current U.S. government would only pay a fraction of that cost, over 40 trillion dollars, since it has been in existence only since 1789." (en.wikipedia.org...)

The problem is that slavery was legal and institutionalized in most cultures. For example, over a million Europeans and even Americans were taken into slavery by the Islamic Corsairs along the North African coast. Surely Islam must also pay, and slavery continues in "tribal societies" today, but it is only politically correct to hold white society to account - although they were the only ones to stop it. (answering-islam.org...)


[edit on 27-12-2009 by halfoldman]

[edit on 27-12-2009 by halfoldman]

reply to post by halfoldman

From what I gather most Americans or Westerners simply don't care if they end up paying or not, or whether Reagan and Thatcher supporters indirectly supported apartheid in the 1980s.
So current Brits and Americans accept their "guilt"?
Well, the silence gives that message.

reply to post by halfoldman


Many of the folks that are silent old man are the same folks that are crying today that their governments are ignoring them and marganlizing them over the wealthy in this financial crises. You'd figure that even following the experience of being margalized themselves they'd understand, but no, its hypocrisy. I remember many conservatives claiming that the ANC (it was the ANC right?) of south africa were communists and why we should not support the movement, and why the whites were keeping south africa "free of communists". These are the same freedom loving "tea party patriots" crying about their rights as humans.

The silence is deafening.

[edit on 27-12-2009 by Southern Guardian]

Originally posted by Southern Guardian
reply to post by halfoldman

 

Many of the folks that are silent old man are the same folks that are crying today that their governments are ignoring them and marganlizing them over the wealthy in this financial crises. You'd figure that even following the experience of being margalized themselves they'd understand, but no, its hypocrisy. I remember many conservatives claiming that the ANC (it was the ANC right?) of south africa were communists and why we should not support the movement, and why the whites were keeping south africa "free of communists". These are the same freedom loving "tea party patriots" crying about their rights as humans.

The silence is deafening.

[edit on 27-12-2009 by Southern Guardian]

Thanks for that - finally a reply by a potentially "fined" person!
My editing period has long past, but perhaps I would have re-focused on the issues of reparations in general (mainly by former slaves, aboriginal peoples). The amounts are usually compared to the German Holocaust reparations.
I think the US media has some catching up to do on this case.
Since every US born youngster already faces pre-birth debt, I would encourage people to get very involved and informed.
Some would argue this is red-handed theft by certain lawyers.