Dear South African Citizen,

First of all I would like to thank you all for allowing us to visit and live in 'your country', though I am not a fan of the imaginary boundaries created by the Berlin Conference of 1884–85 over the last couple of years.

I am a Rhodesian born Zimbabwean, however my ancestors are descendants from the South linked to the BaSuthu and Ndebele klans. I still have traceable relatives who remained in South Africa and also acquired a new link through marriage that qualified me to be a South African citizen regardless of my place of birth. I share this information so that you realise how close we are as people only being distiguished by labels and imaginary boundaries.

I am very worried and disgusted by the emergence of inhuman activities associated with xenophobia being pepatrated by some sections of the South African Society alleged to be endorced by law enforcement officials that I have recently read in various media sources.

I do do appreciate the pressure that migration not only from Zimbabwe but the rest of Africa is placing on peace loving and culturally rich diverse population of South Africa, some who are also struggling to earn a basic living in order to live descent lives. I have no words to fully describe how grateful and appreciative Zimbabweans who are living and working in South Africa are as the socio-economic and political conditions in Zimbabwe have been unstable and unpredicatable for quite sometime now.

I am sure most South African's are well informed about the state of the economy in neighbouring countries, like you have neighbours that you live next to Zimbabwe and South Africa have been peaceful neighbours for a very long time because of the cultural and economic ties between the two countries and now is not the time to start burning those bridges of understanding, if anything we should strengthen our bonds towards finding solutions to problems faced by our communities. We have much more in common than the imaginary differences that some want to try and use to divide us.

I ask those committing these inhuman acts against other humans to think before they act and stop this senseless violation of human rights. We are all living on borrowed time and hence it's important that we have respect for each other, for ideas on how best we can overcome the problems we face won't come from confrontational acts but open dialogue and shared perspectives that will inspire us to be better persons than we were yesterday.

"umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu"..I am because we are and our differences should be learning opportunities to help us understand each other better.

Your loving distant relative

Muntu..