Two weeks after the end of the 2010 fifa World Cup, the much-anticipated outbreak of xenophobic violence in South Africa has passed with only a few reported incidents. However, the renewed threats against foreigners coupled with the memory of the 2008 riots were enough to send thousands of people, both legal and illegal residents of South Africa, fleeing across the border. And, indeed, the fears of Somalis, Zimbabweans, Mozambicans and other Africans were validated by acute episodes of aggression directed at foreign shop owners in some parts of the Western Cape and Kya Sands, Johannesburg. This should be more than enough evidence to remind us that the structural conditions underpinning the 2008 riots have not been adequately examined or addressed, and thus, a conflagration of violence could be ignited again.

There have been a number of possible explanations given for xenophobia, but many fall into the category of frequently quoted hypotheses or ‘assumed wisdom.’ Generally, commentators from civil society have said that violence erupts from competition over resources – high levels of unemployment, scab labour, low wages, poor service delivery and an overall dearth of opportunity. In contrast, spokespeople for the police and government, in both the Mbeki and Zuma administrations, have frequently denied the discourse of xenophobia and attributed the looting and banditry to a small coterie of opportunistic criminals. 

About two platoons of South African Army infantry have been deployed to the KyaSands informal settlement in northwest Johannesburg to maintain order after an outbreak of violence apparently linked to xenophobia, reports by three independent news agencies say.

The South African Press Association says eight armoured vehicles lined up next to the main road leading to KyaSands, yesterday while soldiers disembarked to be briefed before they proceeded to Extension 3 of the sprawling townhip.

Police officers at the scene told SAPA there were no incidents and the Army was brought in to ensure there was calm in the area. Soldiers and police would camp in KyaSands to maintain calm, the wire service added.

Reuters reported mob violence on foreign migrants injured at least 11 “and increased concerns of a fresh wave of xenophobic attacks.” SAPA quoted local police commander Major General Oswald Reddy saying five of the victims were South African, four Zimbabwean and two were from Mozambique. At least 10 people were arrested on suspicion of assault, Reuters reported.

A series of attacks on foreign workers in 2008 killed 62 people and damaged investors' confidence, the British news service added. Another wave could wreck the positive image that Africa's biggest economy was able to portray when it hosted the soccer World Cup, it warned.

A poor response from government departments on tackling xenophobic violence is "frustrating", the South African Human Rights Commission's (SAHRC's) chairperson Lawrence Mushwana told Members of Parliament (MPs) on Wednesday.

Government departments had simply not responded to recommendations contained in a xenophobia report released by the SAHRC in March, Mushwana told Parliament's portfolio committee on justice.

"When the report was launched all various departments were there. They made an undertaking that in a month's time they were going respond. They were going to tell us what steps they were taking to implement some of the recommendations so that come another outbreak of xenophobia, we would be ready.

"But we had to write every time. It was only in my last attempt during June, that was when we started receiving the first response. This makes things difficult for us."

Mushwana said that the commission's task was to see whether the government had "put systems in place" to prevent an outbreak of xenophobic violence similar to 2008, but that the responses had been apathetic.

"We compile some of the reports. We make recommendations. We bring them here. We write. But no one answers."

It is odd that just two weeks after the country was taken over by Ghana-mania, reports of xenophobic attacks against immigrants from other African countries are making the headlines. How could the feeling that ‘we are all Africans’ vanish so quickly? Perhaps in the dazzle of the international spotlight and being swept away by the celebratory mood it was natural for South Africans to show allegiance to their continent, but the underlying factors that explained the xenophobic attacks in 2008 - and since - have not changed.

It is a great shame that after the success of the World Cup we face the grim prospect of renewed xenophobic violence, but the reality is that attacks on foreigners have never completely subsided since such violence made local and international headlines in 2008. For example, in January 2009 two Zimbabweans died in attacks on foreigners at a refugee hostel in Durban. In the middle of 2009 there were attacks on Somali and Ethiopian shop-owners in communities in Cape Town and Mpumalanga. The Mail & Guardian ran a feature on xenophobic sentiment brewing in Gauteng in October 2009.

These are just some of the stories that have featured in the Press, yet it is clear that the view held by some that African immigrants are stealing jobs and are responsible for crime did not disappear when the violence in 2008 died down, and such attitudes are not confined to one part of the country.