Poverty a recipe for wider South Africa unrest

By Phumza Macanda - Analysis

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Failure to spread South Africa's economic gains to the poor has fuelled violence against immigrants and could spark wider unrest as living conditions become tougher and higher food prices bite.

More than 14 years after the end of apartheid, millions are still trapped in poverty despite record economic growth averaging five percent in the past four years. The poverty also fuels South Africa's frighteningly high violent crime rates.

Living in squalor in Johannesburg's shantytowns, the poor have taken their anger out on immigrants, killing 42 people, mostly targeting Zimbabweans and Mozambicans.

"We are sitting on a (time bomb). People are poor. They don't have jobs or decent housing and they are sick and tired of it. It's at a point where it is easy for anybody to incite violence," said Prince Mashele, analyst at the Institute for Security Studies.

The government of President Thabo Mbeki rejects suggestions that policy failures are behind the xenophobia, pointing to increasing access to electricity and housing and the expansion of welfare grants to 12.5 million people. It blames criminals.

"If you say the issue is about poverty then what you would have in the rest of the African continent is nothing but this," said Essop Pahad, one of Mbeki's closest advisers.

About 3 million Zimbabweans, fleeing the collapse of their own country's economy, make up the biggest group of 5 million migrants in a population of 50 million.

Even officials say the Zimbabweans are generally better educated than many poor South Africans, who accuse migrants from neighboring countries of stealing scarce jobs.

The attacks have centered on the province of Gauteng, heart of Africa's biggest economy but also where the starkest inequalities are on display.

The slum of Alexandra, where the violence first erupted on May 11, lies in the shadows of Johannesburg's northern suburban mansions where many of the super-rich reside.

A Statistics S.A. survey released in March found 10 percent of the population earned more than 50 percent of the income while the poorest 40 percent accounted for less than 7 percent.

Analysts say mounting instability is in store if the plight of the poor is not rapidly improved.

"This is not just about xenophobia. The next thing you might get some lunatic in the informal settlement say, how can we be hungry when they are rich across (the highway). These conditions are ripe for that sort of uprising," Mashele said.

FOOD PRICES BITE

Largely unskilled and with unemployment at about 24 percent, the poor are now going hungry as food prices climb.