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To his credit, Ramaphosa cannot be accused of deceit; he did signal his intentions when he was a union leader under the Nationalist government. In an interview with Mario Oriani-Ambrosini he was quoted thus: “…Ramaphosa told me of the ANC’s 25 year strategy to deal with the whites: it would be like boiling a frog alive, which is done by raising the temperature very slowly. He meant that the black majority would pass laws transferring wealth, land and economic power from white to black slowly and incrementally until the whites lose all they have gained….” Twenty-three years of ANC rule and it appears Ramaphosa is going to jump the gun a little, tweak that plan, douse the filthy frog in boiling water and be done with him.

There are certainly going to be multiple legal challenges here and abroad once the constitution is amended to allow the confiscation of property, but I fear the history recalled above is certain to be repeated; the British government will express dismay and the E.U. will have a little tantrum while political and legal obstacles will be squashed under the feet of millions of poor people, recklessly led by opportunistic demagogues who will play the race card adroitly and plunge an infrastructural and economic powerhouse into devastating decline.

Sixty million people will inevitably suffer nationally, but so will the rest of southern Africa because the entire region relies to some degree on the country’s manufacturing, agricultural, and industrial power and on the country’s logistical infrastructure. This is a combined population of roughly 250 million people who will be directly and indirectly affected.

Right now, South Africa provides some sort of sanctuary to roughly 10 million immigrants who have fled the misrule endemic to the north. When this country suffers the same fate, there will be no place left to hide; there will be no crumbs because the table will be bare, and there will almost certainly be a war over competition for dwindling resources. The biggest bloodletting in African history is a certain consequence, and the tragic story of the misery that followed colonization and then decolonization will reach its horrible denouement.