Less than half of South Africans believe that race relations in the country have improved since the end of apartheid, a nationwide survey has found.
On a typical day, the survey discovered, one in four people never spoke to others of different races, and two in five generally found other races “untrustworthy.” The report suggests there is waning confidence in the ideal of the “rainbow nation.”
The belief that relations have been improving has declined in recent years, the study shows, saying social and geographic divisions persist, 15 years after the end of white minority rule.
The South African Reconciliation Barometer Survey, by the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation, was based on questions put to 3,500 people in the two months before the general election last April.
Only 49 percent of respondents in the survey said they thought race relations were now healthier than they had been in 1994, the year former South African president Nelson Mandela was elected.
In 2006, 61 percent of South Africans agreed that “the relationship between the various races” was improving, but fell to 49 percent this year. Confidence in a “happy future for all races,” which peaked at 86 percent in 2005, is now 62 percent.
The survey found 24 percent of South Africans indicating they never spoke to people of other races “on a typical day during the week,” and 46 percent “never socializing” with people of other races in their own homes or friends’ homes. Just 28 percent said they would talk to people of other races more often if given the choice.
It also found that 84 percent of South Africans agree apartheid was a crime against humanity.
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