Misrepresentation of Cape Independence: Value, not race
In his recent article, “Minority Enclaves vs. Free Society,” Ivo Vegter accused the Cape's independence and self-determination of self-determination. This framing is completely misrepresented. These movements are not about race. They are about incompatible values.
When South Africa is a well-protected liberal democracy and involves true ideological competition and regular power changes like the UK and the US, it will not seriously push for the Cape. Despite the country's deep ethnic cultural diversity, most people in the Western Cape will continue to engage in national politics in hoping for change.
But that hope has long faded. As Vegter admits, the Western Cape never elected the ANC or the Socialist Party. And all the signs are that this will continue for the near future. While states consistently vote for nonracism, meritocracy and market-based governance, other parts of South Africa continue to select parties committed to the economics of racial-based policy, state management, and redistributivism.
All 2029 polls show that the African Nationalist Party will win an overwhelming majority of parliament seats, with EFF and MK kicking out the DA nationwide in 2024.
It is not race or culture that promotes the call for Cape Independence, but this deep ideological disparity. The Western Cape does not seek segregation based on racial or ethnic identity – it caters to decades of voter preferences that are essentially out of sync with national governance. It is not surprising that in countries where policies are increasingly shaped by racial classification and redistribution, many of the people marginalized by the system are in minority, but it is not based on athletic races.
Why should people be forced to stay in a system of consistently rejecting in the ballot box, and does that actively discriminate against them?
Self-determination is a right under international law
Vegter warns that enclaves and those pursuing autonomy accept dangerous collectivism, but that he confuses voluntary relationships with forced exclusion. Throughout South Africa, communities and initiatives organized by groups like Afriforum have regained control over education, safety, infrastructure and governance in the face of failure rather than as an act of isolation.
Decentralization – whether local autonomy or through complete separation – is not a threat to liberalism. On the contrary, if the central authorities no longer reflect or respect the value of what they control, it is the only way to protect it.
In asserting the right to self-determination, communities like the Western Cape are based on central principles of a liberal international order. Throughout the democratic world, from Quebec to Belgian German-speaking world, citizen minorities achieved autonomy or self-center without conflict, oppression, or civil unrest. These are not acts of division, but mechanisms for peacefully managing diversity in a diversity society.
Vegter warns that such movements will put civil war at risk, but in reality, self-determination is a pressure valve rather than a powdered barrel. It provides a peaceful and democratic means for communities to control themselves in line with their values, rather than having unimposed values from above. If there is a threat to peace, it comes from those seeking autonomy, not from those seeking autonomy, but from those who have decided to forcefully maintain political control over unwilling groups.
Lessons on transition from Lebanon and “Yukai”
This principle of self-determination naturally extends to the issue of immigration – another region where Bage misrepresents the Cape's independence status. He implies that the desire to regulate migration is driven by xenophobia or racism, but the truth is far more principled and more liberal.
Cape independence is not anti-immigrants. The proposed Western Cape Peoples bill, drafted by the Cape Independence Advocacy Group (CIAG), explicitly recognizes both the region's indigenous people and the many waves of migration that have shaped the identity of the Koi and San to Dutch and Xhosa. The Cape has long been a crossroads of culture, and its openness is part of its character.
But like democracy and freedom, immigration needs a balance. It's not enough to defend the movement. Consensus and reciprocity are also necessary. Vegter cites the United States as a model for successful immigration. And in many ways, that's true. However, there have also been cases where unidentified demographic changes have led to collapse rather than prosperity.
Lebanon is one such example. The once economic prosperity and Christian states became clash points for conflict after a dramatic influx of Palestinian refugees disrupted the sectarian balance. The resulting tension helped to cause a catastrophic civil war. The post-season influx of Syrian refugees since 2011 has become even more tense, exacerbating continued economic and political instability.
It is intellectually negligent to ignore such consequences. The West is not immune. In the UK's 2024 general election, ethnic enclaves emerged as a powerful political bloc. There, candidates were often selected based on identity rather than ideology. This is a phenomenon called “Yookay,” a term popularized by X user Drukpa Kunley.
Unlike what bothered Lebanon, this sect's drift warns what happens when immigrants divorce from the civic and cultural values of their shared citizens.
Mass migration is overwhelming the Western Cape
The Western Cape is already under pressure from uncontrolled internal migration, particularly in the form of illegal settlements that spread throughout the state. These are de facto ethnic enclaves, but Vegter ignores them completely in his warning about parochialism.
The transition is welcome, but not when it starts with a violation of property rights. If the first act of a new arrival is to illegally occupy the land, their moral claims that they belong to the society in which they are in is deeply compromised.
Once the ground where Joe Emilio's documentary is stolen is revealed, illegal residents begin to put a heavy burden on local government resources. The housing waiting list in Cape Town has spread to hundreds of thousands of people. By law, local governments must provide alternative accommodation before eviction. In other words, each illegal occupation delays housing for people who follow the rules.
The institutional burden exceeds housing. Many new arrivals arrive without the means to support themselves, putting pressure on schools, clinics, police and infrastructure. The Western Cape is not a failed governance charity in other states, and cannot absorb an unlimited number of poor newcomers without compromising attractive conditions in the first place.
There are also political consequences that Vegter has not considered. Voters turnout in informal settlements remain low, but available data shows that many immigrant communities continue to support the same parties whose policies have ruined their home state.
In fact, they import political cultures that have destroyed communities and threaten to erode liberal and market-oriented consensus in the Western Cape. It is suicide for localities built on liberal values to invite a large number of people who do not share those values and whose votes could potentially dismantle the institutions that protect them over time.
Migration must work for the people of the Western Cape
This does not mean that the cape should close itself. And it's far from there. Those who come and settle legally from London, East London or Lagos, respect the law, contribute financially, and integrate into civic life should be welcomed without hesitation.
The transition, like any relationship, must be an agreement. It cannot be lawless, unilateral or imposed. Society has both the right and the responsibility to protect itself from those who reject its value and misuse its openness. Cape independence is not about exclusion – it is defending a free and functional society from a central state that has fallen into corruption, coercion and racial nationalism.
The legacy community of the Cape – those who have built and maintained a culture of law, freedom and order – should not be forced to abandon their future for those who ignore it. No one has the right to dismantle a labor society in the name of blind idealism. If freedom means something, it must include the freedom to draw a line and say: no more, no more.
