Jump to content

Vereniging van Oranjewerkers

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Oranjewerkers)

Vereniging van Oranjewerkers ("Association of Orange Workers", sometimes shortened to simply Oranjewerkers) is a South African white separatist political movement that seeks a homeland for Afrikaners.

History

[edit]

Formed in 1980 by Wally Grant, H. F. Verwoerd junior (the son of Hendrik Frensch Verwoerd), Carel Boshoff and C. J. Joost, the group bemoaned the over-reliance of South Africa on a black workforce and sought to set up Oranjegroeipunte (Orange growth points) where the group would buy up land to settle unemployed white people on.

Morgenzon

[edit]

Such a scheme was set up in Morgenzon.[1] Oranjewerkers bought the town in 1982, and in the mid-1990s its population was 400 whites and 6,000 blacks.[2]

Alongside this they also developed the plan of bolwerke ('bastions'), or privately owned farms whose landowners would undertake to stop utilising black labour.[1]

Aftermath

[edit]

Eschewing the party political route, the Oranjewerkers became more of a research group, undertaking a series of studies of the demographics of the country. Leading member Hercules Booysen termed their mission as dinamiese-konserwatisme, seeking newer ways to implement the old ideas of apartheid and the creation of a Volkstaat.[3] Similar plans for redesigning the map of South Africa have been suggested by the group from time to time.

In fiction

[edit]

The organisation features prominently in Larry Bond's tale of a fictionalised Cold War conflict in South Africa, Vortex. By the novel's conclusion, they have succeeded in reaching their goal for an autonomous Afrikaner state under a post-apartheid government.

See also

[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ a b Du Toit, Brian M. (1991). "The Far Right in Current South African Politics". The Journal of Modern African Studies. 29 (4): 627–67. doi:10.1017/S0022278X00005693. ISSN 1469-7777. JSTOR 161141.
  2. ^ Manzo, Kathryn A. (1998). Creating Boundaries: The Politics of Race and Nation. Lynne Rienner Publishers. p. 86. ISBN 9781555875640.
  3. ^ du Toit, 'The Far Right in South Africa', p. 648
[edit]