At a June Invest Africa conference in London's historic Guildhall, governments, investors, and business leaders, all spoke confidently about the opportunities presented by the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), now the world's largest free trade area by participating states, a market with over 1.3bn people and a combined GDP of over $3.4 trillion.
One presentation, Invest Durban, unveiled an ambitious vision of transforming the city into the 'Dubai of the Indian Ocean' - a gleaming hub of skyscrapers, finance, and tourism, feeding off the same AfCTA market.
Yet, at this moment, another reality was unfolding on Durban's streets. Black African 'foreigners' from elsewhere were once again confronted by the civic March and March anti-migration activists and ordered 'home', ahead of a looming 30 June deadline.
Days later, Nkosikhona Ndabandaba, an anti-migrant activist, explained his own vision for Durban's future. It was uncannily like Invest Durban, except he explicitly argued, that like Dubai, foreign AfCTA workers could return and perform the labour while indigenous South Africans, as owners of the country, would sit back and enjoy the wealth, like their Gulf counterparts.
Originally published by African Business.