Are there any secret societies in South Africa?

Question

I always watch these documentaries where it is said that some government officials and prominent people belong to secret societies that back them all the way as long as they keep it secret. Any of these in South Africa?

Answer 1

Christelle J had a very good answer and I won't try and beat that by just getting more info from wikipedia and pasting it as an answer. You can read up about the Broederbond on your own on the links she supplied.

What I can tell you though is out of personal (sort of) experience...

My father was in the Broederbond when I was little, and he's told me a bit about them out of his personal experience.

First off, they were, like she said, male protestant Afrikaners who wanted to further the cause of Afrikaners (white Afrikaans speaking South Africans), and yes, they eventually got tangled in the entire apartheid system and eventually became so intertwined with it that for all intents and purposes they ran the whole system.

What some people don't know though, is the original reason they formed the Bond, was because after the Anglo-Boer war (which was basically an excuse for the British to assert themselves over the Boers, the only major problem to the British expansion in Southern Africa, in order to get their hands on the gold fields of the Transvaal, or the South African Republic, which was a Boer republic, and to further Cecil John Rhodes and his disciple, Alfred Milner's plans for Britain to control Africa and build a railway from Cape Town to Cairo) Afrikaners were despised by the British and were empoverished because of the war and the British scorched earth and concentration camps tactics. In fact, most Afrikaners had lost all they had during the war. The Broederbond wanted to help the Afrikaners by furthering their interests in the economy and business ownership. The plan was basically to have key people identified and then use their influence to put other key people, all Afrikaners of course, in other key positions etc to eventually get a larger part in the then mainly English-speaking business sectors and politics.

Although they eventually strayed from their main objective, my father joined them for the same reason and eventually quit when he realised how corrupt and crooked, and intertwined with religious idealism the whole society was.

Well this is what he told me:

He was approached by someone, after they had done a thorough background check on him (you couldn't be divorced or engaged in left wing or (and most people don't realise this!) right wing politics) and then invited to join, though he wasn't told what he was invited to join.

Then he was taken to a farmhouse, which was dark, and blindfolded, and then, after he took an oath to secrecy, the blindfold was taken off, the lights put on and... there was about 20 of the most important people in town! He knew many of them, but never knew they were part of the Bond. He said the feeling of brotherhood was very strong.

He told me you were only allowed to tell your wife you were a member, not allowed to tell anyone where you met, and were required to discuss and give advice on proposed legislation, government policy, etc. to the government of the day. There was an annual meeting which was guarded by the military, and almost all the ministers of parliament had to be members to get there. Every president of the Republic of South Africa was a member since the National Party won the elections in 1948. Of course, because only important and influential Afrikaners were invited to join the Bond and because of their secrecy and hand in government affairs, most Afrikaners came to despise them.

Eventually they changed their name to the Afrikanerbond and membership is now open to people of all races and also women.

As for other secret societies still in existence, the Freemasons are active in South Africa (interestingly, you could not be part of the Broederbond if you were ever a Freemason). Of others I don't know.

Hope that helps.

Answer 2

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RE:
Are there any secret societies in South Africa?
I always watch these documentaries where it is said that some government officials and prominent people belong to secret societies that back them all the way as long as they keep it secret. Any of these in South Africa?

Answer 3

Yes there is, the Afrikaner Broederbond.

'Between 1918 and 1994 the Afrikaner Broederbond (AB) (meaning Afrikaner Brotherhood) or Broederbond was a secret, exclusively male, Protestant organization in South Africa dedicated to the advancement of Afrikaner interests. Founded by HJ Klopper, HW van der Merwe, DHC du Plessis and Rev. Jozua Naudé in 1918, the organization was known as Jong Zuid Afrika (Young South Africa) until 1920, when it formally became the Afrikaner Broederbond.'

Go to the following link for more info:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afrikaner_Broederbond

Answer 4

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Hello, Well as a rule a thumb streets can be safer under military type governments or dictatorships. True, you don't have freedom to spout off at the mouth and run for political office let alone get the cushy jobs but crime and petty crime are kept under check a lot better. As an analogy Spanish people tell me the streets there were much safer under General Franco's wing and Argentinians tell me about being in the streets in sexy mini skirts when the military junta ruled the roost yet how dangerous things are today after they got their freedom. A for Apartheid it is difficult to know because much depends on where we are getting our stats form which can be quite conflicting. Whites have their side of the story painting a very bleak picture while black people show things in a far more positive light. Cheers, Michael Kelly

Answer 5

Apartheid ended in 1994. When Mandela was released by the NP in 1990, the various black tribes realised that they would finally rule their own country. But the question was: which tribe? And so, ironically and very tragically, about twice as many people died during this period than the entire 40 year period of Apartheid. This meant that between 1990-1994 the country saw a very high spike in crime. Most of this was committed by black people against other black people. And so it went largely unnoticed by most whites (it happened in black neighbourhoods). So yes, when you compare the stats, crime seems to have gone down in some cases. But only because it is compared to this violent period. Before 1990 there was little crime. The police patrolled both white and black neighbourhoods to maintain order and control. The entire Apartheid period was surprisingly much less violent than people seem to realise. Apartheid was more about psychological oppression than physical and violent oppression. The government only ever killed about 500 people in the entire Apartheid period. That is still a shockingly large number, but nothing compared to the millions killed by the Khmer Rouge etc. Finally, as Apartheid came to an end. violence spilled into white neighbourhoods. For the first time white people experienced exterme vilent crime. And as the government didn't have tje competence to control this, the violent crime went unchecked. This meant that violent crime increased in all areas - white and black neighbourhoods. But as the government couldn't face this responsibility, they merely started to alter the stats. They only make certain stats available to the punlicv. Most South Africans by now don't even bother to listen to these stats, they now they are lies. This is why most white South Africans resent the new government. Not because it is black, but because it is lying just like the Apartheid government (in fact, the Apartheid government actually merged with the current one in 2005). This is why many black people actually say that Apartheid was better, at least they weren't being killed like flies during Apartheid. But since the international community doesn't realise what is going on in SA, they only look to the corrupted stats, and they think everything is fine. It isn't. And by the way, explaining the current violent crime as an result of Apartheid's violence, is a rather poor attempt to justify this violence. Most of the crime being committed today arent' even done by South Africans. We have millions of immigrants from other countries who have many criminals amongst them. And since there is no law enforcement, people know they can literally get away wih murder. Ask any South African, white black or whatever, and they will tell you that crime is much worse. And the real tragedy is that we have learned to desensitize ourselves to it.

Answer 6

Christelle - thats old information - the Broederbond no longer exists. It became the Afrikanerbond and made its membership open - no more secrets.

Some people consider the Freemasons to be a secret society - but there's very little about them that is still a secret.

Answer 7

the first time i heard of secrete societies is last year when i met this other guy from sierra leone in china, but i still don't know what is a secret society well. In the case of south africa, i have no idea sir/madam. i am namib

Answer 8

Roger C you are talking crap about the Freemasons. They are a Secret Society still in existence in South Africa and what is known about them is no more that what they allow to be known. The ANC elite are also a secret society but they have so many blabber mouths it is nigh on impossible for them to keep any secrets. A bottle of Johnny Walker easilt opens their mouths.

Answer 9

"If I tell you, I would have to give up my current identity, go hide in a remote village in Tibet and hope "they" don't find me...so, this conversation never happened and we've never met, my friend", the mysterious man in the longcoat said with unblinking eyes, took another puff on his sigarillo and and walked off into the darkness. Somehow, I knew it wouldn't be the last time I saw that longcoat...

...I always wanted to be part of the Secret Novelist Society.

Answer 10

Yes MJ we understand why you don't want to talk about it, considering that the main event in that organization's meetings are to go around school playgrounds and smelling little kids' bicycle seats