Apartheid policies sentenced the vast majority of South Africans to lives of poverty; sixteen years later, that stark reality has not changed much. As a direct result of the policies that were designed and vigorously pursued by successive Apartheid governments, millions of people are poorly educated, poorly skilled and have low paid jobs. Political freedom that came at the end of that era sixteen years ago cannot be expected to eradicate these injustices, since patterns of exclusion and marginalization are reproduced across generations. Today, poverty, unemployment and inequality are reaching crisis levels, and with the added impact of HIV/AIDS, have proven to be potent threats to vulnerable communities and households.

There is also great concern within South Africa about the levels of political and strategic leadership.  Corruption and maladministration at various levels of government pose a threat to effective service delivery and eradication of the factors that contribute to ongoing poverty.
In the review conducted for Bread for the World- BROT by Studies in Poverty and Inequality Institute-SPII, “South Africa: poverty, social security and civil society. Triangulating transformation”, the following threats were identified:

• The impact of HIV/AIDS on the lives of individuals, communities and the nation, as well as the economy;
• Poverty and unemployment; 
• Economic inequality;
• Lack of quality education, especially for the poor;
• Violence within the home and communities: domestic violence (including rape and or threats of sexual violence) continues to be experienced at alarming rates, fuelled by alcohol and other substance abuse, and
• The inability of government to plan clearly for development.

Vulnerable groups within our society are the poor and the unemployed, people living with or affected by HIV/AIDS, seasonal workers, and women and children in general.  Within marginalized groups exist extremely vulnerable people, and this includes the indigenous minority groups of the San.

The San of South Africa, living in the communities of the ‡Khomani, and the !Xun and Khwe, have experienced a tragic history marked by foreign domination and eviction from their ancestral land. During the 1990s, they succeeded in securing land ownership and finding permanent settlements; however, the San are still faced with various social, cultural and political difficulties, and their communities are among the poorest in South Africa. The ‡Khomani (as descendants of South Africa’s autochthonous population) and the !Xun and Khwe (originating from Angola and Namibia) come from very different backgrounds, but nonetheless their community problems are similar in many respects.

For fourteen years the San have been assisted by the South African San Institute (SASI), which provides legal support and has launched numerous projects to improve the San’s economic situation and to build up personal and communal independence and self-reliance. When SASI started its support, the political climate for such demands, nationally and internationally, was quite favourable. Indigenous rights movements, which had developed first in North and then in Latin America some decades before, started organizing themselves on an international level and had begun to identify themselves as global indigenous communities. Indigeneity as a concept entered into the international discourse, and indigenous rights were acknowledged by the UN and other international institutions.

The indigenous rights movements expanded to Africa, where San themselves started engaging in domestic activism just shortly before the end of the Apartheid era. Contrary to other indigenous groups, they had the advantage of gaining valuable public attention and hence received support from various organisations and donors, partly built on the infrastructure already set for the global concerns of indigenous peoples. In Botswana and Namibia, the countries with the largest San populations, governments were (and remain) less willing to recognize the San’s status as indigenous First People and thereby their entitlement to their ancestral land. However, in South Africa the San profited from the societal transformations and restitution of disadvantaged groups that accompanied the beginning of the new democracy. Moreover, though there may be a certain sense of discomfort also within the South African government about recognizing the San as indigenous in a way distinct from the majority African population, a significant proportion of South African citizens are aware of either their San ancestry or the influence (e.g. linguistically) the San had exerted on their own ethnic group. As a result, despite their still marginal situation, the San in South Africa have been comparably successful in securing land and political rights.1

While a positive policy environment encourages the state and public service to incorporate San people into service provision and to recognize their special needs and the threatened cultural and linguistic character, a great risk in consolidating and building on the successful achievement of land and political rights exists. This is as a result of the incapacity of government to address the needs of a small group of disempowered indigenous people in the current political climate of wide-spread service delivery protests and other problems. There has been inadequate post-settlement support, despite statutory obligations and contractual commitments, due to the over-commitment of government departments and officials in the face of numerous time and resource-consuming land claims.

While strides have been made toward bridging the gap between the traditional way of life and the reality of the modern world, much still needs to be done. Critically, San need support to be able to develop their own capacity to ensure access to resources and the protection of their rights under constitutional principles.

An assessment conducted by the European Union in 2000 identified principles for effective programming for San people, namely, long-term development commitments, multi-sectoral and flexible interventions. These included capacity building, project implementation, income generation, community-based natural resource management, and education. Furthermore, the development of a political (governance) infrastructure is critical for long-term sustainable development.