Ryanair Afrikaans test: South African fury over language quiz

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South Africans are angry that they have to take a test in the Afrikaans language on flights.

There are 11 official languages in the country, and many people say they can't read them.

There are questions on general knowledge.

The test prevents people from travelling on fraudulent South African passports.

Passengers travelling to the UK are required to fill out a simple questionnaire in Afrikaans due to the high prevalence of fraudulent South African passports.

They will be refused travel and given a full refund if they can't complete the questionnaire.

The person said that the policy was bigoted rubbish.

South Africa is no longer in Apartheid according to someone. "Learn yourselves", the person on the phone said.

They did not reply to the question of why the test had to be taken in Afrikaans.

UK border authorities don't require the test.

According to a report, the quiz contains questions such as "What is South Africa's international dialling code?" and "Who is the current President of the country?"

The head of South Africa's Afrikaans Language Board described it as "absurd" and said it had hampered attempts to improve the image of the language.

The analysis was done by Nomsa Maseko.

The majority of South Africa's black population doesn't like the fact that the oppressor's language was forced down their throats at school. The black South Africans revolted against this.

Thousands of black children from South African township schools took to the streets in the summer of 1976 to protest against the introduction of Afrikaans as a language of instruction.

I haven't spoken or written in that language in a long time.

As students in former white schools, we had to get good Afrikaans marks to progress to the next grade.

After leaving high school, I swore to never speak Afrikaans again. I stopped thinking about the language.

The memories of my school days came back when I read this questionnaire. I would have failed the test if I had taken it.

The spokesman for South Africa's foreign affairs did not want to be involved.

It's a home affairs matter. The UK government was not involved in it. Clayson Monyela said that the airline has stopped doing it.

There was no mention of stopping the test in the email.

Some reports say it applies to all of the flights from Europe to the UK and Ireland.

Irish border authorities denied in a statement that they required such tests.

There are 11 official languages in South Africa.