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1 PAULUS ZULU
A NATION
IN CRISIS
An appeal for morality
TAFELBERG
Preface
THE ELEVENTH of February 1990 seemed to shrink decades of fear and hopelessness and push them into the distant past. Suddenly the future was held in that moment. Nurtured in the decorum of Christian mission morality and poise, I have never been one to toyi-toyi in the streets. But when the news of the release of Nelson Mandela was beamed onto television screens that memorable Sunday, I suddenly found myself in the midst of a throng of tens of thousands of youths that came toyi-toying in the street past our house in Umlazi, near Durban. “Laqhakaza ikusasa lenu bantabami,” (“Your future is blossoming my children”), cried an elderly woman standing at her doorstep watching the throng of celebrating youths go by. “Viva gogo!” (“Viva granny”) they shouted back, and “viva bab’u Zulu!” (“Viva father Zulu”) they turned to me as we proceeded. They had come to know me closely as we negotiated the tumultuous years of schooling in the turbulent eighties. The elderly woman must have been eighty or thereabouts and had lived through the pain and the hope. The pain was over and a new era had dawned. Apartheid was no more. The old order had come to an end although the birth of a new South Africa was still to take four years of negotiations and this period would prove to be a painful gestation.
There was an aura of certainty regarding the nature of the new era. Had the people of South Africa not made that crystal clear at that mammoth yet humble gathering in Kliptown near Johannesburg in 1955? Then, and through all succeeding generations, they had pledged to themselves that:
• the people shall share in the country’s wealth;
• all shall be equal before the law;
• there shall be work and security;
• the doors of learning and culture shall be opened; and
• there shall be houses, security and comfort.
All those gathered in 1955 went on to affirm that: “These freedoms we shall fight for, side by side, throughout our lives. Until we have won our liberty.” {Text of the Freedom Charter: Kliptown 26 June 1955}.
However, the 1960s and the succeeding decades were to become an even more oppressive era as apartheid became more desperate in an effort to defend the right of white people in general, and Afrikanerdom in particular, to rule what they saw as the last bastion of democracy in Africa. Developments in the early 1980s were such that, although not instinctively an activist, pragmatically I had to choose sides. The two counter-forces positioned within the political terrain were such that neutrality was akin to abandoning ship while the country sank. On one side there was the apartheid regime propped by co-opted homeland administrations partly politically short-sighted and partly self-serving, while on the other stood the United Democratic Front as the last hope for emancipation. The future lay with the United Democratic Front and, as a group of professionals; we resolved to work together with them. The big questions were where and how.
We positioned ourselves in such a way that we steered away from the immediate danger of detention, imprisonment and probable death. While bravery is praiseworthy and noble in fighting for a cause, making ourselves cannon fodder for the forces of darkness would have been counter-productive. The apartheid regime had drawn more than enough blood already. As a social scientist I joined the South African Black Social Workers Association (SABSWA) which was heavily involved in community work in the townships around Durban. In 1984 the township rent boycotts broke out and were soon followed by a massive breakdown, if not a near collapse, in education as the school-going youth took to the vanguard in the struggle for liberation. “Liberation first and education later” became the operating slogan.
SABSWA moved in quickly to fill the vacuum, and we resolved to make schooling our priority. As an academic at the University of Natal, by then a progressive institution defiant of apartheid, I was well positioned to lead a committee to keep the education fires burning. We started Saturday classes catering for the last three years of high school, with an enrolment of around a thousand young people from the townships around Durban. Besides teaching the curriculum with an emphasis on English as the language of instruction, and mathematics, science, and commerce as vital subjects, we emphasised discipline and morality as key ingredients in liberation and development. Under the banner of history, which was part of the normal curriculum, we taught liberation history, and the history of the ANC as the principal and oldest liberation movement in particular.
The intensity of the township riots and the counter-revolution by the state and its co-opted agents added an extra role to my politico-educational work. A University of Natal colleague, an anthropologist, and I monitored and documented the resistance and counter-resistance, and particularly the state-sponsored violence against the forces of transformation. I published under cover of my mother’s maiden name, Zilondile Gwala, especially in the Indicator Journal – a journal of social trends published by the University of Natal. Through both the school work and the political analysis, I could claim to have been close to what the invisible public felt about their lot, their hopes and aspirations, and what the politics of liberation had in store for them. The stronger the forces of liberation appeared to be, the higher the hopes for the liberation ship to dock filled with the long-promised cargo. Indeed, the commitments made at Kliptown three and a half decades earlier seemed to be within reach. So when that eventful announcement by De Klerk on the second of February 1990 was broadcast on the screens, it was the dawn of a new era.
After South Africa attained democracy in 1994, all citizens affirmed the sentiments of the Freedom Charter in the preamble to the Constitution of 1996, which was strikingly similar in spirit. “We the people of South Africa . . . believe that South Africa belongs to all who live in it united in our diversity.” The preamble healed the wounds of the past, laid the foundations for a harmonious society that respected the dignity of all persons and promised to “improve the quality of life of all citizens and free the potential of each person.” It ended in a multilingual plea to the Almighty: “God protect our people.” (The Constitution of the Republic Act No 8 of 1996)
The Mandela presidency became widely known as an era of reconciliation and nation building. With the tone set by Mandela’s morally towering personality and magnanimity in victory, as well as the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, this government was characterised by an inclusive approach, both constitutionally and in practice. Also, honour and decorum in matters of state were generally observed. But besides this, the Reconstruction and Development Programme showed that the political elite were concerned with issues that affected ordinary men and women. If this was a honeymoon, it carried with it an infectious aura and a pervasive inclusiveness. Nineteen years into the transition both the honeymoon and the hopes have been confronted with severe challenges, if not the threat of obliteration.
Developments over the past five years or so have created grave doubts regarding the resolve of the government to uphold the sacred values enshrined in the Freedom Charter and expressed in the Constitution, both of which are auspicious and healing documents. As a nation, we are in the throes of a moral crisis which underlies a crisis of confidence in government and in the country. This is expressed in the anguish and near despair articulated by a large section of patriotic South Africans. The reason is crystal clear. Pick up any newspaper or tune in to any electronic media channel, and you will find a gaffe by a senior official if not some shocking report on corruption or mismanagement in Government.
The reasons for widespread cynicism are easily accounted for. For instance:
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