Nkosana Sibuyi

Posted by Nkosana Sibuyi:13 September 2010
Scribbled on : 14 September 2003
This epistle is part of the essays written as part of the “Scribbles from my Archive”

1. Prelude

13 September 2003 reconfirmed the correctness and appropriateness of the worldview that one has cherished for some time. It was a splendid occasion organized by the Steve Biko Foundation under the overarching theme “Homecoming: Celebrating Ngugi, Remembering Sobukwe” held at the Sandton Convention Centre.

In attendance were Professor Ngugi wa Thiong’o, that global public intellectual, writer and academic, Dr Xolela Mangcu, the acerbic executive director of the Steve Biko Foundation, Nkosinathi Biko (Steve Biko’s son), Mama Ntsiki Biko (widow of the late Steve Biko) Advocate Dikgang Moseneke, Dr Barney Pityana, Vice Chancellor of the University of South Africa, Advocate Mojanki Gumbi, Dini Sobukwe, Benjamin Pogrund, chronicler of that seminal book “How can a man die better: The life of Robert Sobukwe”, poet Bra Willie Keorapetse Kgositsile and many others.

Shortly before the genesis of the formal event, one had an opportunity to engage Dr Barnery Pityana. “The problem with today’s young intellectuals is that they are very conservative” he opined.

With a heightened sense of innocence and naivety befitting a young man who somehow felt challenged:” What do you mean?” I asked curiously. “They lack that resilient radicalism and militancy that characterized public discourse and national debate in this country in the 1970s” he said emphatically.

Unfortunately, we could not engage any further as our ears had to be glued to Robert Nkuna, General Manager of the Communication Division at the South African Post Office, one of the sponsors of the event. Mr Nkuna unveiled the Sobukwe stamp and reaffirmed the post office’s commitment to restore our history.

Drawing on one’s memory bank on radical intellectualism however, one was reminded of Paul Freire ’s central argument when he posit that “ the radical, committed to human liberation, does not become the prisoner of a circle of certainty within which reality is also imprisoned. “On the contrary, the more radical the person is, the more fully he or she enters into reality so that, knowing it better, he or she can better transform it”, he continued.

Admittedly, it is this emergence of awareness of the self-hood and critical consciousness that prompted one to critically evaluate the correctness of our South African history.

The formal programme kick-started with a video depicting the work, vision and strategic intent of the Steve Biko Foundation. One of the clips in the video was that of Chinua Achebe, writer of the epic book, Things Fall Apart, who was captured saying “Do not let Steve Biko die.”

As if that is not enough, Kgafela oa Magogodi gave an innovative rendition of a dialogue with Sobukwe. With the creativity that accompanies such defining moments, he posed the simple question: “What did Sobukwe Say?” We all retorted “Speak the truth before we die”

Like an epic biblical verse rendered by devout Christians in a church service singing ‘Halleluya’, or verse in communist anthem, The Internationale, “Arise ye prisoners of starvation”, Speak the truth before we die was a mantra that was to be repeated and immortalized by the audience with pride and dignity.

Dini Sobukwe, Robert Sobukwe’ son recalled the despicable conditions under which his father was subjected to during the heydays of the apartheid system. “I do not want prison to change me” Sobukwe said to his son at the time.

When Benjamin Pogrund took the stage, he maintained that much still needs to be done in South Africa to overcome the heritage of the past. He postulated that it is wrong to allow our history to slip away from public memory. He argued that Steve Segale, Promise Ngwenya, Lawrence Banda and Godrey Bichi, who it was through him that Sobukwe’s speech was preserved for posterity. Sobukwe’s story and that of many unsung heroes should be told and retold. “We need to plant trees to remember those unsung heroes. Trees are good to the soil. They bring rain and wealth to the nation,” he advised.

As the eponymous night progressed, Bra Willie Kgositsile who was to introduce Sonia Sanchez and Wa Thiong’o said something that left a deep impression in me.

“Anything that you think that cannot be translated at a practical level is not worth anything in the planet. Unless, it has a sense of social relevance, it is not worth the paper it is written on.” he said.

He recalled that when he started writing, he met with his contemporaries as activists in the movement (ANC) and as such all of them were not keenly aware that each in their own right and secluded enclaves were clandestinely reflecting on the South African reality, telling a story from as seen from the lenses of the oppressed.

” When Denis Brutus said English would be a language of the 21st Century, I became angry and stubborn, as I believed that language is a repository of collective memory. The English language is not the only poetic in the world” he emphasized.

Accordingly, when Professor Wa Thiong’o was called (by Sonia Sanchez after reading an inspiring poem about Biko) to the podium, we all stood up and patiently sat down to feast on the food for intellectual thought.

In his introductory note, Wa Thiongo reflected on a meeting he had with Tokyo Sexwale in Cape Town where he delivered the Fourth Steve Biko Memorial Lecture on 12 September 2003, date in which Biko’s life was terminated by the apartheid juggernaut. According to Wa Thiongo, Sexwale spoke at length about Sobukwe and Madiba and wondered how they survived. During their incarceration at Robben Island, they could see the land and the memory it carries. “What made them survive were the living voices of the struggle. We need to connect ourselves with those who have died” he maintained.

Drawing on the lecture he delivered at the Steve Biko Memorial Lecture , wa Thiong’o intimated that we should not allow our memory as African people to die. “..consciousness resides in memory. Even at the very simple level of our daily experience we get excited when we visit say, the place we were born, and recall the various landmarks of our childhood. Sometimes we feel a sense of loss when we find that the place no longer holds any traces of what the place once meant to us. Memory is also the site of dreams, desire. And when we say that a person has lost his or her memory, we are talking of a real loss of those traces that make individuals make sense of what is happening to them. Imprisonment and torture alters or breaks memory’, he had argued a day earlier in his lecturer .

‘If the site of dreams, desire, image, consciousness, is memory, where is the location of memory itself? What is the site of memory?’ he asked.

At the end of Ngugi’s address, one concluded that the preservation of our memory is inextricably intertwined with the national struggle to reassert our dignity, rewrite our history and reaffirm our integrity. Principally, this crusade will be a struggle to own our memory by consciously becoming agents of historical change or “keepers of memory.”

It is within this context and narrative that one sought to use the observations made and lessons learnt at this occasion to reflect on the need to reconnect memory and its social relevance in the current conjecture.

2. Reconnecting Memory and its social relevance

We live in a world of ideas, for history and memory keeping remain socially relevant to humanity’s development. The realm of ideas is understandably a contested terrain. Consistent with the orientation and worldview that has shaped us in different ways, our interpretation of history, social progress and its contemporary relevance is bound to be divergent.

However, it is critical to extricate ourselves from the dogma of empty arrogance which seeks to undermine, malign and invalidate the worldviews of those who do not have the same ideological, political, philosophical and intellectual outlook. Allowing ourselves to be incapacitated by the demon of denialism, arrogance and failure to acknowledge the role played by different formations, in their different capacities, in bringing about social change in the country, will deprive posterity the script that has archived the experience of our collective memory.

In the past two months or so, one has been re-reading Paulo Freire (Pedagogy of the oppressed), Mosibudi Mangena (On Your Own, Evolution of Black Consciousness in South Africa/Azania), Steve Biko (I write what I like), Njabulo Ndebele (Rediscovery of the Ordinary), Slovo’s Unfinished Autobiography, Helena Dolny’s Banking on Change, Lucky Mathebe (Bound by Tradition: The world of Thabo Mbeki), Brian Bunting (Moses Kotane: South African Revolutionary), Professor William Makgoba (The Makgoba Affair), GWF Hegel (The Phenomenology of Spirit) and Franz Fanon (Wretched of the Earth). I am now busy reading ‘How can a man die better: the life of Robert Sobukwe’ by Benjamin Pogrund.

In my own subjective analysis, one consistent theme that comes out of these books is that of asserting the truth and preserving memory, the need to be honest to our conscience and ourselves and others. The contemporary relevance of reconnecting with memory, challenging the reader to ‘pay attention a putative injunction which my read-reader, contemplate the lesson, and act on it! After all, life is too short! Knowledge lives for ever ”

Married to this overarching message, the principal theme that runs like a golden thread in one’s psyche is Sobukwe’s clarion call that “we speak the truth before we die.” Hence, the advantage with any writing that reflect nothing but the truth could be translated at a practical level and infuse a sense of social relevance in a society as complex as ours.

To the extent that truth becomes relevant beyond here and now, emerging young intellectuals should desist from being “conservative” or allow (themselves) to be manipulated through half-truths, deceit and false consciousness. In this complex world, the realm of ideas, though very fluid, history and memory seldom becomes the usual casualty. Which brings one to the over-abused observation, which proceeds from the premise that Blacks, have done very little to reconnect with their memory through literature that seeks to depict a true South African reality. The South African story still has to be told and retold. As the country marches towards the first decade of liberation, many works that purport to examine the progress made since 1994 and the challenges faced remain incomplete and biased in favour of the writer’s consciousness and orientation. Professor Terreblance’s book , whose manuscripts were apparently leaked, to coincide with the ANC Stellenbosch National Conference was, in one’s own observation, timed to help dictate or give context to the discourse on macro-economic debate.

In February this year, I argued that without a shred of hyperbole, an honest analysis freed from the warps and woof of academic ivory towerism would objectively reveal that a comparative examination of the apartheid and democratic governments would show that the strides that have been made from 1994 to 2002 far outweigh the ‘achievements’ archived from 1948 to 1994.

On the whole, if we agree that the study of history posses distinctive competencies which conforms to the art and science of social sciences, it is undoubtedly a commitment to accuracy and veracity which helps to understand the complexity and intricacies of both the objective and subjective environment and how it has shaped humanity’s behaviour and her interaction with the rapidly changing circumstances.

In other words, the work of the historians is generally infused by a commitment to serve the needs of the society that she is a member of. In addition, scholarship is a social process, which in the end must justify its cost to society by the benefits it creates. Many social scientists today feel that social science is a tool in the struggle for a humane, better and tranquil world. Perhaps the question that needs to be posed is: of what use is Professor Terreblanche’s pamphleteering and falsification of history in this hour of the third year of the African Century?

To what extent do Alistar’s and the HSRC books reflect a true and genuine South African reality?

Quite clearly, a dialogue to address these nagging questions when reflecting on the sub-theme “drafting the script for the first decade of freedom’ is instructive.

What does Unisa’s honour to Peter Magubane symbolize in the crusade to preserve and reconnect our memory? Clearly, if we are to remain faithful to history, posterity will marvel at the judicious manner within which we have crafted an indelible script, which will leave an epochal mark in this history of humanity. Our historical memory, fears, achievements, doubts and heroism will be embedded in the African tapestry, resolute in the enactment of an edifice, which is truly reflective of the South African memory-bank.

How are we going to define the misrepresentations and inaccuracies inherent in the history books which our children in both primary and secondary schools are forced to internalize innocently as the gospel truth? How many of us are prepared to speak the truth we die?

Taken further, was Mac Maharaj’s claim in the 1970s that Steve Biko was a spy imbued with a sense of truism in it ? Was it a hybrid of a self-serving promotion and deliberate distortion or a sad reflection of empty arrogance which seeks to undermine, malign and invalidate the worldviews of those who do note have the same ideological, political, philosophical and intellectual outlook? To quote from Mosibudi Mangena , was he intending to emerge out of this as an instant “hero of Herculean proportions?”

Necessarily, one needs to appreciate that considering this matter in its totality, it reflects an anomie or the senility of a social phenomenon wherein over-reliance on labeling and name-calling shapes the discourse thereby deliberately assaulting the basic tenets of any honest debate: truth. Ultimately, a consequence of this is that truth is bound to suffocate, without affording it spaciousness and timelessness to assert its correctness in the realm of memory-catacomb.

Our analogy will be puerile and dishonest to the extreme if allow ourselves to be incapacitated by the demon of denialism, schizophrenia, arrogance and failure to acknowledge the role played by different formations, in their different capacities, in bringing about social change in the country. It will deprive posterity the script that has archived the experience of our collective memory.

As keepers of our own memory, what lessons can we draw from Maharaj’s claim? Without overemphasizing the degree and extent to which each political formation contributed to the liberation of the oppressed in South Africa, we need to acknowledge that we all made a contribution to the struggle in our different capacities: It could have been in political formations, civil society, academia, student activism, media, international mobilization etc. It is a totality of all these collective energy (which were complementary to each others) that the apartheid locomotive was brought to a complete halt.

For instance, Mangena argues that “it is reasonable to imagine that there might not have been any June 16, 1976 uprising without BCM, and that if there was one without the Movement, it might not have had the same political complexion, scope and character that is had.”

He attributes his contention to four major reasons: First, he argues that between 1968 and 1976 the BCM, through its various formations had managed to conscientise a lot of people. Second, the ideology of black consciousness had succeeded in eradicating the phenomenon of inferiority complex amongst blacks and imbued them with a spirit of self-assertiveness. Third, he contends that the uprising was broadly directed at the whole white malevolent dictatorship in the country. Last, the mobilisation of the students and parents that preceded the June 16, 1976 was undertaken by BCM through its high school student wing, SASM.

Having read a welter of fulminations on the historical analysis observable in the interpretations attached to June 16, the ideological vertebral column that shaped it, is unambiguously indicative of the fact that they are diverse, and therefore it is a contested terrain. As we approach the first decade of freedom, the appropriate level of analysis should not seek to be reductionist and selective, rather it should be all-inclusive, truthful, non-biased, and should become a sacred script that seeks to connect posterity to the South African memory.

The same should apply to the Sharpville massacre. As systematic body of scientific inquiry, therefore should provide an honest reflection on the evolution of the South African miracle by looking at the points of convergence such as would inspire us give a concrete expression to the dictum of speaking the truth before die.

The continued commitment to rewrite our history and its expression are evolving with our nascent democratic dispensation. But a narrative and critically, an assessment of the observable utterances and analysis by the media, opinion makers and analysts about the progress or retrogress made since the dawn of the democratic epoch is instructive. Therefore, failure to do so might be an admission of the status quo thereby creating a fertile ground for the manipulation and falsification of our history. It is in this context that, the next Scribble from my Archive section will attempt to reflect on the centrality of memory in archiving the strides of the first decade of our liberation and the attendant challenges of the next decade.