Today (27 April) marks the 23RD anniversary of the first democratic elections in South Africa. They were the first national elections in South Africa where people of all races, ethnicity and class that are over the age of 18, could vote –the anniversary of freedom.
My grandmother is of Malawian descent. Her father moved the family to South Africa in 1958 when she was only 10 years old. She usually recounts stories of growing up in the apartheid era with heavy sighs and a broken voice. I asked her one day how she was able to forgive white people, she said closure enabled her to appreciate freedom and gave her the courage to forgive.
“Resentment is like drinking poison and then hoping it will kill your enemies.” – Nelson Mandela
When my grandmother was in her late teens, her father, who worked on a farm, went to work and never returned home. She said they knew that he was gone. It was normal back then for black people to disappear or get killed without explanation. There was no funeral for him. Her mother eventually remarried, they relocated to a different part of the province and ultimately never spoke about him again… until 1995. The year of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and a year after the first democratic elections. My grandmother was contacted by the son of a farmer who asked to meet her so they could talk about my great-grandfather. That was the beginning of a mission to bring him home. According to the farmer’s son, my great-grandfather was killed on his father’s property by another farmer after he intervened in a physical altercation between that farmer and his wife.
She believed him because it was characteristic of him to defend another human being no matter what. He was selfless. The farmer’s son promised to help them find his remains. They relentlessly searched mortuaries and eventually found him in 1997. On the same year, her father got a proper burial, she got her first well-paying job at the age of 49 and I was born. That’s when she stopped being angry and decided to forgive. Sure it felt good to vote but the real freedom came after. It came in the form of closure. To not be deprived of getting a job, burying her father and taking care of her family was freeing. And to the amusement of everyone I introduce myself to, they named me after my great-grandfather, Thabiso (predominantly a boy’s name so to avoid being the butt of every sexist joke I shorten it to Thabi).
The root of this oppression was a political party called The National Party which came into power in 1948. Although Cape legislation that discriminated specifically against black Africans started before 1900, the National Party legitimised this discrimination through government. It boasted an all-white government and it enforced policies of racial segregation and white supremacy. A system that came to be known as apartheid. Under apartheid, people of colour were forced to live in separate areas called Townships, they were forced to use separate public facilities and contact between different races was limited. By 1950, the National Party government had banned interracial marriages, particularly marriages between black and white people. This oppression was systematic and institutionalised to the core.
The government of President F.W. de Klerk only began to repeal most of the legislation that provided the basis for apartheid in 1991 and it will take some time to undo decades of oppressive circumstances dressed as legislation. For instance, a series of Land Acts set aside more than 80 percent of the country’s land for the white minority and in 2017, a lot of black people remain landless.
“We need to create a new breed of South Africans, who love their country and love everybody irrespective of their colour”. – Chris Hani
However, today we celebrate the sacrifices of freedom fighters, we celebrate every life that was lost to this disgusting era in our country and I celebrate my great-grandfather, whose legacy lives on in my name. We have a long way to go and it is our duty to fulfill the wishes of those who died so we can have some of the opportunities we have today. Those wishes include an equal, democratic and non-racial society.
