In his memoir titled The Story of my Life, the former leader of the Zimbabwe African People’s Union (Zapu), Joshua Nkomo, makes a profound statement when he says: “The hardest lesson of my life has come to me late – it is that a nation can win freedom without its people becoming free.”
I found myself reflecting on this statement a week ago after reading the story of Thando Mahlangu, an Ndebele cultural activist who was humiliated in a Clicks store at Boulders Shopping Centre in Midrand – during Human Rights Month.
In the video that has gone viral, Mahlangu, wearing Ndebele attire comprised of traditional underwear and a traditional blanket draped around his shoulders, is seen being told to leave the store by the centre manager, who contended that Mahlangu’s attire was “inappropriate”.
Mahlangu can be heard arguing that the clothing was part of his tradition, and profoundly making the point that Western clothing would not solicit the kind of humiliation he was being subjected to.
Following a social media uproar about Mahlangu’s treatment, apologies were issued left, right and centre. Clicks jumped to explain that it was the centre manager, not the store, that tried to deny Mahlangu admission. The centre manager was subsequently suspended.
Redefine Properties, the owners of Boulders Shopping Centre, said they want to apologise to Mahlangu in person. This demonstration of remorse and accountability is great, but it does not answer the most important question: Why did something this heinous happen in the first place, and how do we ensure that it never happens again?
The incident occurred because despite being a demographic majority in SA, black people are still a cultural minority. Centuries of systematic racism and disenfranchisement have reduced us to pariahs in our own land – natives who must beg to be accommodated by a minority that decimated our traditional systems and violently imposed upon us their own culture.
This violence has been so deeply embedded in our collective psyche that not only do we no longer need draconian apartheid laws to perpetuate it, but we no longer even need white people to commit the violence. Our own black brothers and sisters are doing it voluntarily, as was the case with the black centre manager of Boulders Shopping Centre.
Mahlangu was degraded because indigenous systems, including traditional attire, have been reduced to the status of the “exotic” and “unusual”, while Western systems, from knowledge to the economy, are the norm. You see it at weddings where black people don’t regard themselves married until they have a white wedding, which they regard more highly than they do a traditional wedding.
We don’t seem to realise that both are traditional weddings – the white wedding is tradition to its own people. Our heritage and cultures are celebrated as a one-day event on September 24, as though we are without culture the entire year except on that one day where we can wear our proudly traditional regalia. But from the 25th until the following year, our traditional attires are “inappropriate” and liable to get us thrown out of stores. Our hair is “unruly” and can get us suspended from schools.
This country is in desperate need of a cultural revolution – one that will result in laws that protect the humanity of black people in the true sense of the word. It must be deemed both immoral and illegal to do to black people what was done to Mahlangu.
Universities must be compelled to prescribe African intellectuals and scholars. Genuine cultural diversity must be imposed in the corporate world. The media must be fined for anti-black advertorials. Government officials must be removed for being enablers of Verwoerdian laws and programmes. A price must be paid – because we cannot be criminalised for being black in our country. We don’t owe anyone palatability.
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