At the peak of my political development Thabo Mbeki was at his prime. In every way he was the over domineering figure in the South African political landscape and most importantly the movement and nation’s political thought.
His ideas, contested or accepted, influenced the national discourse in no small way. As young activists, beyond reading historic documents of the ANC we had contemporary material produced by the sitting president of the movement on a weekly basis that forced us to engage in debates about the future of our country.
One of his greatest achievements, perhaps, was to take a nation that had otherwise been almost exclusively concerned with its own politics, a function of its history of internal struggles and isolation, on an African safari. A journey into the African continent that for the first time forced many of us to engage with our African brothers and sisters in deep conversations about Africa’s development and oddly enough its past well. Mbeki, in a very systematic way forced us out of our comfort zones, began to teach us about interconnectivity of development without him directly saying so to us.
He made us realise the relationship between the past, the present and the future but importantly that our own national development is intimately linked and connected to that of our continent and the world. Perhaps, one of his great contributions was to redefine the narrative about SA on the global stage. Up until that point we were largely known and understood through our apartheid history and as the nation that produced a world icon, Madiba – Nelson Mandela.
But Mbeki showed the world another face to SA. A people who were deep thinkers, concerned not only by their own unfortunate past of racial discrimination but a nation that could equally compete on the world stage in thought and practice.
Through Mbeki, we as a nation, started to participate in critical global conversations influenced by his actual participation on our behalf at the G20 and his strong voice in the annual gatherings of global leaders at the United Nations General Assembly. It was unimaginable for young township and rural youth of our generation that we could have found ourselves conversant on continental and global issues in the way that we were.
It was only through Mbeki’s leadership that we found ourselves traversing these territories. Of course, there are other things that we also learnt through Mbeki on what not to emulate. His leadership was not the most ideal for a thriving alliance. I know he could have done better to harness the cohesion of progressive forces internally for a national project built, supported and ultimately of benefit to the majority of our people at home.
Through his attempts and I think failures of bringing white capital into the project of transformation we learnt that we should not have an over reliance in the transformative potential of the historic owners of capital in this country. His attempts at courting them into the national project were in vein, to a large extent. It posed, for him and us as a nation, a great dilemma in the the task of transforming the economy of our country and the project of nation building.
Mbeki and the movement under his leadership at the time firmly understood the historical exclusion of blacks to a range of social services provided by the state and sought to address this very clear and well understood reality but inherently he appreciated that the journey of national transformation was to be a long road that required an active state.
He had no illusion that the attainment of a prosperous society would be realised in a term but maybe in a generation. Whilst we worked hard to achieve that the state would need to intervene on behalf of the most marginalised until they were able to transition into middle class status where they could be economically self reliant.
At the heart of the Mbeki project was to transition the majority of poor black communities into middle class status which would form the back bone of South African society: it’s politics, culture, the economy and other facets. He hinged his bets for long term development on the creation of a middle class, perhaps an influence of his British experience. There are many things I could say about Mbeki and the teachings he gave us over a period of 20 years in active politics in the country post the unbanning. One that stands out for me is his intellectual stature, whether you agree or disagree with him. With that he defied many narratives that apartheid had perpetuated about the African, namely that we cannot think, we are barbaric and we will not be able to govern our own country.
Yes Mbeki was a dreamer but he was a doer as well. Many will say a lot of different things and remember him through different lenses, that is ok, but this is the Thabo Mbeki I know and I grew up under.
Happy 80th birthday to Zizi, the World SG we never had.
• Sipuka works for the United Nations as the Head of the Resident Coordinator's Office in Pretoria.
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