My Land Obsession shares Bulelwa Mabasa's colourful Christian upbringing, framed by the lived experiences of her grandparents, who endured land dispossession in the form of the Group Areas Act and the migrant labour system.
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ABOUT THE BOOK
Bulelwa Mabasa was born into a "matchbox" family home in Meadowlands, Soweto, at the height of apartheid. In My Land Obsession, she shares her colourful Christian upbringing, framed by the lived experiences of her grandparents, who endured land dispossession in the form of the Group Areas Act and the migrant labour system.
Mabasa’s world was irrevocably altered when she encountered the disparities of life in a white-dominated school. Her ongoing interest in land justice informed her choice to study law at Wits, with the land question becoming central in her postgraduate studies.
When Mabasa joined the practice of law in the early 2000s as an attorney, she felt a strong need to build on her curiosity around land reform, moving on to form and lead a practice centred on land reform at Werksmans Attorneys. She describes the role played by her mentors and the professional and personal challenges she faced. My Land Obsession sets out notable legal cases Mabasa has led and lessons that may be drawn from them, as well as detailing her contributions to national policy on land reform and her views on how the land question must be inhabited and owned by all South Africans.
EXTRACT
Mawe and Tata
My grandparents shaped my formative years in ways that leave me inspired. They were real-life examples of the first people I knew and loved who directly bore the brunt of a regime that was intent on separating the country by race. This regime systematically and purposefully crafted a society on the false notion that white supremacy was not only a natural reality but also a biblical necessity that became woven into the psychological, sociological and economic layers of the lives of black Africans.
I have always thought that white supremacy did as much damage to white people as it did to black people, because it dished out to them generations of underserved, inexplicable and gratuitous forms of privilege that resulted in a society riddled with inequality and pain. It also bequeathed white South Africans an intense ignorance and a complete lack of insight or knowledge that deprived them of knowing not only the drudgery of being a black person living in South Africa but also the gems and pearls that resulted in countless black folks claiming joy and triumph, despite it all.
Tata grew up in the rural Transkei in Zimbane. Not much has been documented about his village. He was an older brother to his only sibling, his younger sister, Notizi. They were orphaned early in their lives in a very remote part of the Transkei. Legend has it that they were raised by their grandmother, their late mother’s sisters and kind neighbours in the village who took them in. One such family were the Fincas. Little to nothing is known about their biological father. Tata and Notizi belonged to the Dlamini clan, o Jama Ka Sjadu. Like thousands of other youths, Tata was forced to escape the poverty and dearth in rural Transkei in pursuit of a better and possibly more illustrious life in urban Johannesburg, the City of Gold, full of promise and wonder.
He was as much a craftsman as he was an artist. More than that, he was a man who crafted his own sense of reality – one that would insist on his human dignity and a sense of being beyond his day job and the trappings of a cruel system intent on dehumanising him
Later in life, the boy from the Transkei would graduate from being a boy to a well-respected patriarch and leader in his immediate family and his wider community. In my eyes, his mature age did not take anything away from his stoic nature. He was my grandfather after all. He was anything but weak or frail. Quite the opposite. The only signifier of his age was his silver soft mane and his wrinkles whenever he smiled or laughed heartily, which was most of the time. You would also notice his age when he gave you the disapproving eye, or the quiet look of pride, or even the impatience of the unconscious knowledge that forever is not forever. Tata was a strikingly good-looking man, with eyes that slanted downwards when he smiled and laughed. He was very fair in complexion, which often led to questions about his genealogy.
My early memory of Tata was that of a present, dignified patriarch, who worked for a major electrical wholesaler by day, and by night was a respectable, active and present husband, father and grandfather. At home, he displayed the same ease standing in front of the kitchen sink washing dishes quietly and delicately as he did waking up before we all did to cook us brown sour porridge. He had a job that paid the bills, but he also had a full life that allowed him to live out his purpose – as a leader in the community, a Methodist man of God, a preacher, and an innately talented chorister and choirmaster.
Although he did not say so, there is no doubt in my mind that his day job would have somewhat diminished the essence of who he was and who he was meant to be. His hands were always crafting, whether it was working in the garden in our backyard or building and making wooden chairs and garden furniture. He was as much a craftsman as he was an artist. More than that, he was a man who crafted his own sense of reality — one that would insist on his human dignity and a sense of being beyond his day job and the trappings of a cruel system intent on dehumanising him. He was somehow able to break away from the shackles of the limits of apartheid that were set to reduce him to a mere labourer. At the same time, who knows what the lengths and breadth of his influence would have been beyond his community had he lived in a different time and space?
I was fortunate enough to have witnessed Tata in action in various roles. On the pulpit whenever he preached, and as part of the congregation, I rarely understood or internalised the Word. It always went above my head, as it was far too metaphorical for my developing young mind. By contrast, the elderly ladies sitting near me would often utter "Hallelujah", and some would perspire incessantly, leading to a trance-like state and some collapsing in the process. The small building would sometimes feel like it was caving in, in response to the spirit of God that contained the place like a glove.
Unlike some of the other preachers, whenever it was Tata’s turn, you could hear a pin drop. You could sense the intensity and fire in the room. Legend also had it that Tata was the sought-after preacher during the much-anticipated Seven Words service during Easter. The Easter services took place at Zone 7 Methodist Church about 5km from the Zone 3 parish. Zone 7 is a bigger circuit parish. If the Zone 3 church services were unbearably long, the Zone 7 services were even longer. The heat was invariably difficult to bear. No matter how early you arrived, children would always have to give up their seats for the gogos.
What I understood clearly though is that each preacher was assigned one of the Seven Words and, true to form, Tata would always feature in the programme as one of the preachers who would be assigned to preach about one of the Words. Tata preached in isiXhosa and sometimes dabbled in Sesotho translations. One Word I vividly remember him preaching was the Word Kugqityiwe. It is finished. Those who subscribe to the Christian faith will understand that this was the last Word that Jesus Christ uttered on the cross.
On these occasions, we had to arrive with my mother several hours before the commencement of the service. Although I did not have the vocabulary then, I was able to dwell in a room full of mainly adults, praying incessantly about young men who were targeted and taken away by apartheid forces, or young women who were jack-rolled by local gangsters. Religion and politics were inherently intertwined.
Tata had the congregation’s full attention. I knew then that he was an important man. He would also usher in the choir at the beginning of the service and lead them out again at the end. The services were far too long, interchanging between standing up and sitting down. God remained mysterious. I often wondered at what point He would deliver miracles and relieve these adults from their desperate pleas.
Tata shared with me the tale of how one day he and Mawe were unexpectedly and cruelly uprooted without any prior notice from the home they had built (or rather tried to build) and grown to love in Sophiatown. In their words, Sophiatown was a confluence of South Africa’s bustling multicultural and multiracial diversity, with African, Indian, Chinese and Coloured neighbours living in proximity and relative harmony. Not many tales are told of a time in South Africa when racial division was not a dominant feature.
Mawe and Tata’s dreams of a bright future were shattered when apartheid policemen one day descended in Casspirs, demolishing houses and seizing personal belongings, forcibly removing them and their young children from their home to a makeshift area a few hundred metres from a graveyard. This place was Jabulani. It seems that Jabulani was a temporary holding place, prior to their ultimate forced move to Meadowlands. A Zulu word meaning "be happy", Jabulani would be a far cry from happiness, having heard stories from my father of what appeared to him and his siblings as a haunted place in the middle of nowhere.
The migrant labour system doubtlessly served to eat away at and erode the fabric of the African family. Even in modern-day South Africa, the absent father phenomenon continues to bedevil the life experience of many South Africans
When he arrived in Johannesburg, Tata was one of the young recruits sought or lured by the apartheid regime from the former homelands during the surge in the gold-mining period in the Witwatersrand. He would be one of many hundreds and thousands of young black men who were used as cheap labour to work in the mines and enable the migrant labour system.
Essentially, the black family structure was destroyed by a system that uprooted fathers and husbands from their homes when they were moved to mining towns and housed in what were called "hostels", which were akin to male barracks. These men would only be allowed to go home to their wives and children once a year. The migrant labour system doubtlessly served to eat away at and erode the fabric of the African family. Even in modern-day South Africa, the absent father phenomenon continues to bedevil the life experience of many South Africans.
There were things that struck a chord with me when Tata shared stories of his life as a mineworker. Among them were the inhumane and undignified body searches these men had to endure to satisfy their bosses that no gold was stolen. He related this tale in jest mainly but in graphic terms, telling me of how they would be stripped naked and then asked to separate their buttocks, line by line, in the interests of building an economy that would ensure that generations of black people would remain on its periphery.
Despite all the odds, Tata managed to attain major accolades in his life as a well-respected and renowned community leader, a co-founder of the Mzimvubu School, which doubled as a community church, and the Zone 3 Methodist Church and choir, which was not only revered for its excellence but also for being awarded many trophies in national competitions across the country. In a way, music and the stage were his saving grace — these were the moments that redeemed him from the plight of apartheid. The orphaned little boy from the Transkei, who yearned to become a man of the cloth and to preach the word of God, had lived a lifetime walking and dwelling in His light and purpose.
When Mawe was 18, she was spotted in the choir where she sang lead soprano by one of the missionary scouts and offered a scholarship to become an opera singer in the UK. Her voice, a natural and pitch-perfect soprano, was the second thing that Tata noticed about her; the first was her beauty. She was born on the wrong side of history. And, being a girl, her parents simply scoffed at the idea of their eldest daughter being whisked away to faraway foreign lands, and they expressed shock and horror at the preposterous suggestion of a girl who was coming of age focusing on anything other than creating her own family.
Her dreams of being a famous opera singer may not have come to bear, but, as fate would have it, her womb would birth three sons who became ambassadors for African classical music worldwide and she would live to see it. The dream of a world-renowned opera singer later manifested in her own sons in the most remarkable ways. When nature wants what it wants, it does not stop until its call is answered.
Extract provided by Pan Macmillan
