Terror and Courage

For the past few days, I have had someone staying with me who goes back well into my past. We were together in the underground in Lesotho, in the early 1980s and in Pietermaritzburg in the mid to late 1980s. Needless to say, these were extremely difficult times.

In Lesotho, there was continuously the threat of raids from the South African Defence Forces. They came across the border in 1983 and again in 1985. They killed at will. They targeted specific buildings and killed anyone inside those buildings. People were killed while they slept. One had her throat slashed, as she slept in a hotel room in the middle of Maseru. As it happens, they killed someone with absolutely nothing to do with the ANC. They had been given information that a particular cadre was staying in room “x” which was (say) three rooms to the left on the right hand side of the building on the third floor – they counted from the left hand side, instead of the right hand side, and that was the person that died. In the aftermath of the raid, I drove with two friends to the houses of those who had been killed. The horror still lives with me today.

In Pietermaritzburg, during what was called the “Seven day war” we saw yet more horror, as the state backed Inkatha and the ANC fought each other. (This was after Nelson Mandela had been released). We were living in the “black” township of Imbali and lecturing in the Federal Theological Seminary, at the time.

We were just remembering some of the moments which continue to haunt us. Bodies lying in the road. Bodies piled in the mortuary. Bodies found in the forest. Remembrance services held in the Lay Centre in an attempt to help people come to terms with the tremendous loss we were suffering.

I said to my friend, that when I think back on those days, the thing I struggle with is remembering my own cowardice – the extraordinary level of fear I had. And, she reminded me, it was not the way I behaved. People were not aware of that fear and that cowardice. I was glad to hear of things I did, which were not cowardly, but still I remember it being there. And it has made me somewhat less judgemental of cowards, I think.

Journeying for Justice - Stories of an ongoing faith-based struggle

Journeying for Justice – Stories of an ongoing faith-based struggle”, compiled by the PACSA 30th anniversary Collective, Cluster Publications and Jive Media, Pietermaritzburg, 2009, 144pp
It is undoubtedly the case that the Pietermaritzburg Agency for Christian Social Awareness (PACSA) was, and perhaps still is, a highly significant organisation, in the life of Pietermaritzburg and the surrounding areas of that city. The book correctly locates the beginnings of the organisation within the context of a developing Black Consciousness ideology in the 1970s. The major premise on which it was formed was to start a white organisation, which would set about “converting” white people – or rather to win them over to a more democratic frame of political consciousness.

Now, whether it actually ever really did that, is difficult to tell. The book does not deal with the question directly, but rather suggests that although that may have been the impetus for its beginnings as an organisation, it soon found itself pulled into the whirlpool of broader political involvement in the late 1970’s and 1980’s.

At the same time, the book (and I would understand here that the book comes from the organisation itself) also seems to give the impression that the issue of white “conversion” was so vast and so impossible a task, that perhaps it would be true to say that not even PACSA itself believed that achieving this was ever a real possibility – certainly not to the extent which would have been needed to change the outcome of a whites only election.

What happened, and what is engagingly documented in the book, is a range of information dissemination - “Factsheets” - which provided white people (and indeed anyone else) with the kind of information they would not get easily elsewhere (because of draconian government restrictions at the time, on the media).

Another way in which PACSA sought to create solidarity around the cause of liberation was through “Agape” (fellowship) meals. These were Ecumenical quasi-Eucharistic events in which like-minded people could come together to affirm each other and to share bread and drink in a meal of fellowship. These, apparently died away after a while – but their significance in creating a committed community of like-minded and mutually supported individuals seems hard to overestimate.

Having lived in Pietermaritzburg during the 1980’s and early 1990’s, I knew many of the personalities featured in this book. I never involved myself very directly in the work of PACSA, because I was, in fact, working underground for the African National Congress. And this was the problem: For me to have been an active member of PACSA would have unnecessarily exposed the work I was doing elsewhere to the security police, so I could not. Pietermaritzburg was, however, an extremely small place and whites involved in the struggle at any level were few and far between – so we all knew each other fairly well – and I am sure the security police knew all of us too!

This is one of the features of the organisation which the book does not deal with adequately, in my opinion. I suppose it is understandable in what amounts to a commemorative publication. But the fact is, PACSA also had its problems. It was a small organisation. Its connection to the liberation movements was somewhat idiosyncratic at times. It was, or at least appeared to be, a church organisation, but it seemed to operate almost like a political organisation – taking orders from no-one. This made it fairly unpredictable on the one hand and on the other, sometimes much too close to some of the highly problematic positions taken by the Heads of Churches , at the time.

Let me say immediately that Peter Kerchhoff, founder and major driver of PACSA between 1978-99, was a man I admire greatly. I have said so elsewhere and I have no hesitation in saying so again now. But he did not function politically. He functioned, 99% of the time, from his heart. And that could be extremely difficult, every now and again, from a political perspective.

This aspect, the book does not deal with. It is, of course, part of the bigger issue of the relationship between the Church as a whole and the struggle for liberation. That there was a relationship, is obvious. That the Liberation movements needed the Church, is also obvious. What is not so obvious is how timid the Liberation movements were in the presence of the churches, on the one hand, and how difficult it was, from within the Liberation movements to work with them, because of their almost total lack of strategy and accountability. PACSA seems to me to have fallen, frequently, between these two stools of church accountability and political responsibility.

Bar that point – and I would say it is a fairly significant point – the book is well worth having, if one is either interested in the period, of if you lived through it. It certainly brings us now, to a point of anamnēsis - “remembering”. A remembering beyond nostalgia. A remembering which takes the lessons of the past to be used in the present, in order to change the future. PACSA certainly did that when I was living in Pietermaritzburg. I understand that it continued to do so on a range of issues, including Land and Gender, after I had left. I have no doubt it will continue into the future.

The question for me is always going to be – to what extent is an organisation an extension of the Church, sometimes at its most difficult and its most reactionary and to what extent is PACSA prophetic to both Church and society. Because I am fairly certain the latter is what the organisation wants to be.

Which makes me wonder why such an important issue was, seemingly, avoided in this book.

My Friend Tito

I first met Tito Mboweni, the soon-to-be retired Governor of the South African Reserve Bank, in Lesotho, where we were both living in exile. The year must have been 1981. Our paths crossed in that strange, former British protectorate, which in the 1960s had achieved independence. It was, and is, a country completely surrounded by South Africa. It relies on South Africa for every bag of maize meal, every matchstick, every candle. And yet, because it was independent, it was a place where the then outlawed African National Congress (ANC) could operate.

I was there, having fled the country in order to avoid conscription into the Army. Tito was forced to flee the country because of political activism and was now in the underground ANC. We would, almost certainly, never have met in South Africa, and if we did, we would never have done so as equals. Because that is what apartheid was all about. It was about inequality. It was about keeping people apart and it was about ensuring that if people of different colours did meet, the one would be the master and the other the servant.

But there, in Lesotho, we met as equals. As comrades. Tito was my recruiter and controller, in relation to the ANC. We never spoke of it as such, but that is what brought us together. I did not realise then, that it was going to be the beginning of an incredible journey for both of us, in very different directions.

Tito was a young student, but honed in the fires of revolution. I was just a justice- minded white boy, who thought that apartheid was wrong and not worth defending. But more pertinently, I could quite easily have been a spy. So getting involved with me was a risky business for Tito.

My then wife, Jane, and I grew very close to him. We taught him how to drive in our little Volkswagen Beetle. We spoke long into the night, about “home” and about what the struggle was all about, and about our history and about the nature of oppression and revolution. Sometimes, it was about simpler things. Like how to roast a chicken, or to his incredulity, me explaining what the “Tube” is in London. Tito could not get over the weirdness of a train which travelled underground – until, of course, he saw one for himself.

That friendship changed my life. And for the better. I remember several years later, when both of us were in London or Zambia, how we would be homesick. Not for South Africa, but for Lesotho – where for the first time we were able to live and ordinary human beings together. Lesotho gave us back the humanity which apartheid had robbed us of .

There were times of terror which we experienced together. Like the raid in 1982 into Maseru, when the apartheid army entered the country and killed several sleeping comrades. I remember Jane and I hearing the news in the morning and leaping into the car to drive to Maseru. On the road, we found Tito and another friend Ngoako Ramalhodi hitching into the Capital. On the way in, they were speaking about the struggle – and how we needed now to pick up the fallen spear. There was no bitterness in what they were saying. There was no hatred of white people in general. We were together with them in this struggle. We were one of them. We were together in the struggle for peace and freedom in South Africa.

Moments like these are unforgettable. They change the way one thinks. They shift the way one understands one’s place in the universe. They come very rarely - if ever, for some people. I am one of the lucky ones.

I was Best Man at Tito’s and his then wife Mamokotlana’s wedding. I was amazed and honoured that he asked me to be his Best Man. The marriage ended, but my friendship with both Tito and Kotli has lasted through the years. Tito, on his return into a liberated country, was given a Cabinet post in the new government, and then went on to become Governor of the Reserve Bank. It was an orbit and a realm which I was, obviously, unable to keep up with. But through the years, we have kept in contact, through the occasional text message, a phone call late at night, a chance meeting. He has been at the launch of two of my books and he has done so happily and the feeling between us has been warm.

Now the tide has turned. New political realities have changed the landscape and, for whatever reason, Tito has decided not to be reappointed in the position of Governor of the Reserve Bank. It will be difficult for him, because it was a position he enjoyed. He enjoyed the power, the prestige, the sheer uniqueness of the job. He enjoyed the adulation of people and he certainly enjoyed obeisance. He had some really odd quirks – such as insisting on being called “Governor”, even by those close to him apparently - (something I could never do, and never did). He insisted on having his own photographer, and that only the photos taken by that photographer could be used in the media. These are conceits and affectations, which he has lived with for the past 10 years. I suspect they will be difficult things to give up.

I have heard it said by more than one person (and not only his political enemies) that he is arrogant. That is certainly true. He is. And the job he has held for the past while has allowed that arrogance to grow and perhaps to be unchecked. The arrogance is there, certainly, together with a lack of concern about people, which is sometimes difficult to justify. But I have also experienced something very different as well. I have experienced kindness, and gentleness and friendship and commitment. I have not minded the arrogance, because the other was there also, in good measure. He is a complex character.

I remember sitting in a car, in Roma, the little University village in Lesotho, some 30 minutes outside of Maseru, late at night talking to him. I said to him there was something I needed to tell him, because it may, perhaps, have security implications. I told him I was Gay.

His response was, firstly, surprise. Then he said this. He said “You know, in the struggle, you sometimes see really terrible things. You see necklaces (the terrible method which was used for a while, of placing a burning car tyre around the neck of a suspected spy). You see dead bodies. You see torture.” He went on, “In that spectrum, to find out that someone is Gay, is a very small thing indeed”.

I have always valued that comment, for putting things in a bit of perspective.