THE Eastern Cape Province is the birth place of Nelson Mandela, the 94 years old ailing father of South Africa’s multi-racial society. It is the natal home of the Xhosa and arrival point of the 1820 settlers.
It was in this region, specifically the village of Qunu, that Mandela hails from even though he was born in Mvezo which has of late been in the news on account of the family feud tearing the Mandela clan apart.
[caption id="attachment_150306" align="alignright" width="315"]
Nelson Mandela[/caption]Oliver Tambo, Walter Sisulu, Steve Biko, Govan Mbeki, Thabo Mbeki and Chris Hani are among well-known South Africans from the Eastern Cape, the rugged region with its rolling hills and undulating valleys that is sometimes called South Africa’s Frontier Country.
Like the rest of the country, this Province has been gripped by fears of Mandela’s ill-health. Even though he is in far away Pretoria, in the Mediclinic Heart Hospital that has been his home since June 8 following a lingering lung infection, no day passes without reference to Madiba.
If prayers are not being organised for his quick recovery somewhere, a march is going on in some other place in his name. These indeed are anxious days for South Africans. Days before my arrival here it all seemed the worst was about to happen after news filtered to the world that Madiba’s health had taken a sudden turn for the worse.
But it felt good to hear how things improved shortly after. Yet the anxious days are not over.
Even while there is nothing new to report other than the regular tit-bits from ANC officials, including President Zuma that the old man is improving, news of him or about his grand children still fill the front pages of South African newspapers. It’s all about Mandela all the way. Not even Barack Obama’s visit could take the front page from Mandela.
South Africans are beginning to come to terms with Mandela’s mortality, however, reluctantly. Graca Machel, his wife, seems reconciled to this fact when, at a fundraiser for the Mandela Children Hospital Trust, she praised her husband for his selfless service of providing unity to his nation, service she said would not be forgotten no matter the outcome of his stay in hospital.
A Black tour guide, Michael, taking me around the local university I’m staying had turned to me and asked, during a conversation, if I didn’t think it was time the old man was left alone to go and rest.
I thought he was alluding to the report that Mandela was on life support. My reply was that nothing that could be done to keep him alive should be spared for as long as he was not in a vegetative state.
There have been little by way of information to confirm that Mandela is on life support. Not much information is being released on this.
A report last week says he is on a respirator. My impression is that Mandela is still conscious and for as long as this is so, every effort should be expended to keep him alive.
The fears of the world about Mandela are quite understandable. Widely revered and adored, his presence had done a lot to stabilise South Africa and Black-White relations since he left office in 1999.
The ANC has been largely held together by his presence and leaders of this party definitely have a lot to do to keep things together in the post-Mandela years. Mandela is the wise elder that could be consulted for direction when things seem to be going wrong.
His image loomed larger than life and for as long as he was around, even when not actively in politics, South Africans knew they had a father whose name everyone revered. But those days are sadly in short supply for, no matter what, old age has taken its toll on Mandela’s direct input in ANC or South African politics. Indeed, the feud that has torn his immediate family apart points to Mandela’s waning influence in the affairs of those closest to him to say nothing of the rest of the country and the world.
Mandla, Mandela’s grandson and surviving male heir, has been pitched in battle against the rest of the family, especially his aunts and brothers over his decision to move the remains of Mandela’s three children from their burial site in Qunu to Mvezo, Mandela’s birth place.
Mandela himself would want to be buried in Qunu. But Mandla in his own wisdom and, perhaps throwing his weight around as a local chief and surviving male heir, moved the remains of the deceased family members to Mvezo in 2011 well before Mandela became as fragile as he is now.
It all became a serious point of bitter dispute which the presence of Mandela himself could not resolve for it took the courts to order the return and reburial of the remains in Qunu on July 4.
Amid the in-fighting in the Mandela family the country still has cause for some kind of celebration on the side. It was the National Arts Festival season and South Africans had celebrated their arts, crafts and culture in different ways.
For 11 days, from June 27 to July 7, the small town of Grahamstown, traditional host of the annual festival, came alive as South Africans from different parts of the country converged on the town. Rhodes University, the 109 years old university that defines the cultural life of Grahamstown, was venue for many of the festival events.
The National Arts Festival is reputedly the largest such festival in Africa and perhaps the second largest in the world after the Edinburg Festival. There were film shows, theatre productions, art exhibitions and street dances and the usually quiet town was awake 24 hours. But not even this elaborate festival could completely take the mind off the fact that Mandela was in hospital.
A good number of the events during the festival centre round the Mandela years, the fact of his mortality and the way forward in the post-Mandela years.
The sun may be setting on the Mandela epoch but the memory of this great son of Africa, icon of freedom and citizen of the world would forever linger in the minds of present and future generations of Africans and the world. Your people want you home Madiba; the world loves you.
No comments:
Post a Comment