HOGARTH
The Congress of Traditional Leaders of South Africa is up in arms over the movie Chris Barron asked Contralesa honorary president Patekile Holomisa . . .
It violates our cultural rules. Boys being initiated into manhood are taken away from the community to live in the bushes for some time so that they are not in contact with women and with people who don’t undergo this particular ritual. For someone to go now and invade that space is a violation of those rules.
Is this kind of secrecy appropriate in a modern, open, democratic society?
It is appropriate. Because it is a practice that is even allowed by the constitution. If the constitution allows us to practise our rituals, then the rules applicable to these rituals have to be respected.
Behind this veil of secrecy a lot of bad things have happened to these boys, haven’t they?
This movie is not about that. It’s not about the mutilation that has occurred.
How does the movie violate the sanctity of the ritual?
The very fact that somebody decided to go and film what happens there in order to share that information with people from whom this practice is hidden.
Not the fact that it deals with the issue of gay sex among initiates?
Our objection has nothing to do with the issue of homosexuality. It has to do with going to sacred ground by people who do not participate in this ritual. Sexual activities are not supposed to take place in the initiation space. Whether it is homosexual sex or heterosexual sex, it is not allowed.
But it happens, and this is what the movie shows.
Anything that is not supposed to take place, there are measures that are taken against such people.
Many Xhosa people don’t agree that the movie violates their culture. Don’t their views matter?
This is a democracy. We expect people to hold different views. But different views are supposed to be held and expressed within the confines of these cultural practices.
What gives Contralesa the right to decide for them what violates their culture?
Traditional leaders are the custodians of the culture of their people, they are the guardians of these practices. It is their responsibility to speak out if something wrong happens regarding a cultural practice.
Wrong things have happened for years, there have been mutilations and boys have died, so why is it only now that gay sex is involved that Contralesa is jumping up and down?
That is not true. We take preventative measures when the initiation season is upon us. We are not making noises just because there has supposedly been exposure of homosexuality in people practising this ritual.
Isn’t it only because there has been publicity about the ritual that Contralesa began taking action to stop the abuses and mutilations and deaths?
In my understanding this film is not about exposing the mutilations . . .
The point is that if your rule about the secrecy of the ritual had not been broken, nobody would have known about the mutilations, would they?
No, we would have known.
Would you have done anything about it?
We’ve always done a lot about it. WRITE TO HOGARTH@SUNDAYTIMES.CO.ZA
Mrs Z tears into hubby’s nemesis
Remember how Grace Mugabe leapt to her husband’s defence during his last days in office? With Comrade Oros, Bathabile Dlamini and the Naked Chef deserting uBaba ka D in droves, our Grace from Nkandla, Tobeka Zuma, took matters into her own hands in defence of her lame-duck man. She went on Instagram on Friday to defend her “everyday crush” when it became clear that McBuffalo was turning the screws on Baba.
Her threats to McBuffalo included a prophesy about pigs farting. “uMsholozi did not join the ANC in 1991, jumped ship nor hip hopped between the struggle and wealth accumulation. He left his home at a tender age to fight apartheid. He was prepared to pay the ultimate price. He will finish what he started because he does not take orders beyond the Atlantic Ocean.”
As with Grace, it will all end in tears of disgrace.
. . . backed up by Mrs Gigabyte
Unsurprisingly, one of the first people to like Grace of Nkandla’s social media meltdown was Norma Gigaba, the wife of Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba. Mrs Gigabyte — as she calls herself — should be preparing to post her own rant for when McBuffalo’s new broom sweeps that cabinet clean. The two may as well form a WhatsApp support group of Wives of Soon to Be Unemployed Husbands. ot so long ago, ANC secretary-general Ace Magashule took a swipe at his new boss, McBuffalo, telling ANC diehards to stop eating McDonald’s because it would make them fat.
Well, McBuffalo had his moment to hit back at Ace during a meeting of the ANC parliamentary caucus this week.
Hogarth’s moles at the caucus meeting reported that McBuffalo, while making a case for unity within the ANC, told his MPs that he was not aware that Ace had a thing for McDonald’s, otherwise he would have organised him a regular supply before he quit as the franchisor of the famous American burger.
Hogarth suspects that Ace would have washed that Happy Meal down with a glassful of milk from the Vrede dairy farm.
Mthembu silences Ace and media
Something bizarre occurred at the end of McBuffalo’s encounter with the MPs. Magashule attempted to brief the journos who had camped outside the Old Assembly Chamber but made the mistake of not informing chief whip Jackson Mthembu.
A visibly surprised Mthembu asked his staffers what was going on before vanishing, clearly to talk Magashule into dropping the briefing.
Eventually the two gentlemen stood in front of TV cameras for about three minutes, providing no details about the meeting with the Buffalo Soldier.
“It was just to come and say hello, how are you, work hard, let’s unite and bring confidence to society in general,” said Magashule in his report-back.
When journos protested, Mthembu put his foot in his mouth. “By the way, we just did you a favour and we think you’re pushing and abusing the favour now.”
Tomorrow, and tomorrow . . .
WMcBuffalo flips the burger on Magashule
Nhere the ANC operates, buzzwords and catch phrases abound.
This week it was no different as the governing party officially adopted “postponed” as part of its lexicon.
It started with the announcement on Tuesday by the Headscarf Queen that the state of the nation address had been “postponed”.
McBuffalo followed suit with the postponement of the meeting of the ANC national executive committee.
Then it was the turn of government communications agency GCIS, with the postponement of its annual shindig for members of the fourth estate.
And then the Department of International Relations showed no mercy to uBaba kaDuduzane by postponing the Ubuntu awards ceremony at which the outgoing No1 had hoped to make a desperate public appearance after being forced into exile by his party.