Growing up in Duncan Village
Pickpockets, gangsters, muti, sangomas and pantsula
Self-confessed pickpocket turned ANC activist Koko Qebeyi has penned and co-published a book on the culture of Duncan Village.
The book, titled iMonti, has taken the Duncan Village-born Qebeyi three years to complete.
It tells stories of the lives of people as well as of the violence, art and culture of the township. There are interesting pictures, including one depicting how immigrants from rural areas in the former Transkei were made to strip naked and submit to dipping to ensure they had no lice. Qebeyi said at the time it was an accepted practice.
“It is a place with a rich and unique social history and it played a particularly significant role in the struggle against apartheid, being the epicentre of both the defiance campaign in the 1950s and the township struggles of the 1980s. We can never run away from the fact that it was that environment that bred both the violence and the drive to change the system of intolerance,” said Qebeyi.
The book takes its readers on a township tour and opens doors into the private lives of some of the community’s most prominent families and characters. Nongqatsini was one such. She was a traditional healer, and the book tells the story of an East Bank gangster who visited her for muti to make him invisible so he could avoid arrest.
It also features the Twakus. One of this family’s members, Pule Twaku, has become a leading figure in the Duncan Village restitution claims.
The book illustrates a society that had a sense of pride and purpose, which had a common goal in addressing some of its social, educational and economic challenges that made life difficult.
Qebeyi, a former ANC councillor, recalls a time when the majority of the young men from the township were pickpockets in town.
He describes how as a group they were admired for their smart appearance, especially by the young girls in the township. He writes how the entire township was fascinated by the youths who were introducing the pantsula movement.
“Pantsula is a culture. Duncan Village had a culture; it is part of the city, and I feel it is not being documented enough,” said Qebeyi.