Do monarchies in Africa serve the people?
We must ask difficult questions about our cultures and begin reinventing our futures
The presence of power is often taken for granted. Take Mthokosizi Ntumba, killed by the South African Police Service while caught up in recent student protests at Wits University. It seems that no matter how many civilians are tortured, harassed and killed by the police, nor how many stories abound of corruption and incompetence in the institution, South Africans see no urgent need to ask whether this power structure actually serves their needs.
Like the police, monarchies have evaded questions regarding their relevance and the contemplation of a society where they no longer exist.
There exist forms of authority so pervasive, so blended into our understanding of the world and rooted in our political landscape, they seem to transcend time and rise above criticism. Like antique furniture, royal families have preserved themselves through conflict and seismic societal change, the purpose of their dusty presence rarely questioned because “they’ve just always been there”.
Initially resisting colonial conquest, so-called “tribal” leadership reluctantly made compromises throughout the 20th century, most clearly in the establishment of Bantustans. Utilising methods of indirect rule, colonial and apartheid governments manipulated indigenous leaders to control black populations to serve the interests of white domination. This ethos of compromise shaped the ANC in our transition to democracy and resulted in chiefs’ integration into post-apartheid South Africa.
But does the existence of these miniature monarchies not collide with our attempt to animate democracy? How can we reconcile its indispensable values — that all people are equal and entitled to freedom — with hereditary kings, who monopolise power through the justification of birthright?
Power is always wielded over others. It demands submission and enforces control. If equality and freedom are the precious values we say they are, authority must be justified. As Noam Chomsky says, if power cannot be justified, then it is illegitimate.
News of the death of King Goodwill Zwelithini ka Bhekuzulu swarmed headlines: he was one of Africa’s most iconic monarchs.
A conflict rose within me. On the one hand I am Zulu, not the most fervently traditional perhaps, but fascinated by my people’s tumultuous history and proud of our heritage nonetheless. The notion of ubuntu, that “I am because we are”, which emphasises the importance and interconnectedness of all people, is a truth I hold steadfast.
It’s a moral truth that has been lost to excess individualism and shallow appeals for unity void of solidarity.
Ubuntu has radical political implications. Because all life is immeasurably valuable, any structure that disregards people’s dignity and exploits others for its own interests must be harshly criticised. Zwelithini was a part of such a structure.
The supremacy of royalty often relied on supernatural validation, usually reinforced by religious institutions. The right to rule was once and sometimes is still seen as divinely sanctified by the heavens, ancestors or other spiritual forces. We can’t risk being lulled into these distortions of what the true functions of concentrated power are.
Monarchies have historically relied on force to amass and nourish their power throughout the ages. Kingdoms are forged in the bloodbath of war and then sustained through strategic self-interested politicking.
Neither might nor hereditary succession justifies the right to rule. The Commission on Traditional Leadership Disputes and Claims has been entangled in determining who are legitimate customary authorities. There are significant material and political benefits to being bestowed with legitimate indigenous royal authority or “chieftaincy”. But no one is born to lead; the opportunity to serve others through leadership must be granted through the informed and collective consent of the people.
It is exactly the tyranny of concentrated power, whether in the Palace of Versailles or through the draconian policies of apartheid, that has driven the pleas for leaders to be accountable, effective and disposable when necessary. Indigenous leadership, before and after 1994, has disastrously failed to meet these criteria.
The dismantling of African societies and the subjugation of their people could not have occurred without severing and dramatically transforming the precolonial relationship to land. Land was once communally owned under the custodianship of an indigenous leadership, for the collective sustenance of a people — this communalism applied to all means of production. Access to these resources varied depending on the customs and beliefs of a particular polity.
Colonisation, the arrival of markets and industrialisation meant land could be privately owned, its riches extracted for profit by the newly inducted subjects of empire and settler enterprise in exchange for pitiful wages. Mass poverty, once unknown in African societies, became a fact of modernity for indigenous peoples — one that persists into the present.
The Ingonyama Trust, resulting from negotiations between the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) and the then ruling National Party on the eve of democracy, is a fund used to manage land owned by the Kwazulunatal government in the interests of its citizens. Zwelithini was the sole trustee, essentially entitling his rule with approximately three-million hectares of land, which represents about 30% of all land in the province.
Has this monopolistic control over land benefited the ordinary people of Kwazulu-natal? Sadly, the Zulu monarchy has failed its people. Through the Ingonyama Trust, and the lucrative benefits of holding some influence over the province’s government, the dispossession resulting from colonial domination has been sustained throughout the province.
Kwazulu-natal is one of the country’s poorest provinces. Its development has been hindered by political violence and corruption, and compounded by crime, gender-based violence, food insecurity, HIV infections and unemployment. Through “permission to occupy” certificates, the Trust receives R100 on all lease agreements in areas under its jurisdiction for developmental programmes, but an estimated R100-million has not improved living standards of most citizens.
Meanwhile, indigenous leaders receive generous government salaries. The Zulu royal house recently received a budget increase of R4.5-million. This totals to R71.3-million for 2020. The inequity of such salaries should be distressing. As citizens went hungry across the province, food insecurity increased by the stringent lockdown, leaders live in opulence that millions of South Africans will never obtain. The lottery of birth cannot determine who is and isn’t entitled to well-being.
In 2018, Zwelithini took the decision to turn permission-to-occupy certificates into long-term lease and rental agreements, the prices reportedly ranging from R1500 to R7000. This decision was challenged by the Rural Women’s Movement, which highlighted how severely poverty and landlessness affected women in rural areas. These activists emphasised that security of tenure was pivotal to financial security.
Across Kwazulu-natal there are communities that feel neglected by the Ingonyama Trust. They ask why they are forced to pay rent to live on the land of their ancestors? Even when rent is paid, the fruits of these tributes to the monarchy are often not seen.
Authority that avoids justification
Twill respond with hostility. In 2018 a parliamentary high-level panel declared the Ingonyama Trust to be unconstitutional, finding that “there is little evidence that the revenue generated by leases is used for the benefit of communities or their material well-being”.
he Zulu king responded not with an openness to criticism but rather the threat of secession. With this threat, memories of the brutal violence between the IFP and ANC during and after the country’s transition reminded many of how the king’s influence can manifest into dangerous political action.
Is it fair that one unelected man can speak for millions, essentially holding the government hostage to his will and threatening to ignite civil war?
One can accept the role of indigenous leaders as custodians of culture and symbols of heritage, especially those that might have been lost to the imperatives of colonialism and apartheid. But pursuing this mandate does not require an excessive amount of authority, money or political leverage.
As Africans — because of the traumatic whiplash of colonisation and the onslaught of its subsequent mutations — at times we attempt to freeze ourselves in time, latching onto romantic visions of life just before encounters with European power. We avoid difficult but necessary questions about our cultures, histories and heritage. To realise the freedom that has long been struggled for, we must ask if our institutions serve all people and begin reinventing our futures.
How can we reconcile democracy with hereditary kings, who monopolise power through the justification of birthright?
Wednesday. It’s Day 356 of the Covid-19 lockdown. There’s a gunmetal ceiling hanging low over Durban’s North Beach, banishing — for a while — the oppressive heat that’s been smothering the city for weeks and providing some form of relief. It’s still early, so the cloud will burn off as soon as the sun makes its presence felt, ending the temporary respite from the heat and humidity.
I’ve forgone the build-up to the internment of King Goodwill Zwelithini kabhekuzulu at the Khethomthandayo Palace later in the day, to spend the morning instead with the residents of the Elangeni Green Zone.
The Elangeni Green Zone is the ethekwini municipality’s camp for homeless men set up a year ago in response to the Covid-19 pandemic and the level five lockdown.
I’ve been visiting them every couple of months since early April, about a week after they were first locked down. Some of the cats living in the camp started growing vegetables out of boredom and turned it into a business and I’ve been going back to document what they’re doing.
The Elangeni camp is still standing, despite the city closing the rest of its 11 Covid-19 camps and setting
up two permanent centres in Albert Park and Block AK.
The municipality has allowed its residents to continue staying there and to keep on growing vegetables on the football field-sized plot behind their tents.
It’s by far the kindest thing the city has ever done for its homeless population, whom it treated with brutality up until the Covid-19 lockdown began, and it is an initiative I hope it continues with.
The project took off very well, with lots of support from locals, NGOS and restaurants.
Even the Boxer supermarket started buying spinach from the farm, hundreds of bunches a week.
Then the wheels fell off, for a bit. Out of the group of 20 men who started planting, only five — Peter Moyo, Sandile Mthembu, Grant, Jiyane and Dubuzane — are left. A dispute over money and control of the project split the group, with one crew deciding to move to Umbumbulu with the bulk of the profits and equipment and the rest staying behind.
Despite the setback, Moyo, Mthembu and the others are still at it. Moyo, who grew up farming, is incredibly knowledgeable when it comes to agriculture. Mthembu is a bit of an ideas man, all energy and plans. They’ve planted about half their land — there’s spinach, lettuce, tomatoes, spring onion and peppers already in the ground — and have prepared the rest to take the seedlings they’ve propagated in a homebuilt greenhouse.
I’d made an arrangement to visit them again on Wednesday, so the call was between the homeless cats planting vegetables, and the official planting of His Majesty.
The decision was easy.
It’s not just my contrary nature. Or the fact that I’m not exactly the world’s greatest fan of monarchies in general. Or the reality that I am, like most of my fellow South Africans, one paycheck or one really bad decision away from the street.
There’s also still a deadly Covid-19 pandemic going on.
People are still dying, and a third wave of infections is coming. It’s inevitable.
Joining the thousands of punters packing Nongoma to say goodbye to the monarch — who himself died from diabetic complications after getting the virus — at this point in our history does not appear to be a wise move.
Despite the best efforts of the authorities, the monarch’s send-off is likely to be among the events that spark the third wave of infections, hasten it’s arrival, so staying away is the sensible thing to do.
It was cool to learn that a monarch is planted, and not buried.
In East Belfast, where I was born, planting somebody refers to punching them. As in, “I’ll plant you.” It also means to bury them, as in “Don’t plant me, put me up the oven” — that’s “Don’t bury me, cremate me” in English — as my old man, Gerald, used to say.
Weird.
I wonder how planting came to become part of the East Belfast lexicon, as well as the literal — and somewhat flustered — English translation of the term for laying a Zulu king to rest?
Perhaps the term planting was brought back from Nongoma by some cat from Mountpottinger Road or Templemore Avenue who made it home alive after 1879? Perhaps it made its way there later, after the South African War, with some veteran of Colenso, who came across the term.
Perhaps it’s just a coincidence. Perhaps I have too much time on my hands.
It was cool to learn that a monarch is planted, and not buried. Where I was born, planting somebody refers to punching them
When the M&G apologised for using the word ‘paralysed’ metaphorically in a headline, some Twitter users responded with allegations of ‘wokeness gone mad’. But as cultural practices evolve, it doesn’t hurt to try to be kind first
In July 2006 I gave birth to my first son, in August my sister had her daughter and in September, my brother’s son was born. My nephew and my son were healthy and have grown up achieving above-average results at school and in sports, winning various awards each year. My niece was born with a rare congenital condition and chromosomal abnormality. She is different from her cousins and this has been difficult for my sister, especially when certain developmental milestones come along.
Besides the hurt that the cousins’ achievements invariably bring about (although their aunt is the first to cheer them on) I have seen her flinch at certain words thrown around in casual conversation — “dumbass”, “stupid”, “idiot”, “retard”, “slow”, “special” — things people say with
out thinking, often to make fun of others who do not have disabilities.
Some words, clearly, should be consigned to the scrapheap of history.
On the other hand, my colleague with a disabled son tends towards the approach of reclaiming and owning offensive language, for instance by sharing family in-jokes.
Other words in history — such as “queer” — have been similarly reclaimed, she reckons, but crucially by the affected community themselves, which is how the excellent Netflix documentary Crip Camp can get away with its title.
The two mothers have different ways of reacting to the situations they find themselves in.
A few weeks ago, when the word “paralysed” appeared in one of our headlines to indicate “frozen”, another colleague pointed it out and we had a discussion about our need to be aware of words that could cause harm or offence.
Our outgoing editor-in-chief Sipho
Kings tweeted about our discussion and received a backlash for it. Some of it was startling in its vitriol — I will never get used to the way people are prepared to be so base on such public forums — but let us just quote the mildest criticism, which was that it was “OTT” for us to do this introspection.
Perhaps to the ordinary person it is an extreme reaction to the use of this common metaphor, a step too far in the direction of politically correct, way too woke.
But, for us in the media, it should be a part of everyday conversation. As Sipho said, it should be a way “to dig into the conscious/subconscious biases that we reflect”. It is evolution. As part of defending human rights, upholding democracy, giving the marginalised a voice and telling stories from the fringes, words are very much our business. It is our responsibility to be aware of how words can cause harm, perpetuate narratives and stereotypes, give life to conspiracy theories and carry fake news — and how words can be used against people.
Consider these words, for instance: “non-whites”, “Europeans only”, “Juden verboten”, “moffie”, “binnet”, “witch”, “China virus” or “corona jihad”, among endless others.
Many readers will be old enough to remember the derision gender activists experienced during the 1980s, when feminists suggested not all chairmen were men, or not all housewives women, and asked for genderneutral terms to be used in official language. By 2021, we accept the term “chair” or “chairperson”, generally without feeling as if we have been robbed of eloquence.
Our job is to err on the side of caution, to consider all views as much as is possible and to have the difficult debates. We tell the public about them because it is in their interest to know that we are continually striving to be better at what we do.
A quadriplegic friend, who used the “paralysed” metaphor herself this week in a Facebook post, said: “Personally I have no problem with anyone using the word in its proper context, be that metaphorically or literally, but I know not everyone feels that way, and I’ve always been of the thinking that if one can be kind, one should.”
The angry Twitter commentators could perhaps think about that before spewing unnecessarily unkind, sometimes poisonous, words to show their disagreement. One day they may have to eat them.
Iwas in an online lecture when word spread across various social media channels that Adam Habib, director of the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) at the University of London, had said the N-word during a student union meeting. Hearing the rumour, I thought, surely not. Surely the director of one of the UK’S most radically left universities would not throw the N-word around, understanding the violence it holds? Surely the former vicechancellor of Wits University, a man of Indian and Muslim heritage, would not perpetuate anti-blackness on a public platform during working hours? Alas, my disbelief was misplaced.
In the clips of the Zoom recording, which have since been circulated widely, we see Habib’s anti-black racism unfold over and over like a bad horror movie.
For context, Habib was addressing the SOAS student union in a meeting organised to allow students to give him feedback concerning the university’s strategic plan. During the meeting, the union raised concerns about how SOAS issues statements supporting Black Lives Matter while axing the BA in African Studies
degree, underfunding the Africa department, and allowing lecturers to say the N-word in class.
Habib eventually responded by verbalising the N-word in full. Students called him out, with one Black SU member even explaining to Habib why it’s unacceptable for him to say it. Habib’s response becomes painful to watch as he becomes defensive, saying that he comes from a part of the world where “we do use the word”.
I think I speak for South Africans everywhere when I say: not in my name.
We who wield words every day understand how weighty they may be. A word holds a world view, it holds a trauma, it holds a history. We cannot take these words lightly. Habib must do better.
The way Habib dealt with the entire debacle belies a violent arrogance.
He was patronising, even bullying, towards students. He then embarked on a Twitter rant which vaguely hints at apology but mostly justifies his use of the word. With his actions and response, Habib is perpetuating a hostile learning environment for SOAS students, particularly Black students. His track record in producing hostile learning environments endures.
We have only to look back at his tenure at Wits during Fees Must Fall. On his watch and by his direction, students — who were mostly Black — were financially excluded, brutalised and jailed by the police and private security, and will likely suffer mental trauma and financial strain for the rest of their lives.
What is dangerous about the particular anti-blackness that Habib performs is the way he hides behind being politically Black in the South
African context. While Steve Biko’s Black Consciousness urged all people of colour (POCS) to identify as Black in the fight against apartheid, this idea is outdated and lacking, especially in the context of current antiracist movements today. Habib also hides behind the anti-indian and Islamophobic racism he faces.
As a South African Muslim woman of Indian descent, of course I condemn any and all anti-indian and Islamophobic racism directed towards Habib unreservedly. But as someone who shares his positionality, it is important for me to acknowledge the responsibility non-black POCS have in tackling anti-blackness within our communities and in the broader antiracist movement. We cannot assume political Blackness in order to perpetuate anti-blackness. Habib’s mishandling of the meeting felt reminiscent of the dismissive ways he had previously dealt with students’ grievances during Fees Must Fall protests.
We have only to search any of Habib’s writing on the student movement to understand how he infantilised, patronised and dismissed the concerns of mostly Black students. To see it happening again at SOAS made it feel like history was persisting, albeit in a different context.
An alarming trend has been cropping up in nonpartisan politics where conservative and harmful laws and policies are being driven by Black and brown faces. This is evident in the way US vice president Kamala Harris has defended antiblack laws that supported the incarceration of Black people.
It is no more evident than the constant discussion in the UK parliament of Home Secretary Priti Patel’s Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, which will give power to the police to shut down protests if they see fit. Just on Saturday, London police officers handcuffed and removed women from a vigil for Sarah Everard, who was murdered while walking home, citing Covid-19 restrictions.
What’s more alarming is that this bill arose after Black Lives Matter protests swept the UK last year. The limitations of identity politics are clear: no matter the institution, masking positions of power with Black and brown faces does not prevent draconian policies that promote racism, colonialism and imperialism.
As the Fees Must Fall protests in South Africa rage on, there seems to be no justice in sight for students. Habib remains unrepentant both for the harm that he caused at Wits and his legacy of anti-blackness at Wits, which seems to be enduring at SOAS. If someone at the top can use racist slurs unchecked, then what precedent does this set for the university? If we do not speak truth to power then where will this leave us as a student body, or as a global community?
These are dangerous times we live in indeed when students, especially Black and other marginalised students, continue to be clamped down on. They are stifling our voices. We cannot be heard over the violence.