We’re still not free, says Sam Moodley
HEN Sumboornam Pillay (Sam Moodley) was forcibly dismissed in the early 1970s from the teaching profession by the former Indian Education Department because of her political activism, this gave her a chance to join Steve Biko, the leader and founder of the Black Consciousness Movement in South Africa. She joined the Biko team as an assistant researcher for Black Community Programmes (BCP).
At this time the BCP was in the then Beatrice Street in Durban, the heart of what used to be known as “Little India”.
“Steve and I seemed to have crossed paths at the same time, because while he was expelled from UNB (University of Natal Medical School Black Section), my services were terminated and we found a home in Black Community Programmes.
“I became Steve’s research assistant, researching for a book called Black Review. We joined in January 1973 but Steve was banned by March 1973 and I was then banned and house-arrested in August 1973 for the next 5 years.”
The years under the banning order and house arrest were difficult.
“I had no employment. Seeking employment meant walking the streets, requesting jobs even as a messenger, a filing clerk or a ‘tea lady’ – I saw the dignity in labour and any job meant putting food on the table.
“But doors were closed on me for fear of intimidation by the Special Branch.
“My heart went out to SE Mansoor and Co who had the courage to employ me selling first, third party Insurance discs (which was once a year) and then long-term insurance, which failed because one had to see to clients at night and that was impossible because I was under house arrest.”
During the last year of her banning and house arrest, Sam Moodley became involved with the then Natal Indian Cripple Care Association and later with the Spes Nova School for cerebral palsy children at Clare Estate in Durban.
The Special Branch at that time, however, continued with their harassment and she was forced to obtain a special permit from a Durban magistrate to continue with her work as a speech therapist.
“I was still under a banning order and as much as the Natal Indian Cripple Care Association had won a battle for me to get my job as a speech therapist, I was not allowed to be on an educational campus.
“I subsequently got permission from a magistrate for a month before actual permission came from Pretoria.
“Thereafter I had to get a letter every month or else I would have been arrested. This went on until the order expired in 1978,” said Moodley.
In the 1980s, Sam Moodley got involved in the Disability Movement in South Africa, the Women Teachers’ Movement, became the vice-president of the Tasa Women Teachers’ Organisation, and worked with the Children and Women’s Programmes within Umtapo.
She also began the Participatory Education Through Theatre (PETT), working with students at high schools, universities and teacher training colleges.
“Much of my time was also spent initiating and holding workshops, empowering and enriching the lives of people with disabilities through the arts, under an organisation called Very Special Arts.”
When negotiations began between the ANC and the former National Party government in the early 1990s, she was not too impressed, because the BC movement was completely isolated from the process. A pained and hurt Sam Moodley did not vote in the first democratic elections on April 27, 1994, not only because of the exclusion of BC and other political formations in the liberation struggle, but “because of the fact that candidates were calling for votes based on ethnic lines (the coloured vote, the Indian vote, the African vote)”.
“This divisiveness was fragmenting South Africa and worked against the BC principles of ‘One Nation, One Azania’. I also felt that if I voted it would give legitimacy to those in Parliament who participated in apartheid structures and collaborated with an abhorrent system that kept us divided along ethnic and racial lines.”
After the dawn of the post-apartheid era, Sam Moodley continued with her activist work, believing in and supporting the cause of Black Consciousness.
She never gave up on engaging with various communities. Her passion has always been with women and youth. In fact, from 2008 to the present day she has been part of a collective of women who started an organisation called Women in Action South Africa (WIASA).
As a social action group, Sam Moodley and her comrades are concerned with various social issues that affect women and youth in Merebank, Wentworth, uMlazi, Sydenham and Newlands.
“We help to co-ordinate discussion groups, conversations, and workshops around socio-political, cultural and ecological issues. It has always been our aim to build capacity within women so that they would empower themselves and the communities within which they work to act as agents and catalysts for change.
“It has always been my dream to resuscitate a women’s movement that is so lacking today.”
When I first interviewed Sumboornam in 2009, 15 years into the new South Africa, Sam Moodley was not too happy with the performance of the ANC government. She told me then: “I admit that lots has been done in terms of housing, in terms of education, but I still question the fact: Are we free?
“Are we truly free in the sense when we ask ourselves about the type of education we have? The same question crops up regarding our health system (poor infrastructures and provisions). With housing when you look at the RDP housing, these are match-box houses. Is this dignified?
“We talk about the right to life and living, but can we say we are really free when there are muggings and killings?
“There’s also mismanagement of funds and corruption is rife. The situation is not what I believed in. Maybe it was Utopic, but the reality is we are not truly liberated.”
I met with her recently, 8 years later, and today in 2017 Sam Moodley is still concerned.
“Freedom is what we have sacrificed our lives for. But what has changed? The contract to build a nation free from hunger, disease, poverty, ignorance, has not been fulfilled. The inequality gap between race, class, gender has widened. Physical and psychological oppression remain a stark reality we have to face each day. Bureaucrats cling to power, and self interests take precedent over the needs of the people of this country.
“There is still a need to build a nation filled with dignity, selfrespect, security and peace.”