South African Journey

The President of the South African Council of Churches and Executive Director: Research at the University of South Africa, Prof. Tinyiko Sam Maluleke, delivered the following address, Transforming Johannesburg's Alexandra Township into a Loving Mother of All, at the opening of a new community education facility in Alexandra.

Bewitched by Alexandra

As a young man who came to Johannesburg in search of work in the 1940s, my own father found refuge and home in Alexandra Township – a township on the outskirts of Johannesburg in close proximity to the part of Johannesburg called Sandton. My father came to live here at the height of the Msomi and Spoiler gangs and lived through the era of bus protests and defiance campaigns. Around 1958 when the powers that be decided to re-engineer Alexandra into a bundle of hostels, my father was among those who moved to the then new township of Meadowlands. In Meadowlands, my father finally got his section ten status – permission to live and work in Johannesburg. But my father kept his memory of Alexandra alive. I recall many weekends when he and his friends would gather at house no.445a Meadowlands Zone 8, to reminisce about Alexandra while drinking beer. At such occasions they would speak, sing, dance and argue about Alex.

It struck me then that they would not say much about Meadowlands. For them it was as if Meadowlands was a painful embarrassment whereas Alex was the place to be. Indeed, the only time they referred to Meadowlands was when they drunkenly sung Strike Vilakazi’s song Meadowlands. Their bodies were in Meadowlands but their souls remained in Alexandra. They had been taken out of Alexandra but Alexandra had not been taken out of them. For one born and bred in Meadowlands, it has taken me time to understand the hold of Alexandra over my father and his buddies.

Now I know that when we speak of Alexandra we are not merely speaking of a geographical entity. When we speak of Alexandra, we are not only speaking of the people who live in Alexandra. Alexandra extends beyond the borders of its geographical area. Alexandra lives in the hearts of its children – resident, in the Diaspora and those who have died.

Who and What is Alexandra?

Alexandra is history - the history of a people in search of meaning and dignity in the ruthless Johannesburg of the Apartheid era. Alexandra is mother – mother of children spread within and beyond.

Alexandra is reality - the reality of life daily lived in the face of death.

Alexandra is metaphor – a metaphor for what it meant to be simple and black in Apartheid South Africa.

Alexandra is irony – the irony of beauty in the midst of squalor; the irony of poverty existing 5 minutes away from the opulent wealth of Sandton.

Alexandra is a witch – she bewitches all those who have been touched by her.

Alexandra is a fountain – a fountain of talent and creativity. Think of Mahlathini Nkabinde, Zakes Nkosi, Caiphus Semenya, the Dark City Sisters, Theo ‘the Black Panther’ Mthembu, Nelson Mandela, Joe Modise, Zanele Mbeki, Wally Serote. What do they have in common? Alexandra. They are all children of Alexandra!

Alexandra is symbol – symbol of defiance, symbol of resilience, symbol of the triumph of the human spirit. From the time of her birth in 1912, Alexandra has refused to be a door-mat, always engaging those who wanted to shape and form her according to their whims and desires. In the 1950s the people of Alexandra rose to the occasion through the bus boycotts. In the 1960s and 70s Alexandra donated many of her children to the struggle both internally and in exile. Who can forget the devastating ‘six day war’ of 1986?

Alexandra is home, home to its residents, home to you and me. Alexandra stands for that human quest not merely house; not merely for hostels; not merely for a bed; not merely for an abode; not merely for a fringe existence in the shadows; no! Alexandra represents the human quest for home. This quest was most intense and most acute in Apartheid South Africa. But the quest is timeless and eternal.

Alexandra is a monument to hope and a testament to a dream that will not die.

Alexandra is me and you. Regardless of which part of this country we come from, regardless of which part of the world we come from, we all know something of the pride, the joy and the tragedy – the tragedy of a people confined and a people defined; the tragedy of dreams defiled and hopes crushed. But we also know something of the joy of struggle and the small victories – private and public – which accumulate as we struggle on. We all know something of the pride and dignity unleashed in defiance to pain and in rebellion against squalor.

Alexandra the Contradiction(s)

Alexandra has also always been a contradiction. Perhaps necessarily so. Its history is both proud and tragic. A community with so difficult and so brutal a history cannot escape without scars. Therefore, buried deep into the best of what Alexandra is, is a form of brutalization whose depth we can hardly fathom. Entangled and mixed with the resilience I have been lauding, are pathologies that sometimes threaten to eat away the very soul of Alexandra. These pathologies sometimes threaten to extinguish the fires of hope. Sitting as it does next to Sandton’s opulence, Alexandra’s bitterness – a bitterness that often turns violent – should not be surprising even though it is not helpful. Similarly, Alex has the dubious honour of having been one of the pioneering hotbeds of the xenophobic attacks of May 2008. I personally visited the frightened and traumatized people who had sought refuge at Alexandra police station at that time. There I saw young women, infants and young men huddled together like cattle, after Alexandra had spat them out violently. Indeed the ones I saw were the survivors. Others were not so lucky. One person who can help us understand Alexandra is Mongane Wally Serote, well-known, gifted author and poet– currently serving as the CEO of Freedom Park – himself a child of Alexandra. His haunting poem titled Alexandra is instructive:

My beginning was knotted to you,

Just like you knot my destiny.

You throb in my inside silences

You are silent in my heart-beat…

Alexandra, often I've cried.

When I was thirsty my tongue tasted dust,

Dust burdening your nipples.

I cry Alexandra when I am thirsty.

Your breasts ooze the dirty waters of your dongas,

Waters diluted with the blood of my brothers, your children,

Who once chose dongas for death-beds.

Do you love me Alexandra, or what are you doing to me?

You wear expressions like you would be nasty to me,

You frighten me, Mama,

When I lie on your breast to rest, something tells me,

You are bloody cruel.

Alexandra, hell

What have you done to me?

I have seen people but I feel like I'm not one,

Alexandra what are you doing to me?

I feel I have sunk to such meekness!

I lie flat while others walk on me to far places.

I have gone from you, many times,

I come back.

Alexandra, I love you;

I know

When all these worlds became funny to me,

I silently waded back to you

And amid the rubble I lay,

Simple and black.

In this poem Serote speaks of his bonds with Alexandra – ‘my beginning was knotted to you’. Indeed he speaks of Alexandra as mother. But note the contradictions in the picture of mother he paints. Her nipples are burdened with dust. Her breasts produce not milk but they ooze ‘dirty waters’. How will Alexandra feed her children? She feeds them dust and dirty waters mixed with the blood of her deceased children. Inasmuch as Serote loves Alexandra he is also frightened by Alexandra. Even as he lies on her breasts he is most aware that Alexandra can be cruel. How does Serote sustain this relationship of love mixed with fear, needing badly the very thing that he fears most, taking refuge on the very spot where death lies in wait? Here is a pathological relationship. Serote would like to walk away from Alexandra and he has tried, many times. But he always comes back to Alexandra- for he has this inexplicably powerful love and connection to Alexandra. To be fair, Serote paints a fairly passive picture of the dangerous mother called Alexandra. It is not a picture of a mother who actively kills and destroys. Indeed Serote leaves it to us to imagine why the nipples of Alexandra have dust and why the milk of her breast has turned to dirty water.

But it is the condition of being in love with what we fear and being in fright of what we love that fascinates me. In this poem Serote depicts a love for Alexandra which is as strong as his fear of it. This feeling where the very object of one’s love; the very ‘person’ on whom your life depends; is also the person most capable of the most horrendous cruelty towards one, is in fact a familiar one for Black people in general and for church people in particular. Is this not the relationship we have with the church? Being so unhappy with many of its structures, policies and hypocrisy to the point of walking out; but don’t we always come back to the church? Indeed, is this not the relationship I have with the township of my youth - SOWETO - that I am both attracted to its resilience and repelled by its violence? SOWETO brought me up. But SOWETO could just as easily have killed me. Many women are disgusted with the patriarchy in the church, yet they keep coming back to the church and they keep sticking around. Similarly, this is the relationship we have with our history as a people. In this history there are things we are proud and things we are ashamed of – yet it is the only history we have. This relationship of love and fear, is this not the relationship many women have with their lovers, boyfriends and even husbands?

Transforming Alexandra

If Serote’s characterization of his relationship with Alexandra is anything like our own to it, then we have a big challenge before us. It is the challenge of turning Alexandra from the Serote picture of a cruel mother we cannot help to love, into a mother in whose love we can all delight without fear and without doubt. Our challenge is one of transforming our warped relations with Alexandra into a positive relationship. It is the challenge of overcoming our brutal history and our pathological relationships.

This is the challenge facing us as people of Alexandra. It is the challenge facing our government. These challenges are more complex than the provision of material things. Our townships will not be transformed in that way alone.

How then shall we turn Alexandra into a loving mother whose breasts produce nourishing milk and not dirty waters mixed with human blood? How shall we turn Alexandra into a developed community, not merely in terms of the types of houses, but in terms of the quality of persons who live in Alexandra? How do we turn Alexandra into a place - not of fear and death - but a place of life and love?

We do this through small but well calculated short term and long term steps.

We do this in collaboration (with the community of Alexandra).

Not by creating structures which will be brought in a ‘finished and klaar’ form, but structures built with and through the local people.

Above all, we do this by providing the people of Alexandra with inspiration not discouragement.

We do this by building on the beautiful achievements already attained by the beautiful people of this historic township – achievements big and small.

We shall transform Alexandra when we confront without fear, ‘the good, the bad and the ugly’ both in contemporary and historical Alexandra.

We will transform Alexandra when we focus on the young people of Alexandra, their needs, their fears, their hopes and their formation.

We will transform Alexandra when we focus on the old people of Alexandra, the carriers of community memory and the bearers of community wisdom. We should seek ways to enhance and protect their dignity.

We shall transform Alexandra when alongside the focus in the dire infrastructural and material needs, we focus also on the spiritual and intellectual needs of the community of Alexandra.

We shall transform Alexandra when we go back into its history to extract moments, icons and examples of resilience and excellence and use these as inspiration for the current generation of Alexandrians.

We shall transform Alexandra when we continue not merely to invest in Alexandra, but also to believe in Alexandra, to believe that Alexandra has a place and a future and so does its people. We must continue to believe that Alexandra can be, to believe that Alexandra can have; that Alexandra can do better than this!

We shall transform Alexandra when we are prepared to speak and act against violence, crime, abuse and corruption in Alexandra regardless of the quarters from which it comes.

Alexandra shall be transformed when all residents realize their leadership potential and roles. It shall be transformed when the people take charge and not abdicate their responsibilities.

The educational facility which is being opened today may be small. The scale of its operation may not be comparable to some better endowed facilities here and elsewhere. What is not in doubt is that the work envisaged in this facility is precisely the kind that we need if Alexandra is to be transformed into a loving mother for all its children. Indeed, a bigger, better resourced facility will achieve less – if it is imposed on the people, if it does not emanate from and resonate with the people of Alexandra.

All three of the main thrusts of the work of this facility will involve women and children – both being vulnerable groups in our society today. The focus on a library for children is a particularly pertinent one, living as we do, in an era where children no longer read or write. The facility being opened here today gives me hope that one day, the children of Alexandra will aspire to greater things than being consumers of ‘mix-it’ and ‘computer games’.

The manner in which church, private sector and community have combined in order to make this facility a reality is commendable. It is clear to me that the future of community development lies in collaborative partnerships. I am especially delighted to see the church rediscovering her erstwhile role in community service and in education.

There is no doubt in my mind that this little facility we are opening today, will thrive and that, small as it is; it will soar high above the skies of Alexandra. Out of this small and unlikely facility will issue future fashion designers, future scientists and future chefs of note. Out of this little facility will issue people of character who will contribute the holistic development in fundamental ways. Please accept my hearty congratulations on this fine, timely and commendable initiative.