A tribute to MaMbeki

Affectionately known as MaMbeki, the struggle hero died at St Dominics hospital this morning at the age of 98.

She was admitted to hospital two weeks ago for medical observation after she experienced respiratory problems.

The Daily Dispatch has been immensely fortunate to get to know MaMbeki in recent years. Many of our reporters and photographers have met her over the years, and her fiery commitment to South Africa and her community was infectious. And despite her old years, or perhaps even as a result of them, MaMbeki's passion for change, for education and for her culture only grew. Yet this giant remained humble throughout, always accepting fanfare with the greatest humility. The Daily Dispatch has been immensely fortunate in knowing and building a relationship with MaMbeki. Here we offer a tribute to a truly great woman and South African.We wish both her family and all who had the great fortune to have known her our deepest condolences, as we too mourn the death of a truly great South African hero.

One of MaMbeki's last public appearances was in 2012, when Rhodes University awarded her an honourary doctorate in law for her dedication as an anti-apartheid activist, teacher and for her work building her community.

“I welcome this occasion with much pleasure and humility, more so because Rhodes University has bestowed on me the honour I do not deserve,” MaMbeki said at the ceremony.

“It is a wonderful privilege to be awarded this honour by an institution whose contribution not only to human knowledge but also to the development of society is well documented, an institution that continues to make a profound impact on the development of humankind.”

She amused the gathered audience of graduates’ friends and family members when she invited a woman on stage to model the clothes made by the Idutywa-based project, Khanyisa Ntsimbi. The project was founded by MaMbeki, and specialised in making traditional Xhosa accessories and clothes.

While MaMbeki was known for her efforts to restore and celebrate Xhosa culture through direct community development projects, she also pushed for inclusion of African culture as a field for education and research. During her 2012 address at Rhodes University, MaMbeki requested that the university establish a department for African Culture, saying that these cultures are worthy of study and celebration and must be included in research for the sake of posterity.

In an interview with the Daily Dispatch after receiving her doctorate, MaMbeki explained she wanted to reinvigorate a sense of pride in South African indigenous culture.

“I got married in 1940. I am a seSotho speaker and came to a Xhosa area. And people then were still using beadwork as ornaments and using the cultural way of dress. But then for some reason, I don’t know why, the ordinary people began losing and looking down on their culture,” MaMbeki explained.

“So personally, I thought we were going to leave nothing to posterity. The idea is that I want to preserve the culture,” MaMbeki said.

Her thoughts on cultural Xhosa traditions showed nuance, and while she sought to celebrate the beauty of Xhosa culture, she decried other traditions and admonished those that participated in it. One such tradition is ukutwala, a pre-marriage tradition involving the often brutal kidnapping of women and under age girls in order to force them to wed their kidnapper.

“The present type of thwala, it’s not the original type of thwala,” Mbeki said in 2012. “Even then , it was marriageable women; it wasn’t just anybody. It was a young man and a young woman, and he wouldn’t take somebody who younger than himself.”

Mbeki said at the time that she had recently given permission for a young man in her community to “thwala” a woman she (Mbeki) worked alongside.

“I said he must go to her and she must accept him,” Mbeki said, and explained that once the woman accepted the man, a group of young people took the woman with her consent, and she and the young man were married.

“They did this with my permission, because I knew this was harmless and agreed upon by both parties,” Mbeki said.

“I have no idea why this has become so brutal, and these young women are being taken without their permission. I have no explanation for it, but it’s brutal and it’s not conventional,” Mbeki added.

Mother to former president Mbeki and political-economy analyst Moeletsi Mbeki, MaMbeki was known for occasionally courting controversy in South African politics. Abandoning the ANC, the party her late husband and son helped build, was one such example. MaMbeki joined political party Congress of the People as a card-carrying member in 2009 and, despite factionalism and strife within Cope, renewed her membership in 2013 ahead of this year's elections. The card was handed over to her in July last year at the party’s election campaign by leader Mosiuoa Lekota, which was attended by about 1700 COPE supporters in Dutywa stadium.

In another interview in 2013, MaMbeki spoke to the Daily Dispatch about her years in solitude as her sons and husband participated in the movement to free South Africa from Apartheid.

Mbeki said that, due to her age, she could not remember much from the old days.

“I am very old, but I will tell you this: in those days, the struggle was our life. It was part of us.”

The then 97-year-old struggle stalwart was speaking from her Dutywa home about when her husband was arrested at Liliesleaf Farm on July 11 1963 and the subsequent court case which became known as the Rivonia Trial.

On that day, 19 ANC leaders were arrested at the farm, which was privately owned by Arthur Goldreich.

It had been used as a hideout for the ANC, at that time a banned movement.

Those arrested with Mbeki included Walter Sisulu, Raymond Mhlaba, Andrew Mlangeni, Elias Motsoaledi, Ahmed Kathrada, Billy Nair, Denis Goldberg, Bob Hepple, Goldreich, Harold Wolpe and James Kantor.

Goldreich and Wolpe bribed a guard and escaped from jail on August 11 and eventually fled South Africa.

The other men were held under the then government’s law, which allowed for a 90-day detention without trial, and were not allowed to see their defence team until two days before the court case started in October. They faced a charge of sabotage.

The defence team was made up of Joel Joffe, Arthur Chaskalson, George Bizos, Vernon Berrangé and Harold Hanson, with Bram Fischer leading the defence team.

MaMbeki said she was not surprised to learn her husband had been arrested.

“Thabo asked if I knew their fathers had been arrested and I said: ‘Oh, hard luck’ because it did not come as a surprise to me.

“We expected the arrest. It was a long time coming. It was the tail-end of years of struggle. It was one of those things – all in a day’s work,” she joked.

Nelson Mandela, who had been arrested a year before and sentenced to five years imprisonment, was not part of the arrested group.

He was drawn into the trial by the apartheid government and charged with the other suspects. He became accused number one.

The trial started in October 1963 and finalised the following year. The group were sentenced to life imprisonment.

MaMbeki said she and the other wives viewed this sentence as “better”.

She said: “As far as the government was concerned, we were not good people.

“We expected that they would be hanged, so when we found out about the life sentences we were glad because that was a better punishment."

As a Sotho girl growing up in Mount Fletcher, MaMbeki said she had never dreamt of marrying a Xhosa man, fighting apartheid or giving birth to a political analyst and South Africa’s president.

She said forsaking a “normal” life with her husband and children was something she would do all over again.

“I spent a lot of time on my own because my husband was in prison and my children were in exile. But I was fine with that. That is the life I knew. Naturally, I would miss them, but it was not an inconvenience.”

MaMbeki said if she could go back in time she would try to improve the education system because, in her view, the current system is “pathetic”.

“Looking back, I would do even more. From what I can see, education is a mess. You must remember that Mr Mbeki and I were teachers. There was a horrible period of Bantu Education which messed things up," she said.

- Additional reporting by Siya Boya