OPINION: Biko memorial more about JZ’s agenda

Commemorating March 21st has never happened without controversy. Apartheid governments barred remembering it because it was both indicting and inspirational. Victims of racism gathered to condemn the state for mowing down 69 unarmed protesters in 1960, a painful ritual that also reinvigorated them to never to give up the fight.

At times they would even be killed whilst in the act of remembering the dead. That’s what happened in 1985 KwaLanga, Uitenhage.

The Langa massacre, marked by 28 dead bodies, was yet another entry into a long list of officially sanctioned slaughters.

I can’t recall Biko ever being remembered on a Human Rights Day.

That’s because there are two full events dedicated to Biko’s memory: June 16 and September 12. One is about the student uprising that Biko inspired and the other is the day of his death. Whilst not an official-day, the anniversary of Biko’s death rivals officially sponsored memorials.

My point here is that there’s plenty of time to remember Biko.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m not complaining. This is a major improvement from, say, ten or so years ago. Back then officialdom didn’t really pay much attention to Biko’s memory.

His celebration was a casualty of inter-party rivalry. The 1980s violence between Azapo and the United Democratic Front, for instance, turned the “Charterists”, who became the post-apartheid rulers, against Biko’s commemoration. Their instinct was to deny him of his place in our history whilst embellishing the role played by the ANC underground in the 1976 uprising.

That changed gradually over time.

Not that officialdom had a change of heart. It was due to Azapo and the Steve Biko Foundation’s tireless efforts. Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki even delivered the annual Biko lecture.

Mbeki went further to declare the Ginsberg-based Biko Leadership Centre a legacy project, which made it eligible to receive state funding enabling it to be completed.

Today, that spectacular structure sits beautifully atop a hill just as you enter Ginsberg. It rates amongst the best memorial centres in the world.

Zuma opened the Centre in November 2012.

We have come a long way, but there was something odd about Tuesday’s unveiling. Even stranger was that Zuma promised to return later in September for a full-blown commemoration of Biko’s 40th anniversary of his death.

But apart from the unusual embrace of Biko, the oddity of Tuesday’s commemorative event becomes clearer on reading Zuma’s speech.

In his address, Zuma told his audience that Biko was being brought under the spotlight of Human Rights Day partly as a celebration of Oliver Tambo’s memory.

Tambo would have turned 100 this year if he had still been alive. This is why the ANC has dubbed this year, “The Year of OR

Tambo: Unity in action in advancing human rights”.

The occasion, therefore, signified an attempt to forge unity.

But, there was very little about Biko in the president’s speech.

That was strange because, for one thing, Biko wanted unity amongst the liberation movements. In the last years of his life, Biko was in communication with both Robert Sobukwe and the exiled ANC with a view to setting up a meeting that would lead towards the reintegration of liberation forces.

Zuma could have used this aspect of Biko’s life to stress the importance of unity. Actually mentioning that Biko also wanted unity would have enhanced Zuma’s message. But, Zuma didn’t.

The other glaring omission relates to Biko’s conceptualisation of the curriculum and the role of memory in identity-formation.

The country is presently grappling with both issues. Biko suggested the concept of a “joint-culture”, a fusion of the best elements in both African and Western cultures, as a way of building a new, post-apartheid identity.

As for education, Biko wrote about how its content is manipulated in order to achieve hegemony for those in power. The idea being to reduce a free people to subjects, dependent on their conquerors to a point that they could not imagine life without them.

A complete and rich curriculum, Biko counselled, would have an emancipatory value. A black person would not only come into being, but also enable a fully functional and a creative person.

My point is that if anyone has to drag Biko’s name into their own gig, then they must share his insights on contemporary issues. Show us how he is relevant. Zuma dragged Biko into his event, but didn’t tell us what Biko stood for.

Perhaps I’m overlooking something here. Zuma did say: “In the memory of Steve Biko, let us promote the emancipation of the mind”.

A few lines down the speech, he elaborated: “Our country indeed needs liberated minds in order to achieve radical economic transformation”.

Biko’s tombstone may have been unveiled on Tuesday, but the event was not about him. It was about Zuma.

Biko’s memory was simply the packaging for Zuma to introduce his ex-wife’s campaign slogan, “radical economic transformation”.

What we saw on Tuesday was a campaign stunt. That tombstone was not even meant to be unveiled that day. Built by government as part of restoring heritage of past leaders, the tombstone was scheduled for unveiling later in September.

But, officials insisted on the unveiling so that Zuma could drag Biko’s name into his campaign for Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to become his successor. He is hoping to generate sufficient frenzy around “radical economic transformation” so that he can hand Dlamini-Zuma to his supporters as a continuation of that platform.

Politicians cannot help themselves. Some are even more callous than others. To these nothing is sacred.

Watching the unveiling on Tuesday some among us were possibly infuriated by the hollowness of the commemoration – claiming to remember someone, yet saying very little about him.

But in another sense the lavish attention to Biko’s memory is gratifying. It testifies to the permanence of Biko’s ideas.

That is why universities are not the same anymore. Black folk will never accept that they do not matter!

• Mcebisi Ndletyana is associate professor of politics at the University of Johannesburg