I remember the days of the struggle with pride and fondly for that matter. It is quite satisfying that feeling of "come get me here I stand" that "detention or death - victory is certain" chant as we pounded our chest and stomped our feet. The most effective of the protests were always the ones that were dignified, calm and resolute. These are the marches that were led by strict and caring leadership. Remember the mass democratic movement march to the Strand to reclaim the whites only beaches? Desmond Tutu, among other leaders was there in his purple dress, on the beach - go figure. Protest on that day was constituted by people spreading towels on the beach, lying down to catch a tan, playing beach volleyball, walking or otherwise getting up to all sorts of things normal folk gets up to on the beach. There was no confrontation with the white folk who were there on the beach, there was an air of peace and merriment - until the police arrived that is. Even then, the protest ended peacefully as peaceful can be those good old days.
These days we protest to destroy, not as in the old days to register our grievances or demands. Please do not get me wrong, the good old days had their fair share of destructive protest. Take the "brave" actions of the people of Khutsong, a township on the outskirts of Carletonville, some 50 kilometres west of Johannesburg. Their protest is constituted by destruction of fellow residents property and of the commonly owned property such as roads and other amenities. Whether protest is the appropriate response given their situation is a question I would love to get an answer to - it is akin to a strike by teachers as a response to their remuneration and conditions of service issues (more about the teachers claiming to be workers, in the Marxian sense, in the future).
The latest I heard from one of the leaders of the people of Khutsong was that their lawyers were preparing papers for an application to court with the view of stopping their incorporation into the North-West province. According to the residents of Khutsong, being part of the North-West province would mean poor service delivery, continued poverty, unemployment and generally a worse life for all, in Khutsong that is. I have not come accross any information that would allow a comparison of service delivery by the Gauteng province to the people Khutsong and, service delivery by the North-West to the people of any nearby North-West town. There are however some report cards and all manner of statistics that indicates performances or lack thereof among various provincial government departments and local governments. The kindest conclusion one can reach regarding local government is that the performance of all of them could get better. There are all manner of problems regarding township governance, service delivery and development generally. At a certain level most of these cannot be helped due to capacity issues and the legacy townships as an urban planning strategy come with.
By now you realise and would concede that we have problems and that we need solutions and we need solutions fast - but burning the mayors house? The mayor of Khutsong has a proud history of the struggle and protest himself, he surely has had cause to reflect on that history lately. Even in my youth and so-called struggle days, when my comrades accused me and many others of being spies for the "system" - I could never understand how the burning the local library (the only one) and the local clinic (the only one) was ever going to make the authorities sit up and listen. I am swimming against historic tide here because somehow the authorities seem to have come to their senses somehow. We have committed some attrocities against our own to get here; or some attrocities were perpetrated by us against our own on the way here. Some people may believe that it is this violence, these attrocities committed against ourselves and our own that got us here, rather than the disciplined marches and peaceful protests. Yes, we have history, we have problems but for heaven's sake we now have children and we need to leave them something!
We have the right to protest, we have the right to freedom of expression and to the promotion of our views. We have the right to engage in social and political debate about matter that affects our lives, the right to refuse to be incorporated into the North-West. Most importantly, we have a duty to allow those who wish not to be part of the protest to bloody well go on about their business without the risk of loss of life or limb. The government have a job of running this country, the courts are there to watch that it is done right. The people of Khutsong say they have made application to court seeking relief, asking for help; in the meantime they will destroy Khutsong and most importantly, the lives of its residents, all in the name of protest. They are not the only ones on this bandwagon, and as with that real real life drama - "the band plays on", people die, lives are destroyed, legacies decimated - all in the name of protest. Protest that may be coming to your neighbourhood too - unless we find another way that is.
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