Network Past Issues

Sojourn in Rural South Africa
Prof. Anand Venkatesh

Kgautswane! A name that if anyone would have mentioned to me a few months ago in India would have meant an invitation to a game of tongue twisters, but now, in the twilight of my year-long stay in South Africa has found an indelible place in my heart. This is the village thatfor me began as a postdoctoral field study area but eventually allowed me to gain poignant insights into not only life in rural South Africa but also life in general. Hence when the editor of Network invited me to share my experiences in South Africa with IRMANs, I readily accepted. At the very outset, I promise that I shall not mention anything about my postdoctoral academic work, involving stated choice transport modelling. The readers of Network deserve a lot better. Instead I will describe certain idiosyncratic aspects of rural South Africa as seen exclusively through my eyes.
I vividly remember my first visit to Kgautswane. At that time, I was ‘exploring’ rural South Africa, another way of saying that I was trying to find a justification for being here and for doing something meaningful. I was driving in the north-eastern part of South Africa with a group from the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), the country’s largest infrastructural research undertaking. We were travelling on a smooth, well-maintained provincial highway. We reached Ohrigstad, a really small town, which seemed to finish as soon as it started. An apparently innocuous detour had taken us to another world; it was akin to being teleported to another time zone, even to another planet. We were no longer on a road where only a few seconds ago we had been driving at 120 kph. We were now on a dirt track, and the car was forced to crawl on it. For quite a long time, we saw nothing on either side of the road except for mountains, which were visible at a distance. Then we came across some hamlets, a primary school, and other hints of civilisation. The CSIR group informed me that we had entered the Kgautswane area, a rural locality with a population of over a lakh and having around fifteen villages. The dirt track, which extended for almost 40 kilometres, was the main access for the rural inhabitants to the nearby towns of Ohrigstad and Burgersfort, or, indeed to anywhere else outside Kgautswane. As we trundled along the road, I saw an occasional minibus taxi or a bakkie, which is a utility vehicle carrying both goods and people, albeit illegally. After a relatively short drive, but which seemed to us to last an eternity because of the terrible road, we reached our destination. This was the community centre of Matshiretsane village, where we were to stay and work.
The community centre is one of the brighter spots in Kgautswane. Setting up community centres in rural areas was the brainchild of President Thabo Mbeki, who visualised these as learning centres for rural inhabitants. The Kgautswane community centre was founded by Madam (Mama) Clara Masinga, and is managed by her. Mama Clara, who is an influential figure in the village, is using the community centre as an effective instrument of rural development. The person who was to help us in our study was her nephew, Ishmael Adams. He is an infopreneur, that is, one who provides information to the community at large, particularly youngsters, about various entrepreneurial opportunities. He was ably supported in this effort by Simon Motumi, a young man born and brought up in Kgautswane. The infopreneurship concept had been evolved by CSIR in Pretoria. It was a novel experiment in rural development, whereby the infopreneurs were equipped with basic skills in video shooting, Web design, and the like. These skills were meant to sustain and support them and eventually to produce a stream of rural entrepreneurs. The project was still in its infancy. Ishmael and Simon were to be my guides who would help me understand the various nuances of life in Kgautswane.
A brief historical account of rural South Africa is in order here. South Africa, like the rest of Africa, or for that matter even India, has traditionally been predominantly rural. As in India, European settlers wreaked havoc on rural life and livelihoods, forcing previously self-contained and self-sufficient tribal and farming communities to migrate to the cities. The discovery of gold and diamonds further worsened the plight of rural communities, forcing them to provide cheap labour to the white settlers and mine owners. So far, the situation seemed to have many parallels with that of pre-independence India. However, in the post-World War II period, when the rest of the world began to break free of colonialism, racism, and other such social evils, South Africa went exactly in the opposite direction. The British had left South Africa much earlier and had been replaced by Dutch settlers, the Boers. In order to prove their superiority over the black tribes, the Boers introduced the monstrous practice of apartheid or forced seclusion. The Group Areas Act led to the creation of homelands, or more exotically termed Bantustans, for the ‘natives’. In order to implement apartheid, people were forcefully evicted from towns and cities, often in the middle of the night, and deposited in godforsaken areas where they were given tin shacks in the name of housing. This led to the emergence of black townships in urban areas and homelands, which were projected as independent countries supposedly ruled by black people (I am using the same terminology as is done in South Africa even today to refer to people, rather than using politically correct terms).
Back to Kgautswane then. Kgautswane was part of a homeland called Sekhukuneland. It was ruled by a king. Under the king was a chief. The chief was a powerful person, and even today remains a figure of authority. The chief derived his power not only from administrative authority, but also, more importantly, from the recognition by the people of the chief as a leader. The chief and his family were part of royalty and the rest were common folk. After 1994, the year when the apartheid regime came to an end and was followed by the emergence of Nelson Mandela as a national leader, the villagers were allowed to take part in democratic elections. Today, rural South Africa seems to be in a confused state. People’s loyalties are divided between the traditional chief and the new democratic authorities. The national government has done little to resolve this confusion. Unlike India, South Africa has no local self-government such as panchayati raj. Thus, the biggest casualties here are effective decision making and reliable service delivery. Due to these factors, rural South Africa in general and Kgautswane in particular present a relatively pathetic picture.
As I have noted earlier, owing to forced eviction and resettlement, many people even today do not identify themselves with the areas in which they are living at present. Mama Clara’s family was one such family that had been forcefully evicted and moved to Kgautswane. Ishmael recounted his days as a schoolchild when he had to walk for an hour from his home to the school, always under fear of being attacked by the villagers who were traditionally based there. His return from school followed a similar routine. In addition, travelling to another village to meet one’s girlfriend meant risking a severe thrashing. However, with the end of apartheid, and following an increasing number of marriages between young people from different villages, this problem was eventually resolved.
Unlike the situation in rural India, farming in rural South Africa occupied a relatively insignificant place in the larger economy. People grew mealies (maize) for subsistence rather than for commercial reasons. It was interesting to note that on the other side of the main road were vast stretches of orange orchards owned and managed by white farmers, while the Kgautswane area presented a contrasting picture, with lack of irrigation, absence of agricultural equipment, and lack of farming know-how. It was shocking to see young boys and girls who had completed their matriculation (class 12), and who were nevertheless loitering, doing nothing, for many years. Many of them came across as bright young people, but who lacked any guidance, motivation, or enthusiasm. Senior citizens received grants from the government, and entire families survived on this money. Single mothers were given a grant of 300 rands per child per month. However, this practice is not as innocuous as it looks. I was informed by many people in the village that these grants gave women as young as fourteen years the encouragement to indulge in unprotected premarital sex and produce children. The babies were often left to languish in the homes of their grandparents, while the young mothers used the grant money to buy new clothes, to drink, and even to gamble. Thus, a noble intention on the part of the government has resulted in a perverse incentive. Apart from girls getting pregnant and becoming mothers when they themselves are little more than children, the prevailing system has greatly increased the probability of HIV transmission and infection.
It was very difficult for many villagers to gain access to basic amenities like clean, potable water and electricity. Many people had to walk for at least an hour each way to get water from a nearby stream. In addition, 70 per cent of Kgautswane was not electrified. Ishmael informed me that it was only due to the community centre that the government had electrified some villages, and that too as late as 2006. He asked what I considered a very pertinent question: ‘What does freedom mean to these people when they have to still grope in the dark?’ I pondered this question a lot, especially when I used to travel to the interior villages, which were backward and wore a despondent look. I told Ishmael and Simon that many Indian villages faced similar problems, but the outlook in India today was one of optimism and hope rather than pessimism and despondency. In India, local institutions are being strengthened gradually and things are happening, howsoever slowly. The results of the recent national elections in India, which were emerging even as I was writing this article, seemed to strengthen my belief. However, that is another story.
Watching Mama Clara at work was an object lesson in self-discipline, hard work, and dedication. She used to be up by 6:00 a.m. and would join her team of workers in doing the daily chores at the community centre, including cooking, gardening, and cleaning the toilet. At the end of the day, she diligently watched the evening television news programme and retired at around 11:00 p.m. There was hardly a moment that one would find her idling or resting. Yet she always had time for a smile and a chat; she was always willing to talk to you. She was a motherly figure, with the ability to motivate people to do great things. She was obviously the inspiration behind Ishmael’s decision to take up community work, even though a much better lifestyle beckoned him in cities like Pretoria and Johannesburg.
Mama Clara was keen that we should meet the chief of Kgautswane. The chief’s village was called Legokoneng, and was about 20 minutes’ drive from the community centre. It was necessary to obtain the chief’s blessings before undertaking any kind of study in the area. Protocol had to be followed in meeting and interacting with the chief. We first had to inform the chief’s messenger of our desire to meet the leader. The messenger would then lead us to the chief’s house. I imagined the chief’s house to be a royal chamber of some kind, but it turned out to be a relatively rundown house with a torn sofa set. A flat-screen TV seemed out of place in the room. The chief was not around, so we were left to interact with his brother. Mama Clara, speaking in a low and reverent voice, described the purpose of our visit to the members of the royal family seated in the room. To be fair, they were quite down-to-earth people and were not pompous or self-important. We were not supposed to speak directly with the members of the royal family. We did our bit by handing over an envelope containing a hundred rand to the chief’s brother and then departed. Needless to say, the chief’s family promised us their full cooperation during our study. In this way, we paid our respects to the royalty of Kgautswane.
Ishmael and Simon were thoughtful and interesting young men. They were passionate about Kgautswane and hence often overtly critical of the situation in their village. In one of his rare pessimistic moods, Ishmael would say, ‘We people are making the apartheid era look like a golden age. At least then people worked out of fear, but today people think it is their fundamental right to get grants and charity and thereby relax.’ Harsh though this observation may seem, I felt that there was a ring of truth to it. People had somehow lost the will to work and to fight, possibly because of years of oppression. Today, the tendency is to grab whatever one can lay one’s hands on. Perhaps this was the reason for South Africa being the ‘crime capital’ of the world.
Ishmael had an interesting story to share. He was born of a black mother and a ‘coloured’ father. Coloured means an offspring of a black and white couple. His father left the family when Ishmael was very young, and his mother soon married a white man. This was a revolutionary step at the time because ‘mixed marriages’ were prohibited under the apartheid laws. The stepfather used to visit Ishmael’s mother surreptitiously in the village because being detected would have meant arrest and persecution by the police and the government. Ishmael told me that his white stepfather looked after him and loved him just as a biological father would, and hence he was sensitised towards the white perspective. He was disturbed that black children were often brought up to hate white people. Thus, racial hatred, rather than diminishing in the post-apartheid period, was unfortunately increasing. Ishmael did his bit to alleviate this racially charged situation in the country by arranging interactions between white South Africans and other international visitors, on the one hand, and the local children, on the other hand, as he wanted to show that for every narrow-minded individual there were ten good people, and to demonstrate that hate would not take them anywhere.
Simon had his own story. As a young man, he had led a wild and misguided life, indulging in drinking and other vices. Ishmael convinced him to work as a volunteer at the community centre run by his aunt, and Simon metamorphosed into a diligent, disciplined, and hardworking man. Today, he is well settled in life and bursting with positive energy. Volunteerism in South Africa was something that I found interesting (it reminded me of the concept of sewa in India, though unlike Sewa, Volunteerism had little religious connotations). It is claimed that volunteerism prevails in South Africa because of the spirit of ubuntu, which conveys the simple but powerful truth that ‘people are people because of other people’.
Ishmael and Simon introduced me to Ali, a Pakistani businessman, who ran a shop in Kgautswane. Ali had his own story. He had left Pakistan because of the deteriorating law and order situation in the country. He landed up in South Africa where, ironically, the security situation was perhaps as bad, if not worse. Ali, however, was not a person to give up so easily. He tried his hand at various jobs. Once, he even faced armed attacks by robbers. Eventually, he settled in Kgautswane. Today, he owns a spaza (departmental store), which is very well equipped. He has married a local woman, and is doing quite well. His hospitality was overwhelming and reminded me of the hospitality of people in rural India. Ali, too, bemoaned the laziness of the youngsters. In particular, he decried the xenophobia prevailing in South Africa where foreign labourers were killed mercilessly. He asked a piquant question: ‘These people allege that the Zimbabweans are taking away their jobs. What jobs are they doing that can be taken away? Why don’t they learn some skills from the Zimbabweans and develop into entrepreneurs?’
Ali offered interesting insights into other aspects of life in South Africa. He said that local shop owners did not know how to run a business successfully. For instance, they charged a heavy margin on an essential commodity like bread. Had the price of bread been reasonable, it would have been an ‘invitation to enter the shop and buy other things in the process’. By reducing the margin on bread, Ali was able to lure many customers to his shop and thus increase his overall sales of other products as well, a marketing strategy that other shop owners had not been able to understand even after years of observation. In addition, Ali taught cricket to students in local schools. The cricket coaching allowed him not only to interact with youngsters but also to stay connected to his Pakistani roots.
The language spoken in Kgautswane is called Sepedi. I managed to grasp very little of it. I would like to describe the exchange of greetings among the local people, something that I found fascinating. Imagine two people, A and B, meeting in the street. The exchange of greetings would go something like this:
A: Dume lang (greeting).
B: Aaaaaeeeeeeey (response).
A: Lekaaaaaeeee? (How are you?)
B: Re gona. Lekae? (We are fine. How are you?)
A: Re-gooona. (We are fine).
I shared my observation with Ishmael that this greeting sometimes extended up to fifteen seconds and wondered if this could possibly be the longest greeting in the world. Sometimes trucks were stopped in the middle of the road and greetings were exchanged with passers-by in the manner described above. Since Ishmael and Simon seemed to know almost everyone of the hundred thousand people in Kgautswane (this is only a slight exaggeration), imagine how much a journey that would otherwise have taken half an hour could be delayed. However, this observation is possibly the result of analysis paralysis and holds no meaning in places where time seems to stand still.
Ishmael and Simon combined my survey schedule with visits to different spots in and around Kgautswane so that I could better acquaint myself with the cultural nuances of life in rural South Africa. On one such occasion, I attended a traditional wedding in a village called Kgotlopong. A traditional wedding implies a marriage ceremony held to please ‘the ancestors’, which involved performing ancient tribal rituals, such as slaughtering a cow, holding traditional dances, and the like. Ancestor worship was the central point of tribal culture. However, this directly contradicted Christian beliefs, and most of the tribal folk had converted to Christianity under British influence. So an apparent confusion prevailed in the black community in South Africa. However, the people had ingenious ways of resolving the confusion. It was intriguing to note that the diverse beliefs of ancestor worship and Christianity coexisted in rural communities, albeit a bit uncomfortably. Another common tribal practice in South Africa, which is also prevalent among tribal communities in India, is the payment of lobola, or bride price, by the prospective groom (note the similarity with the chandla of Gujarat). After lobola has been fully paid, a ‘white wedding’ as per Christian tradition is held, again more as an assertion of status. It was indeed humbling when the MC (master of ceremonies) at the wedding announced that they were happy and proud to have a guest who had travelled ‘all the way from India’ for the wedding. Ladies danced with gay abandon. Men joined the dance only after they were dead drunk. Alcohol flowed freely. There was beer as well as liquor made from marula, a local fruit. The couple wanted to be photographed with the ‘foreigner’. I willingly obliged.
Another such occasion was a stockvel, a chit fund group function. Contrary to such meetings in India, this one was marked by song, dance, and drinking. Different stockvel groups were present, and each group wore its own particular and distinctive gear. It was only after the dancing was over that the women retired. Talk about monetary matters was kept a closely guarded secret for obvious reasons. It struck me that the people in South Africa were fundamentally a happy lot and did not allow day-to-day problems to come in the way of celebrating the small things in life.
The visits to Kgautswane have got me thinking. I could see, first of all, that India in general and rural India in particular are moving in the right direction. This is something that I would never have appreciated had I not been to Kgautswane. I could also see how decades of oppression had shattered the rural socio-economic fabric in South Africa, but the spirit of ubuntu still shone through. Strong leadership at the grass-roots level is needed to mobilise rural communities. However, in this pall of gloom I could also see bright spots of hope like Ishmael and Simon. I could see Ali, who was operating in an area completely out of his comfort zone, and yet, in his own way, who was trying to uplift the community. I could also see in the young boys and girls with whom I had spoken sudden flashes of optimism and determination. This evidence of hope and progress enabled me to leave Kgautswane in an optimistic frame of mind. Something within me has changed forever after my sojourn in Kgautswane. I will always cherish my experiences in South Africa, and that is why I want to share them with my friends and colleagues in India.