Sandile Dikeni
Still remember the Cultural Workers Congress (CWC)? The truth is that organisations like CWC are the reason why this month went cultural.
The United Democratic Front (UDF), led at the time by Allan Boesak, was seen in the 1980s as the cultural mosaic that allowed us to learn and view different cultures as the future of this country. Still remember the elation of sitting at a table with an Indian or Chinese person at the same time without getting hurt afterwards?
On the contrary, there was an elation in the understanding that the many different races of this country could sing or dance with a vibrancy that very few in the world could master. It is therefore not difficult to see my elation in September. I know that the government’s wording about the month tries to be very impressive with gems such as “heritage” and big notions like that. Okay let me be simple and beautiful: September is really and simply a month of culture.
It is just sad that I do not think that the government understands what South Africans would want to do this month. It does not. I know. We would like to jol.
Let me hasten to say that by government I mean all the political parties. Worse, in the Western Cape, I cannot see the DA organising a jol.
In Gauteng it is fair to assume that there is likely to be a gig every day in Joburg or Pretoria. It is also likely that among the artists and musicians performing there, big names will be from Cape Town!
It is not arrogant to say that Cape Town is the artistic capital of South Africa. Johannesburg has the bucks and the liberalism of spaces like Kippies, but Cape Town has a sophistication bigger than Table Mountain.
It also has a depth deeper than the two oceans. In spring, it is general knowledge that the snoek and whales are having a fun indaba in the ocean. It is just a pity they have refused to announce the venue to the DA government. Still remember Ebrahim Rasool?
These fish used to find a way to communicate with his ministry of culture and announce the venues for the spring gig. Sadly they do not anymore. They do not trust Patricia de Lille.
They think she is a Portuguese person in disguise. When I heard this I was shocked and protested that the guys must tell the sharks, snoek and whales that De Lille only sounds Portuguese, but she is not.
The guys said they would rather not because it was difficult to tell a shark that the shark was wrong.
But, they said, they didn’t mind if I went to Sea Point and made the point to the large white they saw there.
I said to them I could not because sharks don’t like talking to journalists. They are media-shy.
Anytime they got into newspaper articles they were hunted down and slaughtered.
Then I thought that maybe it would be wise to change the topic to announce my glee at the prospect of Kaizer Chiefs coming to Cape Town.
Amakhosi coming to Cape Town is not just a small thing! It is amazing that they have chosen the Mother City as their capital.
It is also just fascinating that they can see the majesty of this beautiful space. It is obvious that the majesty of this team is likely to awaken Cape Town to the great marvel of football. The timing of the announcement is also more than glorious. It is majestic. They have made the announcement in September.
How can they lose a game with the majestic breezes of September air caressing their limbs? My theory is that the Kaizer Chiefs management have discovered that the majority of Kaizer Chiefs fans (including yours truly) reside in Cape Town.
It is not theoretical to assume that the Chiefs decision to come to Cape Town will assure them of victories that can make us forget the arrival of the Dutch in the personas of Jan van Riebeeck and Ajax. Cape Town does need to divorce herself from the Dutch. And to announce that Cape Town is home to an entity like Chiefs helps us to see that, despite the DA, this city is the royalty of the continent.
A chief, be reminded, is African royalty. With Chiefs taking over the heart of Cape Town, this cultural month is a return of South Africa to the deep cultural essence. It is also, in my humble opinion, a way in which the continent might realise the majesty they are missing in dismissing the Cape of South Africa as the capital of the continent.
It is not, in my humble opinion, a cultural mistake to see Cape Town as the cultural capital of Africa.
Remember the majesty of Abdullah Ibrahim?
It is my humble opinion that Abdullah Ibrahim’s music is the best musical language that helps us articulate the depths of this space.
Remember that song Woza Mntwana? Between you and me it is not in Cape Afrikaans.
No it is in Xhosa. As a kid of about seven, when I heard the song I was sure that Abdullah Ibrahim was Xhosa. I just could not understand his name; it did not sound Xhosa to me. I asked my brother Douglas who explained to me that he was coloured.
I did not understand that either; what is coloured?
In Victoria West, in the Karoo, it is difficult to see the difference between a Xhosa person and a coloured person.
Abdullah Ibrahim helped me to see that what Verwoerd was saying was nonsense. Just by Woza Mntwana(Come Child). It is still, in my opinion, one of the best jazz songs that I have heard. I know that you will also share my view when you hear that song.
I remember it playing in Munich and everyone asking me which tribe Abdullah was from. I tried to explain the “coloured” concept. The coloureds in Germany did not understand me. Neither did I understand myself. Nor could I articulate to the Germans the difference between a black person, as in Xhosa or Zulu, and a coloured person. I still cannot. I am not sure but I think that neither can anthropology.
Martin Luther King, Malcolm X and Michael Jackson are internationally considered as black by the rest of the world. In South Africa they are “coloured”.
See what I mean?
The cultural month, in my opinion, via arts and culture, must help us to formulate a discourse on this matter. Writers like Herman Charles Bosman did try to enter the discourse via literature, but they need help. They need artistic help.
A creative discourse that helps us with the babelaas of apartheid is not merely or only national but international.
The world needs to talk us out of prejudice. In other words the world needs cultural months like ours to involve us in a discourse that will no doubt educate the world on sensitive discourses like ours.
It is not my intention to harp on the past, but it is mere humility and humanity that insist that our past discourse be dismissed in our dances, poems, songs and paintings.