Freedom in Our Lifetime. Anton Lembede

      Freedom in Our Lifetime

      THE COLLECTED WRITINGS OF

      ANTON MUZIWAKHE LEMBEDE

      EDITED BY ROBERT R EDGAR

      AND LUYANDA KA MSUMZA

      KWELA BOOKS

      To A P Mda (1917–93)

      Friend and Mentor

      Introduction

      ROBERT R EDGAR

      LUYANDA KA MSUMZA

      On Easter Sunday 1944 a group of young political activists gathered at the Bantu Men’s Social Centre in downtown Johannesburg to launch the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL). Motivated by their desire to shake up the “Old Guard” in the African National Congress (ANC) and set the ANC on a militant course, this “Class of ’44” became the nucleus of a remarkable generation of African leaders: Nelson Mandela, Oliver Tambo, Walter Sisulu, Jordan Ngubane, Ellen Kuzwayo, Albertina Sisulu, A P Mda, Dan Tloome and David Bopape. Many of them remained at the forefront of the struggle for freedom and equality in South Africa for the next half century.

      However, the person the Youth Leaguers turned to in 1944 for their first president is not even listed in this group. He was a Natal-born lawyer, Anton Muziwakhe Lembede. Known to his friends as “Lembs”, Lembede was a political neophyte when he moved from the Orange Free State to Johannesburg in 1943 to practice law. His sharp intellect, fiery personality, and unwavering commitment to the struggle made an immediate impression on his peers, and he was quickly catapulted into prominence in both the Youth League and the ANC. Though his political life was brief – he died tragically in 1947 – he left an enduring legacy for future generations. He is best remembered for his passionate and eloquent articulation of an African-centred philosophy of nationalism that he called “Africanism”. A call to arms for Africans to wage an aggressive campaign against white domination, Africanism asserted that in order to advance the freedom struggle, Africans first had to turn inward. They had to shed their feelings of inferiority and redefine their self-image, rely on their own resources, and unite and mobilise around their own leaders. Though African nationalism remains to this day a vibrant strand of political thought in South Africa, Lembede stands out as the first to have constructed a philosophy of African nationalism.

      As South Africa enters a new era, we have decided to remember Lembede’s contribution to the freedom struggle by assembling this collection of writings by and about him. Writing about Lembede is a challenging task for several reasons. One is that we are still faced with significant gaps in our knowledge of his life, especially the years before he moved to Johannesburg and entered politics. Another is that Lembede did not have the opportunity to develop many of his ideas fully because of the short time period in which he was politically active. Consequently, it is difficult to chart precisely the evolution of his political ideas. However, we believe this collection, which brings together Lembede’s writing from his student days to just a few days before his death, significantly broadens our understanding of a seminal figure in South African political thought.1

      We have divided this collection into eight sections. The first consists of essays he wrote in the 1930s when he was a student at Adams College and, later, a teacher in Natal and the Orange Free State. Subsequent sections present his political writings from 1944–47 when he was active on the political scene and began to frame his philosophy of African nationalism. His views on African nationalism, religion, the ANC Youth League, cultural affairs and other political movements were primarily set out in letters and essays he submitted to the black press. But we have also included reports on his speeches, a book review, excerpts from his MA thesis for the University of South Africa and reactions to his activities and ideas. Finally, we have included tributes to Lembede by his contemporaries on his death.

      EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION

      Looking back on his childhood days in Natal, Lembede was fond of telling his Johannesburg friends, “I am proud of my peasant origin. I am one with Mother Africa’s dark soil.” This declaration served a dual purpose: defining a political orientation and commitment and underscoring the fact that whatever his considerable educational, professional and political achievements, he remained strongly attached to his rural roots.

      Born on 21 January 1914 on the farm of Frank Fell at Eston, Muziwakhe Lembede was the first of seven children of Mbazwana Martin and Martha Nora MaLuthuli Lembede.2 His father was a farm labourer who, according to his family, had a reputation among whites and blacks in his area for “listening, thinking … and … a quality of the fear of God which he impressed upon his children by deeds.”

      His mother attained a Standard V education (a considerable achievement for any black South African at that time) at Georgedale School and taught at schools at Vredeville, Darlington, and Umlazi Bridge. She tutored Anton at home in the basics of reading and writing until he was ready to pass Standard II. But she was anxious for him and her other children to escape their gruelling lives as farm labourers. Around 1927, she prevailed on her husband to relocate the family to Mphephetho in the Umbumbulu “native” reserve (situated mid-way between Pietermaritzburg and Durban) so that their children could have access to formal schooling.

      The Lembede family history portrays their move to Umbumbulu as a positive one, but it is also coincided with a major upheavel on Natal’s white farms. For a variety of reasons, white farmers evicted thousands of black South Africans from their farms in the late 1920s. Most of the dispossessed made their way to the urban areas or the overpopulated, overstocked and unproductive African reserve areas that comprised roughly seven per cent of South Africa’s land. Indeed, Lembede’s father could not make ends meet on his plot of land at Mphephetho, and he had to supplement his income by working as a seasonal labourer on nearby white and Indian farms.3

      Before the Lembede family moved to Umbumbulu, Muziwakhe, who had been baptized in the Anglican church and given the name Francis, converted to Catholicism and, with his father and brother Nicholas, joined a Roman Catholic church near Eston. The priest at Eston, Father Cyprian, gave Muziwakhe an additional name, Anton.

      The church was to play a central role throughout Anton’s life. As teenagers, he and Nicholas often played a game in which they acted out the role of a priest. Indeed, both told their family that they intended to become priests. However, Anton promised that before joining the priesthood, he would teach for a few years to pay school fees for his brothers and sisters.

      Anton’s formal education did not begin until he was thirteen, but he showed immediate promise in his classes. His teacher at the Catholic Inkanyezi school was nineteen year old Bernadette Sibeko of Ladysmith, who was fresh out of Mariannhill Training College. Inkanyezi was her first teaching post.

      About sixty students squeezed into her classroom in a “building made of wattle and daub with corrugated iron roofing but with no ceiling.”4 To Standard I and II students, she taught Zulu, English, hygiene and scriptures. In addition, to Standard III and IV students, she taught nature study, short stories from South African history, regional geography and reading, writing and arithmetic.

      Sibeko was the sole teacher for all the classes, and one of her techniques for coping with such a large and diverse group of children was to parcel out responsibilities. Since Anton was one of her best students, she often taught him a lesson and had him instruct the others.

      Anton’s dedication to his studies left distinct impressions on both his family and Sibeko. His family remembers him herding the family cattle, but being so engrossed by his books that he let the cattle wander off. One of Sibeko’s recollections was of watching him at a football match, walking up and down a field in deep thought and occasionally kicking the ball when it came his way.5

      On one occasion, Sibeko asked Anton to write an essay on money. His response, written out on a slate with a pencil, so impressed her that she copied it and entered it in a contest at a teachers’ conference. It was awarded first prize. When we interviewed her in August 1992, she had no hesitation recollecting his short essay.

      Money is a small coin, a small wheel bearing the picture of the King’s head.