Being that it's April and the 27th is comming, I want to re-look this ideology of freedom. Did we really become free on the 27th of April 1994 or was that just the official opening to the idea of freedom. The idea that I can choose who my master will become, is that really freedom?
I am not going to try to explain what freedom is, but I will tell you what I know what it is not. I know that sounds like Tupac's mother on Common Sense's track (I forgot which one but its in the 'One day it's will all make sense' album). I agree with what she said, "... I don't know what freedom is, I know what it is not."
Around early 1986 before my mother was arrested to serve the 90 day detention, she came back home with a box of UDF (United Democratic Front (I think it later transformed to become the IFP, I am not certain about this, though)) t-shirts. I remember it was white with black and red coloured print on the front. She gave me one to wear, and I rocked it immediately.
It was fresh, I felt as if I was also part of the struggle, so I decided amma go outside and 'show off' my new kit to my friends. I walk out the house, see, the front door was a bit elivated so you had to walk down the stairs, but before I could complete my walk down the stairs, I froze.
Because the stairs were a bit elevated, you could see past the 'di stop nonsense' (ala the fence to the yard if you don't know term). Across from the street next to a house that we all knew the father of that house was police man, there was an army truck parked outside. To be precise it was what we termed, S'kafthini (i think) with soldiers peering out of the 'sun roof' of the truck.
That sight, with my UDF t-shirt on, brought me to my knees. I could not walk, my knees failed me, I fell off the stairs onto the lawn, I had to crawl back into the house, which was a good idea, coz I could hide from the 'soldiers'.
I think, that day, that afternoon, was my defining moment of realising what Apartheid was. I was 9 years old, but I knew I could not wear that t-shirt in front of the soldiers, no way, no how, I could have been in trouble, or worse, my mother would have been implicated.
Freedom. What is it? I knew on that day, that there was a good fight to fight, there was a struggle for a reason, the ANC, PAC, UDF, MK existed for a reason, to fight the good fight, so I can wear any t-shirt and any time I wanted to.
But, we are free now, aren't we. I got a formal definition of what freedom is,
The condition of being free of restraints.
Liberty of the person from slavery, detention, or oppression.
So, on the 27th of April 1994, are you telling me, you felt that. You felt being free from any restraints, slavery, detention or oppresion? I did not. I remember that day, coz tv sucked, all the was was coverage of the election day, I could not vote then, I voted the following year, is that what freedom is, to vote, to chose, to elect?
Somewhere between 1987 and 1991 whilst in exile (Morogoro, Tanzania), I learnt what freedom was, I cannot find the words to define it, because I think freedom is a self-sustaining term, but the fact that between 1986-june to 1991 december, I never had to explain to anybody or myself, that I was black. The race was only a reference to the tone of my skin colour and nothing more. White people were 'those people' with lighter skin, like my sister, but thier hair was different.
I felt nothing, no anger, no fear, no hate for any specific race, or my race. I was more my culture, Tswana, than being black.
I am more black now, than MoTswana. I don't want to be black, I don't want to be South African, I don't want to be MoTswana, I don't want to be African.
I want to be lebogang nkoane, my mother's child, my mother's son, my grandmother's grand child, my sister's brother, my uncle's nephew, without the capitals.
That is being free.