Freedom is Not Real if People Don’t Feel Free

Update: A shorter version of this article has been published in the Sunday Tribune and the Daily Maverick.

Freedom is Not Real if People Don't Feel Free

Lindela 'Mashumi' Figlan*

How can you declare from above that people are free from while they themselves talk from below of feeling unfree?

It is true that freedom comes with so many responsibilities. There are responsibilities from above and from below. Freedom is not just about expressing yourself as happy or not happy. There is no real freedom without justice, equality and democracy. Justice, equality and democracy require that people respect each other's dignity and that society is organised around people's dignity. If we were really free every citizen would feel part and parcel of a country that respected their dignity. They would experience this dignity at work, at home and in all the discussions about the future of each community and the country. They would be able to organise and to express their views in safety.

It is not just the politicians who declare that Abahlali baseMjondolo are wrong to deny that we are free. Some political analysts do the same even as we are voicing our concerns about the scarcity of freedom in South Africa. It seems that some political analysts are hired to come on TV and radio and condemn whatsoever the poor are saying about the country. When what is called debate is just a discussion between the politicians and these analysts we are excluded once again. Really it is quite amazing that in a country that says that it is a democracy it is taken as normal for people to speak about the poor while we are denied the right to speak for ourselves. It is as if being poor makes you a permanent child, a criminal or a traitor. We are only taken as citizens when it comes to voting and even then we are threatened that no development will come to those who do not support the ruling party.

The time when the politicians could hide behind apartheid has gone. People are sick and tired of the politicians chasing numbers in their search for power while ignoring the fact that we are human beings. You cannot lie forever and continue to be believed forever. The time of the liars is running out. This is why the politicians are now killing us.

Every weekend Abahlali baseMjondolo has to go to two or three new areas. People are rushing to join the movement because they notice that struggle is the only way to live. Without struggle you will be evicted from your shack or end up in a transit camp. The truth is that the government has no plan to house the people. They are only interested in using the housing budget to make their friends into millionaires. Fraud and corruption are everywhere. Houses that are said to be for the poor are given to people like police officers and teachers, people who are close to the ruling party. At the same time our children are dying of diarrhoea in the shacks, women are being raped because there are no toilets and the fires keep coming. The Constitution says that we have a right to housing and that we can't be evicted without a court order. The councillors don't care about the Constitution. They just evict the people. If you resist you will be arrested. You might be beaten or tortured. You might even be killed. And people are losing jobs each and every day and the government has no plan for them.

It is clear that we cannot trust those in power. Just look at the Manase report. This is so disappointing. There were so many excuses and procrastinations. The politicians do everything in their power to protect other politicians, and their officials, while expecting poor people to go and vote for these thieves.

How can people be said to be free when they are not involved in their own development? How can people be said to be free when the law does not apply to them? How can people be said to be free when they must face violence when they stand up for the rights, for what was promised to them? Yes we have scars from apartheid. But we are still bleeding today. We are still getting new scars. We are still being denied what is basic to human life. We are still under attack. We still live under oppression. Our rulers tell us that they are heroes. But we have really noticed that they are opportunists of worst kind. This is why we call them the black boers. An oppressor is an oppressor no matter what colour they are. This is the truth and we tell it bravely.

At home in Flagstaff my mother used to feed the two pigs with one big walking dish. One day I noticed that she was no longer feeding the pigs from one big walking dish and that she had separated one pig from another and was using two walking dishes. I was so stressed because what I noticed with those pigs was that while they were both in need of food, and they were both screaming with the same voice and thereby showing oneness, one was getting thin and one was getting fat. I asked my mother about the decision to feed the pigs separately while they were sharing this oneness while looking for food. She told me about the parasites. She told me that you can do whatsoever you like with a parasite but once what you have been struggling for is in front of you the parasite will show its signs and its true colours. That is why I saw one pig becoming bigger and the other one became too thin. The thin pig had a parasite that was eating it from the inside.

This is a very big example of what is happening today in South Africa. We fought together. Some ran away from this country while others preferred to die in this country. Today we all notice that those that decided not to leave the country of their mothers and fathers, they are mostly the ones that are suffering more. When freedom was in front of us there was a parasite inside us, eating us from the inside. We were not freed by MK. Apartheid was defeated by the struggles of the people in rural areas and in cities, in factories and mines and in communities. But in this struggle we were so focussed on the boers that we didn't notice the parasite inside us.

It was so easy for the First Man (President) to sing “letha umshini wam” to the people, asking them to bring him his machine gun. Some people they were so happy to give their power to him. But now he is singing “Inde lendlela” telling the people that this war is too long. Some people they gave him the machine gun that he asked for but now he is trying to convince them to be patient even though he is carrying that heavy machine gun.

It is true that sometimes struggle is long. But it is also true that it didn't take long for the First Man to secure the wealth of his family and his friends. It didn't take long for him to build his own home. It didn't take long for the people's struggles to be repressed. We have to ask ourselves what the First Man has been doing with that machine gun that some people were so happy to give him.

Millions of people have no work. Others they are working for R60 per day through the labour brokers. Yet the tenderpreneurs, those who are close to the leaders of the ruling party, are earning millions and millions. The so-called comrades that lead this country are hypocrites. They are parasites eating the people's struggle from the inside. It is time to stop feeding them. It is time to separate the real people's struggle from the parasites. It is time to stop giving away our power to politicians. It is time that we look after our own struggle and keep it separate from the politicians and their tenderpreneurs. It is clear that some who were fighting the boers were doing so in order that they could become the new boers and not because they loved justice. These are the same people that came with the so-called Slums Act which shows that really they don't care about poor people and that they don't even want us in the cities. They are the same people that are repressing our struggles by burning our homes, locking us in prison, torturing us in the police stations and killing us. They are the same people that are working with the imperialist system. We notice that poor people are struggling all over the world and we are waiting for the day when the imperialist systems will fall down and be replaced with a system that is in favour of the poor. In fact we really need a system that abolishes poverty so that we are all just people.

Some they think that it is a wise decision to align socialism with capitalism. Even Lenin in Russia looked at all the wars and decided to make a compromise between socialism and capitalism. In South Africa we have a Communist Party that is in full support of capitalism. They even support the bosses and the police against the workers. Just look at what happened in Marikana. Look how that Minister behaved. It was so disappointing. She behaved really badly. People need to analyse what happened in Marikana very carefully. We need to analyse this situation for ourselves. We don't need analysts to come from above and tell us what happened there like they tell us that we are wrong to say that we are not free.

During the Marikana tools down one of the capitalists was admitted to a luxurious hospital for emotional distress. But the workers must suffer on their own after the massacre. Some are committing suicide. Even the money for the funerals of the workers was sometimes corrupted. We are told that this is a democracy but the reality is that people were killed like flies. Witnesses have been tortured and killed too. If you are a poor person or a worker your humanity means nothing to the imperialists and it means nothing to the parasites in the ruling party that want us to call them our comrades.

The police went onto the mountain to kill the workers in Marikana just like they went onto the mountain known as Ingquza to kill in 1960. Really we have to ask ourselves what has changed for the workers and the poor?

It is good to see that Advocate Mpofu decided to represent the workers. Those who tried to kill him were trying to strike a big blow against the workers. Middle class people who stand with the workers and the poor will also come under attack. Those who are patiently waiting for the results of the commission should remember what happened to the trial of the police officers accused of murdering Comrade Andries Tatane. His bones cannot rest in peace and they will never rest in peace until the truth is exposed to the world. However we cannot trust the courts to expose this truth. They have become so politicised. The parasites are inside that system too.

It is a warning when the trade unions are on the side of the government that is ruining the state and leaving workers to be exploited by labour brokers. But the union that will stand on the side of the workers is very good. Those who see a union that stands on the side of the workers as a betrayal of the struggle must rethink their position. The time when NUM was on the side of the workers has passed. Justice is for ever. Organisations rise and fall. They are corrupted. Organisations must only be supported when they are on the side of justice. It is only loyalty to justice that must be forever. NUM aligned itself with the bosses and with imperialism. NUM was oppressing the workers. It was NUM that started the violence in Marikana. AMCU really needs to be praised because it shows that whatever the conditions it is possible to take the side of the workers. It shows that it is possible to organise outside of the ruling party. Those churches and law firms that are supporting the workers in Marikana also need to be praised.

We really need the workers to take the side of the poor, to join with us in our struggles. We all know that this is impossible for so long as the workers are controlled by COSATU which is under the ANC and influenced by the SACP too. But now that some workers they are organising themselves autonomously from the ANC, like we have done in Abahlali baseMjondolo since 2005, it might be possible for the workers and the poor to struggle together. When we are struggling it must not be for our names. It must be for our country which is under the control of an organisation that is being eaten from the inside by parasites. A country that is drowning in corruption. A country where violence is becoming normal. When we are struggling it must be for justice.

Some of our fathers were in the mountain committees. Some of our brothers are in the strike committees. Our wives, our sisters and our daughters are in the shack committees with us. We know that more of us will be arrested, tortured and killed in this struggle. But we will stand strong in this struggle. We will oppose all attempts to divide the poor. We will reject the opportunists that are only coming to the people's struggles now that they have been pushed out of power.

Corruption is not legalised in the law as it is written but it is legalised in reality. Most of those in the ruling party and government who are against corruption are under attack because they are disturbing the parasites. The government and the ruling party say that they represent all the people but they are just there to take for themselves in the name of the nation. They are happy to work with the imperialists as long as they get something for themselves. They are liars and hypocrites. They are eating the people's struggle from the inside. When we resist they oppress us. A country of this nature is not for all the people who live in it.

If natural resources remain under private ownership more people will be killed. If organisations like NUM and the ANC are happy to support the imperialists and repress the people more people will be killed. If organising outside of the ANC is considered to be treason more people will be killed.

The apartheid regime separated the people in so many ways. This separation crippled our humanity. It was a very big and destructive weapon. Today we are still being separated from each other. Some of us really hate people from other countries in Africa. We are calling them with many names. We are doing this even though people in those countries provided those of us who went to exile with land to plough, with safety and with training. Most of the Africans from other countries are not even looking for jobs here but are creating their own ways of surviving and yet some people here want to blame them for everything that is wrong. There is also hatred of people from other races and people that speak different languages and are coming from other provinces in South Africa. There is prejudice against women too. You will even find this discrimination in political parties. You will even find it in churches, NGOs and social movements.

This is a warning to all social movements and struggles by workers and poor people. We must do away with with xenophobia, racism, discrimination against people from other provinces and sexism. These divisions are the most destructive weapon that we face in our struggles. We will only realise our truth strength when we are united. Our mission is to unite the hungry, the homeless, the exploited and the poor. Those who come preaching division amongst the poor are our enemies. Let us be clear where the real parasites in our society are. The parasites are those who have privatised our struggle for their own gain. The parasites are those who are growing rich while we are getting poorer. The parasites are those who send their police or assassins to repress us when we organise. We need to stop giving our support to the organisations that are hosts for these parasites. We need to build healthy organisations, democratic organisations, honest organisations. We need to build organisations that can build the power of the workers and the poor.

We need land and housing. We need decent work. Our children need good education. Our demands are clear – the land, the wealth and the power must be shared fairly. Every person must count the same. If this is called communism them I am a communist.

Alutta! Jama. Sjadu. Zizi.

*Lindela 'Mashumi' Figlan is the Vice-President of Abahlali baseMjondolo