It can be tough to get hold of a busy mother; tougher still, when she’s fighting the good fight against corruption and is on the front pages of all the newspapers. Thank goodness for social media.
Many know Thuli Madonsela for her work as South Africa’s Public Protector. Few know she is a single parent with two children Wenzile and Mbusowabantu.
“It’s so difficult to get hold of my mom; I sometimes have to get hold of her through Twitter,” says Wenzile, Madonsela’s daughter.
In 1998, their father, Nhlanhla Mngomezulu, the first Secretary General of the People’s United Democratic Movement in Swaziland, died of a stroke.
“My father was passionate about human rights and movements, that is how he and my mom met. They shared the same passion,” says Wenzile.
We are at the Serious Social Investing Conference, in the Gordon Institute of Business Science in Sandton. Here, Wenzile is engaged in a heated debate with Adam Habib, Vice-Chancellor at the University of the Witwatersrand and Anthony Farr, CEO of the Allan Gray Orbis Foundation.
Her brother Mbusowabantu is also present.
“At home, she’s not the Public Protector. She is a loving mother; she hurts when we’re hurting. She takes no joy in our pain. The reason I can dream is because of her. She raised us to believe anything is possible and that we can achieve whatever we want,” says Wenzile, wonderfully opinionated and not afraid to speak her mind. Her brother is a soft-spoken environmentalist.
“We come from a home where we live out the spirit of Ubuntu. For example, she sent five children to university because she’s trying to break the cycle of poverty.”
Wenzile says Madonsela is a diplomat. “She likes sugar-coating things.”
What makes her angry? “If you interfere with her territory, she bites. But she doesn’t lose her temper,” says Wenzile.
According to Madonsela’s son Mbusowabantu, deception is what annoys Madonsela the most.
The 24-year-old Wenzile is following in her mother’s footsteps, studying towards a degree in law at the University of Pretoria and is also Secretary General of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) at university.
“I feel like we can’t live in a false paradise, we need to redress past injustices before dealing with current ones.”
Big on black consciousness, in 2015, Wenzile decided to enter politics, a decision Madonsela supported.
“In terms of harnessing my dreams, whether through the ANC or EFF, she supports me. As long as it resonates with my identity and vision… she invests in our dreams. She used to be a communist herself.”
In February 2011, controversy loomed at the Madonsela household, when Mbusowabantu, crashed her BMW X6, a state-owned car into a garden wall on Lucky Bean Crescent in the center of Pretoria, after allegedly attempting to avoid a dog on the road.
“If we do something wrong, she doesn’t defend us… When she heard about the car, she told me to take responsibility for my actions.”
“My mother is socially awkward. She is always discussing work, philosophy and politics. She finds it difficult to converse with a stranger,” says Mbusowabantu.
“I am still finding myself and identifying with the circumstances of being the Public Protector’s daughter. I have to be careful of what I do even though sometimes it’s harmless to me,” says Wenzile.
Mbusowabantu hopes Madonsela’s successor will have the integrity his mother has.
So does South Africa.