South Africa survived colonialism followed by apartheid, and
most recently, a new pandemic, HIV/AIDS. While we are living through the
aftermath of the old order, the words often attributed to Italian philosopher,
Antonio Gramsci, could not be truer: “The old is dying and the new struggles to
be born. Now is the time of monsters.”



The dragons we need to slay are clear. We have unacceptably
high levels of poverty, youth unemployment, child illiteracy and nutritional
stunting. All of which are systematically undermining the next generation’s
ability to enjoy freedom. 



That said, these are but the more visible aspects of our
life together. There are others – the more subtle, social dimensions. 



In 2019, non-racialism – the bedrock of the new South Africa
– struggles to find relevance in the public imagination in light of the
disillusionment many experience in the new political dispensation. It remains
devoid of substantial weight and consequence.



Its original purveyors did not theorize it or write about it
extensively, making it all the more elusive. What we do know is that race is a
social construct and that it has no biological grounding. While it does not
exist in a scientific sense, race has profound political, social and economic
implications. And it continues to be an undeniable fault-line within South
Africa. 



What is clear is that non-racialism does not mean
not-seeing-race-ness. In this lesser sense, it mimics the American notion of a
post-racial society. It is based on the myth that 1994 symbolized a tabula rasa
– a blank page. But 25 years later, the past haunts us. 



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="387" height="594" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/gettyimages-144859349-594x594-2.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-40401" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/gettyimages-144859349-594x594-2.jpg 387w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/gettyimages-144859349-594x594-2-300x460.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/gettyimages-144859349-594x594-2-195x300.jpg 195w" sizes="(max-width: 387px) 100vw, 387px" /><figcaption>Mural depicting 1st election in new South Africa, 1994 opposite Parliament, Cape Town, Western Cape (Photo by Hoberman Collection/UIG via Getty Images)</figcaption></figure></div>



In our public life, we often find ourselves in a
rinse-and-repeat cycle in which an offensive action is followed by public uproar
and reactive debates. In this polarizing space, the spotlight remains on rabid
racists, leaving implicit and internalized anti-black racism unchecked – both
of which affect most South Africans.



Political entrepreneurs – understanding the wounds we carry
as a nation – capitalize on the moments of uproar by playing on these
incidents. What happens in the context of the misuse of our racialized
experiences is that well-meaning citizens opt to shun any references to race in
order to maintain respectability. This tempts us to see race talk as
unproductive rhetoric, and not as a useful language to name our experiences
with one another in this country.



In our public life, talk about the past has similarly been
weaponised. Our history is either denied or it is deployed to delegitimize, to
silence, and to condone the inexcusable. But it is exactly in this moment that
we need more robust and critical engagement with our histories and their
effects in the present – not less.



When we actually grapple with the historical records, the
findings are chequered. History refuses to simply serve as a pass or a trump
card. It is far too unruly and intricate to merely be functional. History
demands to be reckoned with as a way of understanding the processes that led to
the present. A more accurate way of understanding it is as an unfinished story.
It has no end and it implicates us all. 



A way we can begin to participate in the unfolding of our
history is to infuse non-racialism with substance. We need a larger project
that rigorously surfaces our experiences at the coalface of the color line.
Scholars in the social sciences and the humanities as well as fiction writers
have no doubt begun this theorising labor, and their work has to make its way
into the mainstream. The process of naming the thousands of experiences we have
with each other can begin to inform our imagination about what it means to
simultaneously be inclusive, rooted in Africa and released from Europe’s orbit.



The project of naming our experiences for ourselves is an
act of power. In fact, the true might of colonialism and apartheid lay not in
their arsenal but in their ability to name us, define our borders, to codify
our laws, and thus, frame our self-imagination. 



In this moment, as South Africa reaches the quarter of a
century mark, it is imperative that we take a fresh look at the past. Not
merely as a story of victory, but as an incomplete struggle. At 25, all South
Africans need to join the struggle, knowing that aluta continua and that the
country we inherited in 



1994 is ours to continually liberate. 



We are part of the same cast of characters in history’s
production of South Africa, and we are on the stage now. 



– Dr Sebabatso Manoeli is a historian and non-profit professional. She serves as an Innovation Director at the DG Murray Trust. Previously, she was a History Lecturer at the University of Oxford, and at Stanford University’s Montag Center for Overseas Studies. She consulted for the African Union Commission’s Department of Political Affairs and the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation on transitional justice, as well as the African Peer Review Mechanism.

Tag: 1994 elections

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

Over The Rainbow: 25 Years Of Freedom For South Africa