The countless photo sessions in the park were followed by feasting and dancing until dawn by the mountains. A glimpse of a wedding in rural South Africa.

It’s a long weekend in South Africa and a childhood friend, Letlhogonolo Kedijang, is getting married in Zeerust, a dusty town in the country’s mountainous North West province, 240 kilometers from Johannesburg.
After an early start and a four-hour road trip, we finally arrive in rural Gopane, 47 kilometers from Zeerust. We are extremely early and ravenous, and the place is downright rural but these are no deterrents.
We have driven all the way to witness our friend’s nuptials. But we can’t ignore the rumbling in our tummies.
The boys decide to go to a local Buy-and-Braai, a butchery where the meat is cooked on the fire as you wait and watch. I stay back at Gopane and document the groom’s preparations with my camera. For a start, there are no modern bathtubs or showers here – you use a bucket filled with water to wash up.
Preened and ready, it’s time to hop into one of the cars that make up the convoy to the bride’s home. We are late and I am told our destination is just around the corner, when it’s actually behind one of the mountains.
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The cars are speeding and I am jittery, wishing there are speed-cameras or speed humps to slow them down. The scenes whiz by – dry land, sheep, chicken and grazing cows. There’s no oncoming traffic for miles on end.
Finally we arrive. A mountain away, what awaits us is singing, dancing and ululation. The groom leads the way as he walks uphill on the gravel road to the bride’s home to be accepted by her family.
I photograph their every move; he is accepted and she is taken. They look lovely in outfits that are a fusion between traditional and western; a trend I have been noting at most African weddings, not just in the cities, but in the countryside too.
Another convoy – a larger one this time – leaves for the local park, presumably a botanical garden, for the wedding photos.
Both sides of the family and their extended families are here. This is a staple in black South African culture – photos with the newlyweds amid flora and foliage.
After endless photographs with more than a hundred guests at the park, the couple leave in a white BMW convertible to the bridal home for the ceremony and grand lunch. I can finally rest and hand my time-worn camera to a friend eager to take over.
All the formalities are done, and the newlyweds are dancing away. More neighbors join, the ululating and singing get louder, and the band takes over.
The party has just begun.
<div id="attachment_37633" style="width: 750px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-37633" class="wp-image-37633 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/SIA-499-1024x686.jpg" alt="" width="740" height="496" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/SIA-499-1024x686.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/SIA-499-300x201.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/SIA-499-600x402.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/SIA-499-768x514.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/SIA-499.jpg 1356w" sizes="(max-width: 740px) 100vw, 740px" />Singing, dancing and Ululation at a wedding in North West. Photo by Motlabanna Monnakgotla.</div>
This is when we decide to stay on and not drive back to Johannesburg.
We continue to dance on the gravel, and the young couple open a circle for guests to challenge them at the dancing, a practice popular in black culture. The sun has set and the moon is out, and so are we.
It’s Monday morning, the birds are chirping, and the gents are snoring.
We wash our faces and head back home. Before leaving, we are gifted a bottle of whiskey as a token of appreciation.
We save it for later.
We make our first stop-over at a supermarket for a breakfast of chicken and bread. We open the boot of the car to double as a table. Locals can tell we are from Johannesburg.
We scorch the road again to music, until four hours later, we see a sign that says ‘welcome to Gauteng’.
After all the fun and frolic at a traditional African wedding, home beckons and duty calls in the modern commercial capital that is Johannesburg.
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Tales From An African Wedding

As soon as I heard of my aunt’s death, I knew straight away that I had to make a plan to fill my petrol tank and attend the funeral. I hadn’t seen her in months and felt bad about not getting her the mobile phone I had promised her months earlier. Guilt was flowing through my body with the blood pumped by my hurting heart.
Back to the tank issue – I was broke and could barely afford to get enough petrol to drive 175kms to Ledig, in the North West province. After fetching my uncle in Midrand, north of Johannesburg, and with just a 1.5-liter bottle of Valpre water in the car, we began our journey.
Fifty kilometers into our trip, we drove through Hartbeespoort, a scenic holiday spot in the North West known for its dam. We were stunned to see the narrow bridge in the area; it was like being in a different country for the first time, looking at everything with a new eye. It looked like one of those bridges from the movies depicting ancient Europe. It was beautiful.
We didn’t have time to stop and take pictures; it was 6:15PM and we didn’t want to drive in the rain, especially as it was getting dark.
After driving past the Sun City resort, we knew we had arrived. Far from home, our Tswana dialect wouldn’t go unnoticed by locals; they would know we were from Johannesburg.
At Ledig, we were greeted by three men who were expecting us. I was interested in learning more about the guy wearing the white Marikana mine overall with an X marked at the back. He was loud and funny, but also useful. He helped carry the chairs and tables from the van to the house.
The only thing I found out about the guy is his age, his jokes and that he is known in the area for his pantsula (a culture originating from black townships during apartheid) dress sense. He also wants to go to Johannesburg; a common desire among many youths in the area.
On Saturday, the day of the funeral, I couldn’t hear a word at the service. What was strange was seeing people waiting at the graveyard for the burial. Even stranger, men were not allowed into the graveyard if they weren’t wearing a jacket; to be fair my parents had warned me about that.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/focus/2017/07/10/pain-business-death/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: The Pain Of The Business Of Death</a>
At most black funerals, there is a culture that has evolved over the last couple of years where music is played and alcohol is consumed after the burial. It is called ‘after tears’ and is done as a celebration of life for the deceased.
This ‘after tears’ ceremony in the rural area of Ledig was no different from the one we have in the townships, where I live.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2018/03/09/slice-africa-durban/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: A Slice Of Africa In Durban</a>
It is now Sunday morning and I have just enough petrol to get us back home to Soweto. It wasn’t the most pleasant drive back to Johannesburg because we had nothing to nibble on, nor drink. Just a dry mouth, a hangover, and a dirty car.
Finally, we get home. I freshen up while my uncle heads to bed. I was tired but felt it was important to go to church with a friend after what was a sad weekend.
I never heard the sermon – I was too tired. Instead I took my shoes and socks off, rested in the car and passed out. I was woken by a knock on the window; my friend told me I embarrassed her because people saw me sleeping in the car outside church.
I didn’t care – I had rested and was officially back in Johannesburg.

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The Sad Road Trip On An Empty Wallet

Reabetswe Ngwane has come a long way from Rustenburg, and she has covered the journey on recycled tyres – literally.
The bubbly and ambitious Ngwane, raised in Mogwase, a township in Rustenburg in the North West Province of South Africa, recycles tyre tubes for a living, and has been able to turn waste to wealth.
When we meet her in the affluent suburb of Sandton in Johannesburg, she is late, having driven in from Rustenburg after another meeting. Dressed formally in black, she settles to talk about where it all began.
Ngwane’s entrepreneurial journey unraveled when she relocated from the township to the city in Rustenburg where she started her first business with a friend. They recycled plastic bags, turning them into school bags with solar lanterns, provided to kids in underprivileged areas.
Unfortunately, that partnership did not last.
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“Then we parted ways respectively in business and generally. That’s when I started the tyre business with my sister [Katlego],” says Ngwane.
The business picked up. They were approached by REDISA (Recycling and Economic Development Initiative In South Africa) who offered to handle their Rustenburg tyre depot.
Ngwane wanted to learn and research more about all the elements that went into the tyre business.
So she did what most wouldn’t think of – she consulted with the people pushing trolleys on the side of road recycling scrap.
“They work extensively at the mine fields; in a nutshell, they are industry experts. We went to them, consulted with them. [About an] alternative to plastic, because that’s all I knew. I asked them ‘what else I could use as a resource to make up products’ and they advised on the tyre tubes and it became a business,” she says.
The business’ main focus is recycling tyre tubes to make fashionable bags.
The whole process begins by transporting the tyre tubes to one of their work sites where they wash, clean and refurbish them. They are then taken to a production factory where they are cut into respective patterns depending on orders.
Ngwane has her products in a store, Mememe, in Cape Town in the Western Cape, and another in South African capital Pretoria, called In Bloom. She also takes orders online. Her bags range from R500 ($43) to R1,400 ($120).
She not only recycles tyre tubes to create trendy bags, but also makes products for the mining and construction industries.
These orders differ from the retail industry.
<div id="attachment_35904" style="width: 693px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-35904" class="wp-image-35904 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Reabetswe-101-683x1024.jpg" alt="" width="683" height="1024" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Reabetswe-101-683x1024.jpg 683w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Reabetswe-101-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Reabetswe-101-600x900.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Reabetswe-101-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Reabetswe-101-768x1151.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Reabetswe-101.jpg 1366w" sizes="(max-width: 683px) 100vw, 683px" />Reabetswe Ngwane. Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla.</div>
“The retail industry is not as mass-orientated as the mining and construction industry. With the retail industry, it depends on how many orders of these we get, how many orders of backpacks we make, and then the patterns are made and then the bags. With regards to mining and construction, there are three sets of products we provide to them,” she says.
For the mines, Ngwane makes first-aid kit bags used by the workers underground and over the ground. The material mostly used for this previously was canvas, which is not durable, she says.
Ngwane also makes respiratory bags or masks used by the workers. The biggest orders she gets from the mines are however for seat protectors.
“It’s like a shield that covers your bum, you strap it on your waist, strap it on your legs, as the guys drilling underground [are] scooting backwards and forwards; because they [are] scooting, they damage their Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and bump into hard surfaces like rocks, and corrosive liquids whatever the case may be; [the seat protector] is used to protect them,” she says.
Ngwane is the first to break into this kind of market, she says.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2014/06/01/woman-toughest-job/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: The Woman With the toughest job</a>
She recalls the days she had to knock on several doors to get her business going. Her research involved ongoing conversations with users in the mines asking them about the durability of canvas.
Ngwane is contracted to an entity that supplies a lot of the mines in the North West of South Africa with PPE. With her sister Katlego, their company, KreamFields, has been in operation for the last two years, and their fortune is growing.
Their work also has social significance as recycling waste means helping the environment rid itself of rubber scrap.
Ngwane seems to have literally reinvented the wheel turning tyre tubes to tote bags.

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On A Roll With Used Tyres

Supra Mahumapelo, the Premier of South Africa’s North West province and staunch ally of President Jacob Zuma, is the man leading the way. He wants to build a statue on the remote spot where police arrested Zuma on his way to Botswana with uMkhonto weSizwe recruits, the armed wing of the ANC, in 1963. It would stand in the dusty rural town of Zeerust, in the north of the country. Zuma spent 10 years on Robben Island, after the run-in with police on this spot, but protesters don’t seem to care.
“We are disappointed the Premier wants to erect a statue, he’s spending more time in planning what he is going to do with the statue, rather than spending time dealing with corruption. We will call upon Barutsi people in Zeerust not to allow a statue on their soil. The statue of Jacob Zuma will go nowhere to solve their critical need for services, as water supply fails daily, waste water treatment plants lie unusable and broken, and the inhumane bucket system still plagues our people. We need service [delivery] rather than statues. We are saying the Premier must reconsider this and listen to the plight of the people. Mahumapelo’s priorities are clearly disturbingly skewed to praise Jacob Zuma, rather than to deliver to the people,” says Joe McGluwa, the provincial leader of the opposition party, the Democratic Alliance (DA).
McGluwa says the Premier is acting as a law unto himself by planning to honor Zuma – who has been in power since 2009 and has 783 pending criminal charges.
“He spoke about celebrating the lives of all those who were in the struggle. President Zuma is still alive and there’s no need to erect a statue for him. Even worse, he has been linked to a number of corrupt activities. The president of this country, better known as JZ 783, doesn’t deserve a statue, he’s a broken president, he broke the law, he broke the constitution, he acted in contrast of his own oath. The honorable thing is to retreat from what they are doing.”
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), another opposition party in the province, acknowledged Zuma’s role in the liberation struggle, but they are also against the statue.
“Zuma is not exemplary and has multiple cases of fraud. Why must we honor him, why must we celebrate him? He’s broken his oath of office, he must leave that office for an honorable man to occupy,” says Betty Kedisaletse Diale, the EFF provincial leader.
“We will make sure that the statue is swiftly removed. It will not be erected while we are members of the legislature. We will fight it until the end,” she says.
The DA claims it has done its own cost analysis and demands the North West province reveals how much this statue will cost. The DA says there’s a tender out for R6 million ($457,000), but Mahumapelo denies this.
“Where the opposition gets their exaggerated figures, I don’t know. We said six meters, not six million rand. We can’t spend that money. It will be wasteful expenditure. The decision was taken in 2009, it was before my time. I have the responsibility to implement. We are going to honor the families who helped liberation fighters. We want to talk to those who are still alive to have audio and visual records of this historic event,” Mahumapelo told journalists minutes after his state of the province address in Taung.
Mahumapelo says it concerns him when people say they don’t want the statue because they want services.
“There must be a win-win situation. People must have water, but we cannot run away from the fact that in South Africa there were freedom fighters. We cannot erase the history of people who experienced torture. Other countries are honoring their leaders. Why shouldn’t we?” he asks.
Mahumapelo, who calls himself Supranomics, said the statue will create more jobs in tourism.
In Ventersdorp, 150 kilometers from Zeerust, stands another controversy.  A six-meter statue of struggle hero JB Marks cost R4 million ($305,000) and left his family irate. They say the North West government did not consult them.
JB Marks left South Africa in 1963 for Russia to lobby the international community to support the struggle against apartheid. He died in exile in 1972, and his body was repatriated and reburied in his hometown of Ventersdorp, on March 22, 2015. The statue was to be unveiled on the same date this year.
So statues appear destined to divide. In the North West province alone there are two statues, two issues, and two groups of angry people.

Give Us Water  Not Statues

The Royal Bafokeng Nation in north west South Africa has an estimated worth of more than R40 billion ($3.76 billion), with stakes in platinum mining, telecommunications and shares in the Rand Merchant Bank Holdings. It listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange in 2011.
But, many on the ground claim this vast wealth is not trickling down to the people; that millions have been wasted on white elephant projects. At the sharp end of this discontent is Luka in Action, a group representing youth in Bafokeng.
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The group is based in Luka, a village lying 10 kilometers north of Rustenburg in the North West province. The youth say the Bafokeng administration has failed to deliver on promises of employment, despite its vast wealth. These days, Luka, once a fertile farmland with livestock, resembles a township dotted with shebeens and youth hanging around on street corners.
Luka in Action claims it has companies; Sediba Sa Kwena, involved in renewable energy and Refetogile Moral Regeneration, which seeks to train ex-offenders, which are yet to get off the ground because there is no money.
The youth claim the money was wasted on sports development programs involving a team of Brazilian football coaches. They say, without their knowledge, the Brazilian team called Samba was brought in to train coaches and young players. After a five year contract, little has happened.
“Those Brazilians have come and gone with millions of rands but there’s nothing to show why they were here except t-shirts and soccer balls they handed out. If they can pay the Brazilians for doing nothing, surely they have funds to sponsor our projects,” says youth representative Otlile Thlapane.
In Luka village there is a state-of-the-art youth center, equipped with computers and games, as well as a radio station paid for by the Royal Bafokeng, but it is not working amid claims of mismanagement.
The youth further complain that the nearby mines, where the money comes from, are damaging their village. Blasting creates cracks in houses and underground vibrations, pollution and water shortages are the order of the day.
“The influx of migrant workers with their families had turned Luka to a slum township. Each year, locals erect dwellings to rent out. Our water supply is overused and the municipal refuse truck cannot manage. These people are causing stress to the limited resources, even clinics are not managing well because the mines are not providing adequate resources to their employees,” claims Thlapane.
“Royal Bafokeng Administration people have their individual agendas, they do not represent us, and worse, they don’t know their jobs.”
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-2443" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/IMG_4862-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" />
“Kgosi Lerou Tshekedi Molotlegi [the king of Bafokeng] desires the best for the Bafokeng community, making sure that we are getting the right education and we become employable, but the administration entrusted with implementing that is failing him,” says Thlapane.
He says the surrounding mines have encouraged many youth to drop out of school and go underground for low wages.
“We are the richest nation with seventeen mining shafts but we have nothing to show for that,” says Thlapane.
The youth in the 29 villages around Luka say their frustrations with the Royal Bafokeng Administration and mining company Impala Platinum, which have shafts nearby, have led to people taking the law into their own hands.
Twenty-six-year-old Kelebogile Diale, who is a partner with Thlapane in Sediba Sa Kwena, says there are three pending court cases implicating the community in arson and malicious damage to property, public violence and intimidation.
On an overcast summer’s day, FORBES AFRICA went in search of answers at the Royal Marang Hotel, in Rustenburg, a four-star hotel owned by the Royal Bafokeng. Here we met Kgosana Mojalefa Mogono, a headman in Mogono village and businessman, dressed casually in jeans and a t-shirt. The 36-year-old speaks for the older generation on behalf of the Royal Bafokeng.
“The youth’s claim about unemployment is valid but we are doing our best to have more youth trained and skilled so that they could be employable in the future,” says Mogono.
“The sense of entitlement is really killing our youth. Lack of communication has led to wrong perceptions that there’s nothing happening.”
“Bafokeng youth know where to get information but they choose to be ignorant and go around spreading lies. There are more non-Bafokeng people who have come to pursue jobs in the mines and they are the ones making the noise,” says Mogono.
“In our programs we align ourselves with youth because we have aging community leaders and in the next 10 years the Royal Bafokeng will be run by them. The nation will be shooting itself in the foot if they ignore youth.”
Mogono and Ditebogo Diale, a Luka resident and Mogono’s cousin, say Luka in Action’s claims that the nation spent R400 million ($37.6 million) on the soccer development project are ridiculous. They say the project budget could not have been far from the similar National Basketball Association project that cost the nation R10 million ($940,000).
Mogono says renting out houses to mine workers had been discouraged by Molotlegi. He says it is draining resources allocated to Bafokeng subjects.
Mogono says the Bafokeng Administration, which is independent from Rustenburg Municipality, conducts its own census and all the Bafokeng have proof of residences so they could get employment priority. But, outsiders manipulate the system.
“Unfortunately Kgosi cannot willy-nilly chase people off the Bafokeng land. It’s unconstitutional, but the government needs to create employment where these people come from,” Diale says.
Mogona says the Bafokeng Education Institute, which oversees a nursing college, a management school, as well as hospitality and artisanship colleges, promotes skills development. In 2009, King Molotlegi launched Lebone II College, a private school that sponsors tuition fees for Bafokeng learners.
“Lebone II College is a world-class school, whose main purpose is to afford talented Bafokeng children an educational opportunity that will hopefully assist them to transcend their circumstances and achieve their true potential. As such, it is equipped with the best infrastructure and educators in South Africa,” says Mogono.
Mogono dismisses Luka in Action’s claims that the Royal Bafokeng Administration is autocratic.
“If people were following the right channels of the Royal Bafokeng Administration they would not be making such noises. These are people who don’t attend makgotla (meetings). Many of them stay in Johannesburg for a long time and they come back demanding. This is not how we do things.”
Mogono also denies claims that the local youth are not given equal opportunities of employment in the nearby Impala Platinum mines.
He says the youth don’t seem interested in the youth center facility. The center is endorsed by the Love Life youth program.
The Impala Platinum management has acknowledged they have not done much to develop the community in the past, hence they have a social labor plan that involves the building of a technical school in the Luka village this year, says Mogono.
The future for the Royal Bafokeng, the wealthiest tribe in Africa, threatens to be as complicated as it is rich.

Tag: North West

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

Tales From An African Wedding

The Sad Road Trip On An Empty Wallet

On A Roll With Used Tyres

Give Us Water Not Statues

The Sense Of Entitlement Is Killing Our Youth