South Africa's current revolutionary phase

The current state of our Revolution

By: Mihlali Gqada

We are whirling in a pond of mystified understand of the current status of our revolution, as we silently fall prey to those who are on a mission to sidetrack and or take-over our plight. Our lack of a review and re-examination of the road we sick to follow is sending mixed signals to the masses of our people who have not the tools of analysis to depict error or miscalculation by our leaders. My opinion is that SA is currently facing a ripening Bourgeoisies Revolution. As Kwame Nkrumah correctly alludes to in his book entitled, “Class Struggle in Africa”, the emergence of such a force is directly aligned to capitalistic bourgeois political and economic aspirations. The down side of which is the imperialistic and neo-colonial outlook to the future of our country. We as the masses are living at the mercy of the select few who either by hook or crook have been christened to be the formidable part of the A Team. Relics of a modern socialist order can be traced in our scrupulous policy outlook, though smuggled in to baffle and bamboozle the true revolutionary who has stuck it through to the mainstay, as though we are being done a favour by the government who continues to give us “handouts” which we are always reminded will have to end at some point. Our liberation ushered in capitalist social structures, characterised by the emergence of a “petty bourgeoisie”, a unified but relatively small national bourgeoisie consisting in the main of in some cases self proclaimed intellectuals, those of fake honorarium status, elitists foreign educated personal and professionals all with a business exploitative glare, many of which did not suffer under the ruthlessness of Apartheid, many were busy studying English and sipping espressos and drinking chardene’ on foreign lands, while others sold us out and enjoyed lavish lifestyles within. Now an embryonic strata who seeks to dominate the forces which rule our land, these few continue to leave absent from the reality of many of our people, they refuse to acknowledge the need for self introspection, they refuse to realise that not so long ago they were but slums begging for opportunities under the banner of liberation, that once we were one, united in cause. Now they will not even remember your name, while it was you who leant them your shoes in the desserts of Lusaka. The danger we are facing comrades is that unless we give direction to our rising bourgeoisie, unless we remind them that they are in existence for a course and soon after that they will be expected to commit suicide and join the struggle, unless we remind them of their obligations to plough back into the souls of our communities, unless we remind them to take on bound ordinary people, unless we unleash a refining strategy to remind them of the obvious – that they are struggle machinery and not on individual missions, unless we do the above the Bourgeoisie will take over our struggle, they will suffocate us until we are mute and are vehicles for their evils.

Now our own leaders have caved themselves in, surrounded by businessman with no obligation to the revolution, with no passion or zeal to see through our struggle. While we are closed out, and cast aside as the insignificant chanters of latter day liberation songs with not meaning in today’s world, their world. Academics have been elevated to the status of intellectuals, business unit to that of core partners while we have put aside as diminutive beings with no fore sight.

Noted: each revolution has phases, and this is one of those. As a country we are in desperate need to shift the ownership of capital to the progressive forces and this is a proper way of doing it. But let it be wide spread, least it feeds a few stomachs at the expense of millions.

Let us de-colonise the mindsets of our mounting Bourgeoisie or ship them to their mentors – the Caucasian…

Let us seize back the struggle and begging to launch its fore steps, our time is now…

AFRICAN INTELLECTUALISM - A MERE FARCE

AFRICAN INTELLECTUALISM

By: Mihlali Gqada


GLOSSRY

Intelligence
Is a most complex practical property of mind, integrating numerous mental abilities, such as the capacities to reason, plan and solve problems, think abstractly, comprehend ideas and language and learn. Wikipedia, Encyclopedia

Intellectualism

Is the quittance of human life, identity, culture, expression, appearance and idiom, it is not a farce or a charade of written text or well read speeches, it is not confined to encrypted notes or poetic gestures.

An intellectual
Is a person who uses his or her intelect to study, reflect, speculate on, or ask and answer questions with regard to a variety of different ideas.
There are, broadly, three modern definitions at work in discussions about intellectuals. Firstly, 'intellectuals' as those deeply involved in ideas, books, the life of the mind. Secondly, and here largely arising from Marxist 'intellectuals' as that recognisable occupational class consisting of lecturers, teachers, lawyers, journalists, and suchlike. Thirdly, cultural "intellectuals", being those of notable expertise in culture and the arts, expertise which allows them some cultural authority, and who then use that authority to speak in public on other matters. (Noam, Chomsky. 1967)
Intellectuals have been viewed as a distinct social class often significantly contributing to the formation and phrasing of ideas, they are both creators and critics of ideology. (Furedi, Frank. 2004)

THE AFRICAN INTELLETUAL

The elementary flaw in the beckoning of African Intellectualism is undue glorification awarded to castigatory academics, which provide relic manifestations of theoretic explanations and preponderances of intellectualism. Sono, T (1994) writes in his thesis, “Dilemmas of African intellectuals in Africa. Political and cultural constraints”, that to even talk about African intellectuals and intellectualism is to grant such a non existing appendage a favour, he bases his argument on a framework of Western rationalism which in his phobic view is the epitome of ranking intellectualism. Odera Oruka, (1991) however dismisses such mislead utterances as ignorant and fixated on formative formulations of intellectualism in Africa. He points out that African intellectualism on its own is netted on ethonophilosophy profoundly found in Africa, he also insist that intellectualism in not prescribed by written text alone but that oral culture is also a form of critical philosophy.

The issue at hand then becomes the need to reclaim and redefine African intellectualism at the ideological level, creating protuberance of twined notions of the real African basis of intellectualism therefore an inauguration of African combat at an ideological and philosophical level.

It is a known fact that much of the insecurities and lack of clarity about the status and agenda of African intellectuals relates to the lack of dialogue between themselves and the lack of connectedness. African intellectuals spend most of their time trying to earn points and approval from white intellectuals. There are few forums exclusively for African intellectuals to encourage thought and exchange of ideas. The other issue facing African intellectuals is the ‘linchpin …academic legitimation and placement, the individual certification and positioning take priority over content, orientation and quality intellectual output. There is a lack of questioning of the intellectual paradigms; this has proven to be an inescapable dilemma for most African intellectuals. Most if not all black intellectual have to pass through white bourgeois academy or its black imitators before capturing any intellectual grounds. There is however visible negritude towards African formulated concepts celebrated world wide, but these alone do not solidify or connote intellect.

The absence of African voices in academy also put to question the role of African intellectualism, Africans are physically absent from institutions of Higher Learning in the country and continent and in the literature that recommends and prescribes academic programmes. The greatest deficit is that African languages like African culture have been confined to the periphery of the academy. Epistemologies have however lead to post colonial knowledge production, wherein factories of Africans are producing African identities and cultures beyond colonial subjugation, these are transformative realms which challenge Western rationalism and dismiss it as further colonialisation of minds and thoughts of African intellectuals. The late Claude Ake noted that most African intellectuals are a replica and carbon copy of faint western intellectualism with no imputes on Africa.

Simply put African intellectualism still has to conquer the space to be noted as an existing surfeit of mental power, based on African notions, philosophy and ideology. Let us not be afraid to challenge western intellectualism and create our own. Form this early stage, as students let us lead by example by writing papers and formulating ideologies to take Africa forward. I consider my self well read with a capacity to write and be heard, this I will take forward and be a panacea of African intellectualism

NOTE: intellectualism does not belong to a soul or group of people, it is shaped according to time, space, available tools of analysis and ideological prescriptions amongst others.

A Celebration of the women who gave me life

As women's day draws near, i can not help but rejoice at the poise of she who gave me life...Mama ndiyabulela...

Mama don’t cry

Wipe those tears off your face
You are too great a being to shed unwarranted tears
Your have too grand a soul to worry about troubles of the world
You are too great a specimen to whip or drown your sorrows in misery
Let depression not wild your humility
Let not grief bewail your person
Allow not humanly sadness to trouble your frail heart


Let beat your heart
Let rhyme your soul
Let rejoice your humanness
Let exult your faith


Troubles are a mere farce
Made to remind you of the worldliness of this ambit
They have no plight no light and no sight
They have no endurance, no sustainability
They have no stand, nor future and no glare
They shunt ascend or augment
They are but situational, seasonal and momentary
They cause temporary defect


Mama don’t go

I shedder to think of a life without your beautiful refreshing smile
Your enchanting glare and warm heart
Your courageous soul and wise cranium
Your silent thoughts which penetrate caves to reach my thirsty soul
The love shown to me in ways I can never tally
The wisdom in me you installed
The home that housed and raised me to the beauty today I am
The faith you schooled me to believe in, to treasure and practice


With your simple touch my soul ignites in jubilation
With your simple smile my heart muses though dancing with angels in the land of the great he is
With your simple technological queue I come alive
With your simple gesture, I love you ever greater


As you nurtured me from infancy; feed my bones and made them strong
As you taught me my first word and volunteered your knowledge to make me judicious yet shrewd in this world
As you continuously said No when troublesome tendencies took over my merciful soul – You single-handedly made me who I am today


To you I give unwavering gratitude,
I have no wise words to exclaim and make heard my appreciation
I have no poetic raptures, no exclamatory prose, no rhythmtic motions, no worthy bequest to thank you for your unshakeable contribution to who I am today

If I ever had to pay for the person you are and have made me to be, I would spend all my life paying mercifully and indebted to your for eternity
If I had to return the favour, I would know not where and how to begin


Your strength and love have never gone unnoticed
Your humility and humbleness are your most striking features
Your sincerity and slight sensitivity make you, Gods greatest child
Your earnestness and naturalness make you Great in your own being
Your ability to shadow your own needs as a mother make you my uncontested Heroine
Your place in my heart is inert, solid and profoundly tepid


Mine in this life is to make sure the smile on your face is always there
That the joy in your heart is sustained against all odds
That the wisdom in your head is kept rejuvenated


I Love you seems common
Thank you does not seem enough
So let me leave my piece inconclusive
For you in my heart do not have a start nor end
Your are my heart
To my loving Mother: Boitumelo, Nomvuyo Cossie