Malema the “One-Dimension Man”

By Reuben S. Dlamini

Julius Malema is the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) president. He was born in 1981 in Seshego township, Limpompo province, South Africa. He is renowned for being a controversial public and political figure who is very outspoken on socio-political issues, and living a lavish lifestyle. His salary, which he claims to be making at the ANCYL, and his lavish lifestyle, are not directly proportional. Malema, with his imperial arrogance, like the west he criticizes, has no room in the new democracy.

As he goes around exhorting, "violence, racism and misogynism", Malema should know that South Africa, in its infant democratic stage, cannot afford his utterances. There is no need for him to open unhealed wounds while driving top of the range cars, living in Sandton, and using his political power to obtain lucrative governments contracts for his companies. Malema should stop betraying the confidence and trust of the citizens he pledged to serve, as he recently did in the midst of his birthday celebration, having live music bands, and in which high-profile politicians were served Moet and Chandon champagne. As Henry James called America a “Hotel Civilization,” where lights are on all the time, rooms kept clean, and never see who cleans them, Malema has an obsession of comfort and convenience.

Yes, there is nothing wrong for politicians to be rich, but for Malema being able to afford a $34,000 Breitling watch, two expensive homes, and a black Mercedes-Benz C63, while his official monthly salary is $2, 700, is disturbing. As you can see the numbers do not match in anyway his lavish lifestyle. Malema should not become so cynical that he forgets about the fundamental duty he has as president of the ANCYL to serve and promote issues affecting the young people of South Africa and African youth at large. Malema must be the stalwart of transformative economic policies and stop being complacent about his political power. He should be championing policies on healthcare, education, business ethics, entrepreneurship, women, and youth empowerment.

He is a disgrace to the African National Congress (ANC) because of his utterances on private and public stage, and his controversial remarks undermine the work the ANC has been doing to transform The Republic of South Africa. On May 3, 2010 the Time magazine listed Malema as the worlds “least influential” and among the most “un-influential” figures in 2010. The ANC leadership is not helping the situation by calling Malema the future president of The Republic of South Africa. Encouraging a young up coming politician is a good thing, but he should be held accountable for his hate speeches and the promises he made on land seizure while visiting Zimbabwe.

His access to the business community movers and shakers in South Africa should not make him compromise his sincere commitment to public service. Julius Malema, just like the Mandelas and the Tambos, must use his power to enact positive socio-economic change for the masses in South Africa. As the editor of Time magazine Rick Stengel puts it, service, “is not about the influence of power but rather the power of influence.” According to Earl G. Graves, Sr. of Black Enterprise, service is “an extension of one’s absolute duty to family, church, community, the military, and one’s country.” As Malema claims to be the spokesperson for the marginalized groups economically, he needs to examine his life, as service is about the one who contributes, than the one who receives. With the power and political will that Julius exhibits, he can empower ordinary South African citizens to do extra ordinary things.

Malema needs to perform some self-examination before starting to address other people’s concerns and wishes. It’s imperative that he knows who he is, and what his values and principles are. He needs to honor the core values of those who fought the apartheid regime, and those within the governing party, the ANC, instead of going around undermining its efforts to transform the rainbow nation, and Government of National Unity in Zimbabwe. A “one-dimension man” is not a solution to the challenges facing South Africa and the continent. The concept of a “one-dimensional man” is defined as conforming to existing thought and behavior with no critical dimension to transcend the existing society (Marcuse, 1964). Malema’s ideological manipulations hinder radical social change. With Malema blaming the whites in South Africa he should first check the mirror and ask himself what has he done for the less fortunate citizens of The Republic of South Africa.

»»  read more

Should we allow the media to be subdued in Africa?

By Agaptus Anaele

As we ponder over some of the activities of kwame Nkrumah reputed for his Pan Africanism, the freedom of the media remains an important element in African development. The media including traditional newspapers, electronic media were instrumental to Nkrumah’s achievements. Perhaps the political feats recorded by Nkrumah may have been difficult without the media. Through his evening newspaper, The Accra Evening News established in 1948, Nkrumah consistently launched fierce attack at colonial government adding to his demand for Ghana’s independence, “The gentlemanly dialogue of nineteenth century newspapers transformed into full-blown anti-colonial protest in the newspapers of the 1930s,” a commentator remarked. In addition to the conventional media, Nkrumah creatively utilized unconventional means to communicate with his followers while in detention. His ingenious mass communication included scribbling words in tissue papers, which was transmitted to his retinue of supporters who implemented the strategies.

The colonial government occasionally attempted gagging his public awareness through censorship, but he rebuffed the attempts. I could not agree more with Nkrumah on the importance of the media in the struggle for liberation and national development. No doubt, there is considerable increase in the number of media organizations in the region, but the trend in many of the African countries is disturbing. Formal, informal and subtle censorship of the media ranks high. Assassination of media practitioners seems to have taken a dangerous dimension. Hordes of Nigerian journalists have been assassinated for exposing corruption. Similarly, there have been reports of intimidation of journalists in Ghana and media institutions, ostensibly to cow them from objective reporting. Pockets of constitutional provisions that prohibit media censorship exist, but adherence to these stipulations remains a challenge.

African leaders must reconsider their approach to media censorship. Conscious efforts must be made to reevaluate the protection of the media institutions because they represent important mediums to actualize development in Africa. We must not allow attempts to cover our weaknesses in office to take precedence over national interest. Africans must effectively utilize the digital media that has expanded the global media landscape. The media remains an important element for checks and balances. We must all support media freedom to advance development in the continent.

»»  read more

Remembering Makeba: who is the next Mama Africa?

By Siphokazi Magadla

It has been almost 2 years since the death of Miriam Makena on November 10, 2008. To the world she was known as Mama Africa and the Empress of African Song. I saw Mama Makeba for the first time in 2004 performing at Rhodes University’s 100 years celebration. Despite the fact that Makeba was 75 years old at the time, we were all struggling to keep up with her as she jumped up and down performing her popular songs including Pata Pata and Qongqothwane (the click song). I often wondered in silence why one person would be known as the mother of the whole continent. But now I get it!

Makeba the global citizen, the global leader, was first and foremost the manifestation of pan-Africanism. She loved Africa; not a superficial kind of loving Africa which involves a tattoo of the African continent on your shoulder or a collection of books on Mandela, Lumumba, Nkrumah and others. I am talking about the kind of loving that Cornel West talks about, the kind of love that begins at home and spills over to the whole world. In Makeba you see this kind of love for Soweto in her song Pata Pata, but the love quickly spills over as this young girl became a woman, and a mother of the continent. As Mama Africa she demands Africa to come back- Mayibuye. This is the kind of love that led her to dedicate her whole life to telling the whole world that the African agenda of post-colonialism is not only good for the Africans themselves, but for the world as well.

In 1966, six years after she was refused entry to South Africa in 1960 to come bury her mother, a defiant Makeba stood proudly at Bern’s Salonger in Stockholm, Sweden singing Mayibuye (Come back Africa), Kilimanjaro and Mbube among others. At the time the bulk of the leaders of the liberation movements in South Africa had been successfully silenced by the South African government; tucked away in Robben Island. At the time of her death Makeba had been to all African countries with the exception of five. It was Makeba who reminded South Africans months before her passing that the xenophobic attacks of 2008 were an embarrassment to the country, especially because she, like most of the political leaders in South Africa had for decades depended on other Africans during the fight against Apartheid. But sadly, now she is gone.

Now I wonder, who is the next Mama Africa? Who among us can profess that kind of love for Africa? The kind of love that forces us to demand a lot more of ourselves and to put what Cornel West calls “loving pressure” that does not attempt to rationalize the terrible conditions of the marginalized in our communities. Do we have the kind of love that denies itself the luxury of saying “I deserve”, “I ought to have this and that” but instead says as Makeba sings in Chove Chuva “they say I will forget you, but I say I never will.”

»»  read more

‘MEN WHO WANT TO BREATHE INTO OTHER MEN’S EARS’: HOMOSEXUALITY AND HOMOPHOBIA IN AFRICA- A CALL FOR PROACTIVE ACTION FROM AFRICAN LEADERS AND GOVERMENTS

By: Gcobani Qambela (a Graduate student at Rhodes University, reading Joint Honours in Anthropology and Politics and International Studies).

The innate homophobia in most African countries has recently been brought to the fore in the past few months. Steve Monjeza (26) and Tiwonge Chimbalanga (20) generated both continental and international interest in December 2009 when they became the first gay partners to be publicly engaged to marry in Malawi. They were consequently imprisoned and have continuously been denied bail as they wait for their trail date for their “indecency” charges by the state. They could be imprisoned for up to 14 years if the charges by the state are found to be substantiated.

Uganda has similarly steered similar interest with its intended moves to criminalize homosexuality, going as far as to propose that it be an offense punishable by the death penalty. More recently Zimbabwean Prime Minister, Morgan Tsvangirai has expressed his support for President Robert Mugabe’s views pertaining to gay rights and is widely quoted as stating that there is no space for “men who want to breathe into other men’s ears…” when there are so many women in Zimbabwe they could be with.

Fascinating and disturbing enough however has been the absence of critical voices from African leaders to create the proper context in which a more open and progressive debate on gay rights and the blatant homophobia currently rampaging the African continent can be analyzed and scrutinized. It is against this backdrop that I argue that African leaders need to take a more proactive stance when it comes to gay rights, as opposed to always reacting to campaigns waged by civil society or other external factors advocating for gay rights outside the state.

Both homosexuality and homophobia are a reality in most, if not all African countries, and merely criminalizing or affording homosexuals limited rights is not the ideal long term-solution. Homosexuals, just like heterosexuals are equally worthy of the protection and enjoyment of the law, which at its core should in anyways protect the marginal and oppressed in society.

Autocratic statements and bigotry laws that promote and suggest heterosexuality to be the only mode of sexual preference should have no space in a continent like Africa that itself has a deep history of oppression of cultures, ideals and identities. Discrimination based on sexual orientation just cannot be tolerated in the African continent. African leaders cannot preach ubuntu (the idea that one’s humanity is realized though other people) to the world, and not at the basic and salient level afford adult men and women the chance to love and marry each other simply because they are of the same sex.

Arguments that homosexuality is “un-African” no longer have a place in 21st century African. Guardian columnist Blessing-Miles Tendi recently pointed to the fact that amongst the Azande, found in the north-east of what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo, it was perfectly acceptable for Kings, Princes and soldiers to take young male lovers as spouses. This then diffuses the common assumption that homosexuality is a relatively novel occurrence in Africa brought about by Westerners.

I conclude that it is shameful that only handful of African leaders have spoken-out about the violation of homosexuals intrinsic rights. This mutism from African leaders only serves to perpetuate the unjust laws and the so-called “corrective rapes” which most homosexuals have to contend with from African society that is content to “cure” them.

African leaders need to take proactive standpoint on the issue. An open space for dialogue not only between African leaders themselves, but also civil society and other non-state actors needs to be created to foster debate and programmes that will move the African continent towards more tolerance, respect and protection of marginal and minority groups like homosexuals in Africa.

The apathy of African leaders towards homosexuals and homophobic attacks consequently forged on them can no longer go unquestioned. Africa has the capacity to accommodate homosexuals “‘if we can change the bent of the [African] human heart which seems to instinctively fear what it cannot – or will not – identify in itself, the eradication of homophobia will remain a Utopian goal’ (Sylvain Larocque). African leaders need to do exactly that – lead!


(1). N Barker ‘Sex and the Civil Partnership Act: The Future of (non)Conjugality’ (2006) 14 Feminist Legal Studies 241, 244

»»  read more