Tshepiso Mabula: Uncovering unspoken truths:
In 2018, South African photographer Tshepiso Mabula embarked on a profound and soul-stirring journey that would lead her to document the previously untold stories of former members of Umkhonto weSizwe (MK), the ANC’s underground army in exile.
Through her work, aptly titled Ukugrumba — a Xhosa word that means “to dig” — Mabula has shed light on the complex and deeply personal narratives that emerged from a tumultuous period in South Africa’s history.
Her work not only explores the lives of the combatants but also delves into the challenges faced by their families and the lasting impact of apartheid’s violence.
At the heart of Mabula’s project lies a poignant reflection on her own family history.
“My late uncle had been part of Umkhonto weSizwe but it wasn’t, for whatever reason, taken seriously in the family.
“And so, I really started to think about how he had been treated by the family upon his return and why he decided to join the armed struggle — how much that would have had an impact on the person that he became when he came back,” she says.
Initially, Mabula set out to capture the stories of former combatants.
Many of these individuals joined MK at an early age — some as teenagers — driven by a profound sense of purpose and a desire to dismantle apartheid.
However, when they returned to civilian life, they often found their dreams and aspirations had been derailed, a consequence of the turbulent times they had lived through.
Securing funding for her project not only provided the necessary resources for Mabula’s travel and production but also laid the foundation for a broader and more powerful narrative.
As she delved deeper into the lives of these former combatants, she realised that her work was about more than just their stories. It became a testimony to how living in a violent society, shaped by an oppressive regime, forced individuals to respond with violence.
This cycle of violence didn’t end with the abolition of apartheid in 1994; it persisted, casting a long, dark shadow over South Africa.
Mabula’s work also highlights the often neglected trauma experienced by the families of former military combatants.
These families paid a heavy price for the choices their loved ones made, and their stories deserve attention, as much as those of the combatants themselves.
Moreover, Mabula’s work reveals a concerning issue of erasure — the stories of disabled black men, women and queer individuals who participated in pivotal events in South African history.
Telling these stories isn’t straightforward or without its problems. It’s an ongoing endeavour, one that often requires her to step away from the project to recharge and then return to continue photographing.
The weight of these stories and the enduring trauma they represent can be overwhelming, even for the photographer herself.
As Mabula’s lens captures the experiences of the combatants, one theme that consistently emerges is the enduring impact of their past.
The trauma they’ve carried from their time as freedom fighters remains ever-present, yet it’s a topic that society is often reluctant to acknowledge or discuss openly. Instead, these individuals are met with dismissive remarks like, “Get over it; it’s in the past.”
One poignant story that Mabula encountered was that of a combatant who chose to engage with the struggle from a cultural perspective, as a poet and writer.
“I remember him saying that’s what he wanted to contribute to the struggle but, again, within a military organisation that was like, yes, there is space for that, but also you should be willing to engage with the violence in a different way,” she says.
“So, he also got ostracised and eventually moved into a neighbourhood in Tanzania where he had children and then, ultimately, had to come back to South Africa — and he left his family there.”
Mabula says this narrative raises questions about displacement, the toll it takes on families and the impact it has on individuals’ lives.
Through her lens, Mabula discovered that many of the combatants’ stories are gut-wrenching, filled with pain and suffering.
They also reveal the painful realisation that trauma is passed down through generations.
It’s a legacy of anguish that can be traced back to the time when individuals such as Mabula’s uncle, who were deeply affected by their experiences, were left without the support they needed.
In hindsight, her work reflects the missed opportunity of allowing these individuals the space and time to process their feelings.
It’s a profound journey into the hearts and minds of those who fought for a better South Africa and a reminder that the wounds of the past continue to shape the present. Mabula’s Ukugrumba is a powerful testament to the resilience of the human spirit, the enduring impact of trauma and the unspoken truths that persist in the shadow of history.
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The Fiscal Cliff | Will austerity push South Africa to the brink?:
In 1999, South Africa’s debt burden had become heavier after local interest rates rose sharply in the wake of consecutive crises in emerging markets.
In his budget speech that year, then finance minister Trevor Manuel reflected on the financial distress endured by other countries during the period, including Russia, which ended up defaulting on its debt.
In spelling out South Africa’s predicament, Manuel used a common analogy. “Like any household, the government cannot spend what it does not have, and increasing the level of indebtedness will simply make us vulnerable and threaten our transformation agenda.”
Today, as the country awaits the next update on the state of its public purse, the prospect of a debt crisis seems more imminent than before. This is as South Africa’s fiscal position has deteriorated markedly during the course of this year, a dilemma that could see the treasury inflicting another round of spending cuts.
However, despite the commotion surrounding South Africa’s supposed descent off a fiscal cliff, the country isn’t teetering on the brink of a debt crisis — not yet, anyway.
Debt is not inherently bad for an economy, although it is sometimes framed that way. “I think in some cases it is linked to the idea of the household budget, which suggests that if you spend more than you have you’re likely to run out of room to spend and eventually reach a crisis,” Zimbali Mncube, a researcher at the Institute for Economic Justice (IEJ), explained in an interview this week.
Mncube was one of more than 100 experts and organisations who wrote an open letter calling on President Cyril Ramaphosa and Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana to halt all planned budget cuts.
Godongwana will table his medium-term budget policy statement next week. In the months leading up to the minister’s speech, the treasury has sought to impress on the government the extent of the country’s current fiscal setbacks. Some of this correspondence has been leaked to the media, creating the picture that the state is running out of money.
In a letter to department and provincial heads in August, the treasury prescribed a raft of cost containment measures, including freezes on hiring and infrastructure projects. The treasury cited “unprecedented challenges” in the 2023-24 financial year, brought on by chronically low economic growth, revenue shortfalls and unfavourable debt market conditions.
The treasury followed up that letter by making those guidelines public. The latter document said cost containment is required to prevent the materialisation of “potentially crippling resource constraints”.
Meanwhile, another leaked document suggested that the treasury presented to Ramaphosa various cuts that would be needed to fund the social relief of distress grant, including closing certain government programmes. But the treasury maintained that the leaked presentation was not an accurate reflection of the discussion with the president.
In the face of the treasury’s manoeuvring, the open letter to Ramaphosa and Godongwana disputed the view that South Africa is on the brink of a fiscal crisis. “A sense of panic is being created in order to force through these rushed, chaotic and indiscriminate cuts in the medium-term budget policy statement in November 2023,” it reads.
“If implemented, these cuts will slow economic growth, undermine service delivery and curtail social protection, thus exacerbating unemployment, hunger and social instability, leading to a retrogression in the realisation of the socio-economic rights contained in our Constitution.”
The letter also called the cuts “self-defeating” as the austerity-induced economic contraction would make debt repayment more difficult. “Rather, the fiscus must be leveraged to set South Africa on a new economic path,” it said.
In a policy brief released ahead of Godongwana’s speech, the IEJ said economic expansion is the best defence against the feared debt crisis. According to the IEJ’s analysis, South Africa doesn’t face an immediate debt or liquidity crisis. The economy does, however, face a growth crisis.
“If you zoom in on the current debt levels, they do not indicate that we are at crisis proportions,” Mncube said, noting that South Africa’s 71.4% debt-to-GDP ratio is in line with those of other emerging market countries.
That said, South Africa’s debt trajectory does not look good, given that the country’s borrowing has consistently exceeded revenue since 2009. The cost of the state’s debt has also steadily increased.
There are two big reasons why South Africa’s debt service costs are so high, according to the IEJ.
The first is that the country’s foreign-denominated debt — only about 11.7% of total public debt — has been subject to adverse exchange rate movements, which have added R5??billion in debt servicing costs. Second is the fact that most of South Africa’s debt is long-term. Longer-term debt is more expensive to service.
Stanlib chief economist Kevin Lings agreed that a fiscal crisis is not an imminent reality. “South Africa’s fiscal position is precarious,” he said.
“And the reason it is precarious is that you’ve got two elements working against you. The one is that debt service costs have risen dramatically. It’s going to be about 20% of revenue and obviously that is high by any standard, by historical standards and by international standards. And it appears to be rising quickly.”
The second element driving South Africa towards a fiscal cliff is low economic growth, which stands to narrow the tax base, Lings said.
He said South Africa’s fiscal crisis has been precipitated by international factors, namely tight financing conditions and little political will to implement economic reforms.
If the government is unable to implement any of these measures and economic growth continues to disappoint, then South Africa will face an outright fiscal crisis, he said.
“We will get further credit rating downgrades. It will become more difficult to fund ourselves. And it can start to become self-reinforcing. In other words, because your fiscal deterioration is ongoing, bond yields go up, investors want a better return to buy your bonds, which makes the cost of financing more difficult,” Lings noted.
“We are very clearly heading towards a fiscal crisis. Are we there yet? No. We have still got the ability to rein it in, to reverse it, to rectify it.”
Although Lings suggests reducing government expenditure — specifically on the consumption side — will help the state avoid a fiscal cliff, the IEJ contends that cuts will hinder growth, accelerating the debt crisis.
Herein lies the dilemma: economic expansion is crucial to avoiding fiscal crises. But, without spending, or taking on further debt, it is near impossible to inspire growth. Meanwhile, countries such as South Africa face considerable pressure to pare back spending.
“Cutting back government spending works in the opposite way than is intended,” Mncube said. “Whilst the view that supports the cut is that government spending is essentially crowding out private investment — and therefore it should be cut in order to bring in private investment — we say that, in a context where there is such low demand in the economy, it is actually government spending that is likely to stimulate the economy.”
Because the debt-to-GDP ratio is measured based on the size of the economy, a contraction stands to worsen this indicator.
Lings agreed that the government is in a difficult position given that fiscal discipline constrains its ability to borrow and dole out economic stimulus. He suggested, however, that the government could change the composition of its spending — allocating more to investment and less to consumption — or it could partner more actively with the private sector.
The IEJ’s remedies fly in the face of this more conservative approach, proposing, for example, that the government borrow more. Increased borrowing should happen alongside a credible growth plan, as well as efforts to access credit on more favourable terms.
The IEJ also proposes that the government raise additional revenue by removing tax breaks on high earners, re-evaluating corporate tax subsidies, implementing a wealth tax and a resource rent tax, restoring the corporate income tax rate and clamping down on illicit financial flows.
The think-tank suggests the government also undertake a thorough spending review, but this ought to be done transparently and by consulting various stakeholders.
Mncube suggested there is some danger in accepting the most prevalent view on South Africa’s public finances as truth.
“It’s sort of easy to fall into the dominant view and take it as something that is true without questioning it. If everyone, including the government, is saying that the state is running out of money it is easy to take that on.
“I think there is a need to do more to get people to read the budget and understand how things work and not use the analogy of the household … It implies that austerity is equal to saving, when in the real world it equals starvation and higher inequality.”
See “Is South Africa nearing a debt crisis?”
This article forms part of the third instalment of The Fiscal Cliff, a monthly series by the Mail & Guardian on the state of South Africa’s public purse. The series looks into the effect of fiscal consolidation on public services — which have steadily deteriorated over the years — and considers this policy’s impact on the country’s growth prospects. You can read the other article in part one of the series here.
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South Africa celebrates as Boks win again – by one point:
The Springboks were singing in the rain in Paris last night, retaining the William Webb Ellis Cup by beating the All Blacks 12-11 in a closely-contested, dramatic and often excruciatingly intense final. As they sang, so an exhausted South Africa sang with them — often long into the night.
The fans were helped along by increasing quantities of whatever drinks were to hand. It was a happy, raucous night throughout the length and breadth of the land but in Paris, the city in which the Springboks won the cup 16 years ago, the celebrations were wild.
It’s been a nerve-shredding few weeks for South Africa’s increasingly hopeful supporters. Although the Springboks lost their pool game 6-11 to Ireland, once they reached the knock-outs, the Boks beat hosts France, 29-28 in the quarter-finals, and then snuck home — 16-15 — by the finest of margins against England in last weekend’s semi-finals. View all the latest World Cup stories here.
Surely another win, against an All Black team that had trounced Argentina 44-6 in their semi-final, was unlikely? Surely another one point win was from the outer reaches of statistical fantasy?
Leading 12-6 at half-time, it was a smash-and-grab win built on traditional Bok virtues: kamikaze defence, a never-say-die attitude and the ability not to be intimidated by either the opposition or the moment.
The Springboks probably inched the first half, helped by Handré Pollard’s unerring boot that saw him kick three penalties in the first 20 minutes and four in the first 40. His first kick just grazed the inside of the upright before going over, and his second wasn’t entirely convincing either. As the half grew, however, his accuracy grew with it.
His steady boot was backed up by yeoman forward effort, despite the early loss of hooker Bongi Mbonambi, who was replaced by Deon Fourie as early as the fourth minute. The man-of-the-match, Pieter-Steph du Toit, was immense in the tackle and the South African back three of Damian Willemse, Cheslin Kolbe and Kurt-Lee Arendse were brave under the high ball.
South Africa were helped by the fact that New Zealand flanker Shannon Frizell was yellow carded early. So, too, was New Zealand skipper, Sam Cane. His tackle of Jesse Kriel (who has had a remarkable tournament) was upgraded to a red, meaning he was off from the 27th minute and the All Blacks played for more than 50 minutes with 14 men. Cane’s red-carding in a match of this importance will haunt him forever.
South Africa, too, suffered from yellow cards. Skipper Siya Kolisi was carded in the 45th minute, while Kolbe was shown his marching orders seven minutes from the end. His touchline agonies were so intense that he hid his head in his jersey, unable to watch as the clock wound down and the Boks tried to protect their one-point lead.
Kolisi’s sending off coincided with the New Zealanders’ best period of the match. Despite the rain, which seemed to lessen as the match progressed, they continued to play their pattern of high-tempo, slick-handling rugby. Their faith in their pattern seemed to have been rewarded with a try to scrum-half, Aaron Smith, after a silky outside break by fly-half Richie Mo’unga, that was disallowed for a knock-on back at the line-out where the move began.
Still, at this stage of the match it was looking increasingly ominous for the defending champions. The All Blacks were playing more enterprising rugby. They were winning the battle for both territory and possession, with the Springbok line-out looking as wobbly as a drunk man walking home in the early hours of the morning. A score that wouldn’t be disallowed was surely only a matter of time.
And so it proved. With 20 minutes to go, Beauden Barrett dotted over in the far corner after dancing feet (and a pass that appeared to go forward) from increasingly influential winger Mark Tele’a. The conversion was missed — so the Boks held onto their slender one-point lead — but the momentum was with New Zealand, whether they were without skipper Cane or not.
Despite this, Jordie Barrett missed a long-range penalty a few minutes later and suddenly all of those watching in pubs, sports bars, shebeens and taverns across the land had the same thought: “Might we just be able to sneak another improbable win?”
With bravery, composure and a little luck, they were. It was an incredible win after an incredible run. Let’s not forget they were only ahead 6-3 at half-time against Scotland and were behind 13-15 until shortly before the end against England. But this was a side with remarkable reservoirs of self-belief. They are warriors. And they are heroes, although Du Toit, in answering the television interviewer’s questions, was careful not to get too carried away. “I’m quite happy with the win,” he said.
As for the fans, they were more than happy. They were ecstatic.
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