For the South African post-apartheid political establishment, how they contest political power to remain firmly in their hands seems they must survive narratives every time they approach succession epochs. The 2022 Conference of the ANC was supposed to be a moment of triumph for the Paul-Mashatile-as-a-node establishment. What is now unfolding indicates that as-a-node, he is under siege to be allowed to succeed Cyril Ramaphosa as President of the ANC and maybe the country.
When ANC cadres search for solutions to any siege they find themselves, or any of its leaders, they habitually turn towards themselves and manufacture theories about each other as being responsible. They package themselves into distinct factions and mine from within factions tormenting pasts that make them ignore what drives the siege against the organisation and its leaders. In the whirlpool of fighting amongst themselves, they feed the narrative designed to drive the wedge inside the ANC.
When a narrative begins and catches fire, we tend to focus on the 'narrated' content and never the 'narrative', which is advanced. The Paul Mashatile saga, or 'narrative', seems familiar about liberation movement leaders since its unbanning 1990. For each leader, there was and still is a narrative. These were all aimed at liquidating the moral high ground of the liberation struggle; at the least, they were designed to demonstrate the hollowness of the settlement in real power terms.
How the various leaders were dealt with displayed a form of lynching. Lynching is the public 'killing' of an individual who has not received any due process. Lawless mobs often carried it, sometimes even through (police) officers or equivalents. This they did under the pretext of 'some' justice. Lynchings are (reputationally) violent public acts that people (with some form of power) use to terrorise and control the dominated. Historically lynchings typically evoke images of Black men (and women) hanging from trees, but they involved other extreme brutality, such as torture, mutilation, decapitation, and desecration. Some victims were (burned) alive.
A typical lynching involved an accusation, an arrest, and the assembly of a mob, followed by seizure, physical torment, and assault (including murder) of the victim. Lynchings are often public spectacles attended by a cheering community to celebrate the supremacy of the dominant.
Without any brief to any of the publicly lynched ANC leaders for one issue or another, and in almost all instances, there is no conclusive narrative on the issues they were hanged in the town square for.
In the matter between Louis Luyt and Nelson Mandela, Louis Luyt refused to appear before a presidential commission of inquiry and instead forced President Mandela into court. This demonstrated Nelson Mandela's commitment to the rule of law, but its public lynching character was equally pornographic.
There was also the HIV/AIDS issue of Thabo Mbeki, where he was globally presented as a President that believed in garlic and beetroot as a cure for HIV/AIDS when he interrogated the thesis behind the interventions he was expected to endorse. His inquiries instructed what was the most elaborate HIV/AIDS intervention by a government. Zuma had his lynchings, legitimate or otherwise, David Mabuza had his lynchings when he was deputy President, and Ramaphosa is still navigating his public lynching.
The onslaught on Paul Mashatile is following the same pattern. Accuse until the accusation becomes a narrative as you search for supporting evidence to an otherwise peddled narrative. This is not new. Paul Mashatile will hang on that tree for the economically dominant and benefit from cheering as they look on. The lawless mobs operating under the pretext of press freedom inconsistent with the press code are hard at work with extreme brutality on their reputation. His reputation is in torture, mutilation, decapitation, and desecration.
The open letter by Jurists for
Christ Foundation is an encouraging act by Civil Society Movements to demand
accountability from fishers of African Role Models to lynch publicly. There are
worse acts of corruption, dysfunction, and malfeasance that have not received
equal wrath and perpetrators being put on South Africa's post-apartheid tree at
the town square. CUT!!!
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