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Date : 12/02/2004
Source: KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Government
Title: S Ndebele: Prayer breakfast


SPEECH BY KWAZULU-NATAL MEC FOR TRANSPORT, MR S'BU NDEBELE, DELIVERED AT THE PRAYER BREAKFAST HELD AT THE ICC, DURBAN, 12 February 2004

To use Martin Luther King Jnr's phrase: "If I were standing at the beginning of time with the possibility of a panoramic view of the whole human history up to now, and God said to me: which age would you like to live in and in which part of the continent?"

To answer the last question first, I would naturally say Africa, where human life and civilisation began. I would take my mental flight from Egypt. Then as I marvel at the pyramids I would be painfully aware that they were built by slaves and that that tried and tested tactic pharaoh used to prolong slavery was to keep slaves fighting amongst themselves and that wherever the slaves got together something happened in Pharaoh's court.

But I would not stop there: I would go across to Mali and see the oldest University in the world. But I would not stop there. I would go across to Ghana and see how Kwame Nkrumah's vision of a democracy still holds, blending religion and African traditional leadership - a modern economy and a modern democracy.

But I would not stop there. I would pass on to Nigeria, a country that exports more African intellectuals to the United States second only to India. A country that has learnt the bitter lesson of the futility of turning one tribe against the other - and one religion against the other - a country that has embarked on a firm democratic road.

But I would not stop there. I would then pass the Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, look at the statue of Dr Livingstone and proceed to KwaBulawayo. Here I would hear fascinating stories about the Zulus and that the original KwaBulawayo was still a long way down south. I would proceed to South Africa, a country that has been able to turn its scars into stars.

In Gauteng I would be filled with joy to see Zulu, Sotho and Venda people together with white, coloured and Indian people living together - hard at work.

But I would not stop there. I would proceed to a province whose very name excites the mind - whose name talks of the birth of Natal - natality and heaven - KwaZulu.

If South Africa is a land of hope, what would keep that hope and that flame of promise? Would such be KwaZulu-Natal?

Having located myself in the space that is KwaZulu-Natal I would look for the best age in which the children and KwaZulu-Natal's full potential could be realised.

I would really be caught up in the exciting period of the reign of King Shaka whose credo was the recognition of all human beings, not on the basis of the accident of birth but on merit.

I would marvel at the scientific feats of the tempering of steel and the massive effort of unity on people at welcoming white people way back in 1824. I would remember Sotobe and the cultural and scientific exchanges that he conducted at the request of King Shaka. But I would not stop there.

I would enter into the robust debate between the ancestral worshippers and the Christian religion that flourished during the reign of King Mpande. I would listen to Dr Mankankanana from Maphumulo to Mahlabathini to Eshowe, Ntuweni, Hlabisa and Obuka.

I would probably start to sympathise with his determination even as he converted the first African convert, Shange, at Maphumulo, after 14 years of preaching.

But I would not stop there. I would first be angry and then admire the young women of Ingcugce in 1876 as they stood up and demanded the right to choose their boyfriends.

I would not stop there. I would be left with a serious mixed feeling on that fateful Friday, 9 March 1877, when Maqhamusila Khanyile became the first martyr when he was executed for turning into Christianity. His last prayer before execution was that KwaZulu-Natal would at last be Christian.

But I would not stop there. I would be inspired by King Cetshwayo's magnanimity about his desire to live with Afrikaans-speaking people with the English, with the coloured and with Indian people - each living from the other and pulling their common resources to build a winning nation on the basis of equality.

I would not stop there. I would join Bishop Colenso and Herold and other Christians as they became one with the Royal House and the people in a campaign to release King Cetshwayo and other political prisoners.

I would not stop there. I would support the Bhambatha rebellion even as King Dinizulu, even as Bishop Colenso and even as Mahatma Gandhi collected bandages and medicine when all state hospitals refused to treat anyone injured in that rebellion.

I would not stop there. I would follow Mafukuzela Dube in his quest to create a new person through education and Christian teachings, head, heart and hand. I would follow as he identified divisions amongst African people as the sole reason for their continued oppression.

I would not stop there. I would follow that first Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Inkosi Luthuli - a traditional leader, a Christian, an intellectual, a democrat and a humanist. A leader who taught us not only what to fight against but what to fight for - a leader who declared that non-racialism was not only desirable but possible - a Christian par excellence.

I would not stop there. Laws would be introduced that defined Africans out of existence. Religion - notably Christian leaders like Archbishop Hurley would keep the idea of peace and unity alive. Peace and stability would elude KwaZulu-Natal even as freedom dawned in 1994.

But I would not stop there. I would ask myself why God seemed to visit the harshest punishment to this province.

I would not stop there. I would enter the hardest of any struggle - the struggle to change myself; change myself to be ready to die for my province, but not allow the province to die for me.

Issued by: Department of Transport, KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Government
12 February 2004

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