20 years on

I wanted to write about the 20th anniversary of South Africa's first elections two weeks ago, but all I did was think about what I could say. Today I went off to vote in our 4th national election since becoming a political democracy. Maybe it's the conversations, debates and slight turmoil about who to vote for, that has accompanied me over the last few weeks, that crystalised today in my determination to put my thoughts down.

Thelma a few days before
the inauguration of
Nelson  Mandela

In 1994, for me and most my family it was a foregone conclusion who we would vote for. This was accompanied with much optimism, enthusiasm, even euphoria about the fact that as a country we had reached this momentous landmark despite the bloodshed, destruction and turmoil that had defined the 'struggle years'. I remember desperately waiting to see the results tally and wishing the ANC would get the two-thirds majority that would once and for all show the previous apartheid government (and the rest of the world) the faith and confidence the South African people had in it's liberation movement and political party. Nothing could dampen the feelings of positivity and deep hope for a different kind of future, one defined by equality, for everyone in the country.

Today I went to vote at a Bridgetown voting station. I grew up in this apartheid era 'council area' and accompanied my sister and brother-in-law who still live there. On our way back after voting we were reminiscing about the 1994 elections and my sister made a very simple, but poignant statement. She said it was so sad that after only 20 years all that has become of the expectation, hope, optimistism we felt then, is now, only a bitter taste felt in our mouths.

The last time I voted for the ANC in a National Election was 2004. For the local elections I had unfortunately, already lost faith in party and especially its personalities, before that. But I think in 2004 & 2009 the debates about who to vote for were more predictable. People like me who were a bit pissed off or irritated with the ANC, made a token gesture of either spoiling our ballots or voting for an obscure, small independent party. It was a silent, person statement. This time around the dissatisfaction with the political context was more widespread and had entered the heartland of the ANC support base. I'm defining 'support base' here as people who, while dissatisfied with particular policy or tactical  decisions made or who had issues with certain personalities in the ANC, are by and large still loyal supporters (for whatever reasons). In the last few weeks there have been all sorts of calls, even by ANC stalwarts, to vote tactically, and in so doing give the ANC a wake-up call. For me it's been hard to respond to these calls and debates. In principle I could agree, but on the question of who to vote for I was very unsure. It's one thing to make a personal, and very silent, statement in a voting booth, but a completely different thing to possibly direct your vote towards an opposition party that you find morally irreprehensible, simply because you want to send a clear message to the ruling party without watering down the opposition.
My dilemma today.
My choice about which political party to vote for is still emotionally charged and undeniably scarred by my history. Just like I was unable to vote for the ANC because I see it distorting the ideals it held in such high regard a mere 20 years ago, I was unable to put aside my personal and political beliefs when selecting which opposition party to vote for. As it can be said that most political parties stand on shaky moral ground anyway, does it really matter? Unfortunately for me, at this moment, it still does. I tried to pick the best of the baddies and as a result I probably didn't do my bit for helping to develop a more robust opposition.

Melissa's ink-marked thumb

Waiting to vote for Melissa

My niece, Melissa, who was born in November 1994, and therefore a true 'Born Free', voted today for the first time. So a special moment for our family and maybe symbolic too. I'm forced to acknowledge that the political landscape has changed in the past 20 years, and this is positive too. In a way the fact that Melissa had the option to choose an alternative to the party I voted for 20 years ago is an indication that, politically and socially, our country is able to accommodate the necessities of change. And in a small way I feel, through the act of Melissa voting today, the same positivity and optimism we all felt the first time we went to the polls, in what also seems like a life-time ago.

write even when you don't want to

I was thinking about my last post a few days after I'd written it, reflecting on the fact that while I'd been conscientious in maintaining this blog I had completely stopped my journal writing. I've been journalling in one or other form since my early 20s. But I stopped about three years ago. The personal is too personal to write about. In my head the blog is for my PhD experiences, the ones I am able to share with the invisible but every present audience. My paper-based journals meant to occupy a more personal space reserved only for me and whoever gets to read it one day when I'm too old to care or dead. I know the reason why its been harder to write in my journals - because what I have to express is too immediate, personal, too painful - the kind of stuff I don't want to reflect on because by reflecting, it all becomes too real and I'd rather it be tucked away in the recesses of my mind. But for that very same reason I also know how important it is to write about those very things I want to forget or turn away from. You need to write even when you don't want to. Here my personal writing and my academic share a common connection. A few weeks back I spoke about being inspired to write. I haven't done anything yet, but the urge and push is becoming stronger. I want to write, even though I don't really want to and I feel this urge is driving me forward. The urge is so tangible that even though I know whatever I'm going to write will be crap, in the first instance, I don't care. The desire is there to do it anyway. I'm on a short break from work for the next week and hope I will concede to the need, desire to write, to create time to spend in my calm, familiar writing and research place. Push myself to do what certain parts of me don't really want to do. In this way the academic writing always has some leverage over the personal. If only it were so simple to rouse my personal writing genie.