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African Rennaisance: Challanges and Opportunities for Eastern Cape
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Speeches and Media Releases
 Sports, Arts Culture

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EASTERN CAPE PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT

SPEECH BY THE MEC OF SPORT, ARTS AND CULTURE

THE AFRICAN RENNAISANCE: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNINTIES FOR THE EASTERN CAPE

7 SEPTEMBER 1999



Introduction

Ladies and gentlemen, friends - let me begin by thanking the organizers of the Africa Heritage Week for the invitation to this conference. 
September is the month of Heritage Day. The Department of Sport, Arts and Culture in the Eastern Cape will be hosting, together with local 
authorities and communities, a provincial Heritage Day commemoration on 24 September. There will also be five regional commemorations. It 
is very pleasing to see how Heritage Day continues to gain momentum. It is no longer just a government-initiated event. More and more 
communities are viewing Heritage Day as an opportunity to reclaim and re-affirm their heritage. More and more the whole month of September 
is being given over to a series of heritage issues. That is why we welcome the initiative here today. It occurs in the context of very 
exciting developments in our country.

Central to our commemoration of Africa Heritage Week is the whole vision of an African Renaissance. This concept is pregnant with 
opportunities and challenges. We need to explore this if we are to ensure that the concept takes us where it should: to create a better 
life for all, to restore our collective sense of humanity, to rediscover our lost and suppressed past and to re-inculcate a sense of 
dignity and pride in communities which bore the brunt of colonialism and apartheid.

Locating the African Renaissance

Since President Thabo Mbeki first unveiled his vision of an African Renaissance, a considerable amount of excitement has been generated. In 
his speeches he has highlighted some of the strands that weave into the tapestry, stretching from the Cape to Cairo:

At the beginning of our rebirth as a Continent must be our own rediscovery of our soul, captured and made permanently available in the 
great works of creativity represented by the pyramids and spinxes of Egypt, the stone buildings of Axum and the ruins of Carthage and 
Zimbabawe, the rock paintings of the San, the Benin bronzes and the African masks, the carvings of the Makonde and the stone sculptures of 
the Shona.... We must retune our ears to the music of Zao and Franco of the Congos and the poetry of Mazisi Kunene of South Africa and 
refocus our eyes to behold the paintings of Malangatane of Mozambique and the sculptures of Dumile Feni of South Africa.1

We all know that there are many examples of African achievement and endeavour that have been marginalised and ignored, in the interests of 
perpetuating stereotypes that we Africans are primitive, backward and less than human. Africa is a glorious continent with a glorious 
heritage. Let me take you on a brisk armchair tour to illustrate some of the points so eloquently made by our President, with a few 
stopovers of my own.

Let us start up north and meander southwards. If we were guided by popular Western media we would all believe that the Egyptian pyramids, 
one of the greatest achievements in the history of all humankind were created by non-Africans. Indeed, some people would rather believe 
that they were constructed by extraterrrestrials than accept them as African. Of course they are very firmly located on African soil and 
were built by Africans. Who can stand before them and not marvel at this wonderful example of African ingenuity and achievement?

Let us move on to Ethiopia, home to a Christian church far older than that in most Western countries. The technology and ingenuity in 
carving the churches of Lalibela out of the living rock are a testament to African achievement. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries 
Ethiopians carved eleven exquisitely-designed churches, inside and outside, out of solid rock. So beautiful are these churches that legend 
has it that the angles wielded hammers and chisels at night to complete them. Who, standing before these magnificent monuments, could fail 
to be inspired by the level of sophistication required to construct them?

Let us move westwards. The old empire of Mali was one of the greatest states Africa has ever known. First-hand accounts by scholars in the 
fourteenth recorded with admiration their impressions of Mali: ?the small number of acts of injustice one finds here and the complete and 
general safety one enjoys throughout the land. What makes the achievements of the rulers of Mali all the more remarkable was that they 
succeeded in holding together for close to two hundred years, people of diverse ethnic origins spread over a vast territory. This is 
something we all need to consider when the Western media continually plays on the civil strife in Africa today. Who cannot be impressed 
with the level of state craft achieved by Africans at a time when Europe was in the clutches of its Dark Ages?

Let us move on in our tour for a brief visit to Kenya. The Masai people are renowned worldwide. One of their supreme achievements has been 
to develop a lifestyle that enables them to live in synergy with their environment. In this day and age where Western agricultural and 
industrial practices have caused such widespread environmental destruction, who cannot but be impressed by the skills and knowledge 
inherent in such a way of life?

From Kenya let us move on to great Zimbabwe. European academics have expended an enormous amount of energy and time in trying to prove that 
this incredible monument was constructed by people other than Africans. Of course this is all arrant nonsense. Archaeological evidence 
proves conclusively that great Zimbabawe was constructed in the thirteenth century by Shona-speaking peoples. Who can stand in the centre 
of great Zimbabwe and not be moved by the grandeur of the buildings and by the culture that was able to construct them?

Let us now come home. As we move southwards, we pass magnificent heritage sites like Thulamela and Mapungubwe, parts of the empire that 
constructed great Zimbabwe.

We pass the Sterkfontein and Makapansgat caves, were early evidence of hominids proves beyond any shadow of doubt the critical role Africa 
has played in the evolution of humans and development of humanity. There is a certain delicious irony in the fact that those western pseudo 
academics in the nineteenth century, who were so quick to condemn Africans as savage and primitive, had themselves originated from 
Africans.

And now we come to the Eastern Cape. We have a rich heritage to which we can turn for inspiration, enlightenment and enjoyment. 
Archaeological evidence at the Klassies river caves provides us with the oldest evidence in the world of anatomically modern humans 
utilising fire. The recently discovered mummified remains of a Khoisan person in the Langkloof provides fascinating evidence of the 
sophisticated use of medicinal plants. We have an incredibly rich heritage of rock art. Fortunately recent research has now dispelled the 
notion that rock art is simply the daubings of primitive people. We are now beginning to understand that apparently simple rock paintings 
hold the key to unlocking complex sacred and religious beliefs. Moving to the modern era, we have a long history of resistance to 
colonialism and apartheid, which is manifested in sites all around our Province (including the very university where we are today).

In examining African heritage in general, and heritage in the Eastern Cape in particular, we need to ensure that our notion of heritage 
encompasses two aspects: the tangible and intangible. Tangible heritage relates to those sites, places and structures which are a physical 
manifestation of our shared history: battle fields, graves, great places, mountains to which oral traditions are attached, historic mission 
settlements, archaeological sites and so on. The intangible aspects are no less important: the customs, indigenous knowledge and belief 
systems, traditions and mores of past societies. These are manifested through dance, certain rituals, oral traditions, ways of doing things 
and song. The Eastern Cape is very rich in both tangible and intangible heritage.

Challenges and Opportunities

The opportunities presented by the African Renaissance include the following:

* It is a very useful concept that takes us further in the transformation and reconstruction of our society than the so-called Rainbow 
Nation. Nation building and reconciliation are very important aspects, but in the second five year terms of our democratic government, it 
is clear we need to focus on the spiritual and material reconstruction of our society. This is where the African Renaissance can play a 
vital role.
* It is a concept that holds the key to unlocking the National Question in South Africa. It will enable us to develop a uniquely South 
African sense of nationhood, without neglecting our African roots and values.
* It is a concept which restores dignity to African People. Paradoxically, in so doing, it can also restore dignity to those who deprived 
African people of their dignity.
* It redresses the imbalance in how we have viewed Africa and Africans. Centuries of colonial domination created a myth that Africans were 
primitive, blood thirsty savages who achieved nothing of note and had nothing that could be construed as a meaningful contribution to the 
development of humankind. This world view became so pervasive that Africans themselves were forced to accept it. The concept of an African 
Renaissance is useful in that it provides a tool for balancing the scales again, for rediscovering neglected or marginalised sites 
associated with our heritage, for removing the imbalances of the past, for reinterpreting our history, for rediscovering African 
achievements and values, for restoring a pride and dignity to our people, for recapturing neglected traditions and customs, for 
rediscovering neglected aspects of culture like music, stories and dance, for shaping an identity that will take us forward to the kind of 
society we would all like to create in South Africa. In the process of restoring the humanity to our people the concept of ubuntu needs to 
be popularised again.
* The concept of an African Renaissance (encompassing the aspects mentioned above), together with economic growth, offers the only real 
tools for addressing the problem of crime in society and restoring respect for law and order.
* It is obvious that crucial to the whole notion of an African Renaissance is the question of heritage. We cannot talk of a rebirth of 
values of the past, if we do not know what that past was. Heritage, and the interpretation of the past, then become a vital issues. This 
presents many opportunities for us. We need to look beyond purely political history. We need a new (Africanist) cultural and social history 
of the people of this Province. How they farmed the land, how they related to each other, how rulers interacted with the ruled, the role of 
women in society, the place accorded to children in traditional society and so on, are all important issues. We also need to look at the 
pre-colonial record of the achievements of the African people in this area in settling the land, in spreading the knowledge of iron-
working, in the trade networks they set up and in the manner they treated shipwrecked European sailors. All of these things will help to 
dispel the myths the colonial and apartheid process forced on people. The ploughed field should become as important as the battle field.

In the process, we face several challenges:

* We need a clear understanding of what is meant by African Renaissance if we are not to just use it as a slogan. It should be a tool to 
achieve a particular end, rather than just a slogan. In a sense, it is a pity that there is not an African term that can be used, rather 
than an Italian one.
* We need to translate the theories underpinning the African Renaissance into real and tangible benefits for ordinary people in the 
humblest of our communities.
* We must find a way of making our history, our policies and our institutions truly African in inspiration, content and operation. We need 
to take up the challenge of developing African models for solving the problems we face. We are in Africa, but we still need to be of Africa 
for Africans.
* At the same time, we need to guard against using the concept of an African Renaissance in a chauvinistic and narrow sense. How we define 
African becomes very important. This again relates to the meaning we attach to heritage sites and the identity we create for ourselves as a 
nation.

Conclusion

In the final analysis, the concept of an African Renaissance, drawing as it does on our shared and common past, could serve as the basis 
for shaping the kind of society we would all like to see in South Africa. When the new history of South Africa is written from the 
Africanist perspective, the Eastern Cape will be found to have played a very big role.

We rely on you, as African academics and intelligentsia, to reach out to communities to research traditional African beliefs, knowledge 
systems and history so that you generate a solid core of evidence which will form the foundation of the new society we wish to reconstruct.

What areas am I referring to? Well, amongst the areas that would seem to be fields of immediate interest would be:

* traditional beliefs and cosmologies
* traditional medicines and medicinal plants
* archaeology and history
* traditional agricultural techniques and land usage
* traditional environmental conservation practices
* traditional animal breeds and crops
* traditional African social and economic relations
* African politics and philosophies, and
* traditional games and recreational activities.

I am not arguing for the production of some kind of romanticized merrie Africa version of the past. I am not arguing that we should replace 
one type of stereotypes and one set of myths with another. What we need is serious people-centred academic research. For the Eastern Cape 
Department of Sport, Arts and Culture, and for yourselves as university academics, the opportunities and challenges are there. We need to 
develop partnerships which will explore the implications of the various strands of the African Renaissance that will inform and underpin 
our policies and programmes. What I am arguing for is a new and dynamic relationship between government, academics and communities, one 
which will tap into the African Renaissance vision to create a better life for all. That is the fundamental challenge we all face.



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1Deputy President T.M. Mbeki, Statement on the African Renaissance, SABC, Gallagher Estate, 13/8/1998

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