'UMKHONTO WE SIZWE. THE SPEAR AND THE SHIELD OF THE NATION'

32nd anniversary celebration, 16th December 1993, Curries Fontein (sic), 9am.Issued by the African National Congress, and Umkhonto we Sizwe.

On the 16th December 1993 Nelson Mandela gave the keynote command at the Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) flag lowering ceremony at the Orlando Stadium in Soweto. At the same time - give or take an hour - the same sequence of protocols occurred at seven other events throughout South Africa. These carefully planned and staged events were MK’s first and last public military parades in South Africa.

MK was the military wing of the ANC. Umkhonto we Sizwe is isiZulu for `Spear of the Nation`. This armed unit was secretly planned and formed from the late 1950’s onwards by leading members of the ANC and the South African Communist Party (SACP), with its first operations in South Africa carried out on the 16th December 1961 - or the evening before. The symbol of the unit is of a stylised African warrior attacking, with shield to the fore and assegai held high. There is considerable symbolism in the unit’s image, the date of its first operations, the design of the poster, the military order read out in keynote addresses at the flag lowering parades, and the post-1994 place of the 16th December in South African national reconciliation.

The `shield-spear` question is a classic paradox of irresistible force, with origins dating back to 3rd century BCE Chinese philosophy on government, politics and war. Within the ANC-led Congress Alliance circles of the 1950’s, the `shield-spear` metaphor was often used in defining the relationship between the ANC and its trade union ally - the Congress of South African Trade Unions (SACTU) - and then later with regard to MK, where the necessity of political control over the armed formation was of paramount concern. The image of the African warrior was also intended to make explicit reference to the pedigree of the lineage from pre-colonial African states, anti-colonial resistance and rebellion, and MK’s modern role as a liberation army. It was also vital that Nelson Mandela’s head and shoulder photograph featured prominently and solely on the poster. Here was a be-suited Mandela, not simply or only as the then President of the ANC (as from 1991), or as a modern politician, or head-of-state in waiting, but as a leading founder of and MK’s first commander-in-chief.

It was no accident that MK’s first operations were on the 16th December. This day was for long the most politically contested and controversial of all South Africa’s pre-1994 public holidays. The day was a religious public holiday celebrating the victory of the Voortrekkers over Zulu King Dingane’s army on the banks of the Ncome River in Zululand in 1838. Before the battle, the trekkers prayed, taking a covenant that if victorious the day would be honoured as a holy day. After the battle, where some three thousand Zulu’s died, with but a few trekker injuries, the trekkers renamed the Ncome River Bloedrivier (Blood River), with the battle henceforth becoming known as the Battle of Blood River. In 1841 the victorious trekkers built the Church of the Vow at Pietermaritzburg, and passed the obligation to keep the vow on to their descendants.

It was with the formation of the Union of South Africa in 1910 that the day was officially declared a national public holiday. The name of the day changed from the Day of the Vow to the Day of the Covenant, and was also popularly known as `Dingaan’s Day`. But the symbolism was clear: that of divine providence and Afrikaner Christian and white supremacy. With the opening of a monument on the battle site in 1947 – planned at the centenary of the battle in 1938 – the site became a place of annual pilgrimage for Afrikaners each 16th December, attracting vast crowds. In the 1960s it was decided that the original laager of Andries Pretorius would be replicated as accurately as possible. Sixty four life size bronzed steel wagons, including whip barriers, lanterns and open ammunition wagons, were modelled exactly on the `Johanna van der Merwe` centenary replica wagon, identical to the original sixteen oxen-drawn Kakebeenwa (`kakebeen`: Dutch/Afrikaans for `jawbone`) wagons of the Great Trek, which took part in the 1938 Symbolic Ox-wagon centenary trek across South Africa. This replica laager (Dutch/Afrikaans for `wagon encirclement`) was unveiled on 16th December 1971 by the then South African prime minister, B.J. Vorster. At all annual ceremonies at Blood River especially selected religious and political leaders would offer sermons and addresses on the burning issues of the time. As legally promulgated as a religious holiday, all manner of public events, including cultural and sporting ones, were prohibited, with all shops, hotels, restaurants etc. closed throughout the country.

In the post-1990 period of political negotiations, the South African government and the ANC signed the Pretoria Minute on the 6th August 1990. Here, inter alia, the ANC agreed to suspend the armed struggle, but not to abandon it, nor to reveal arms caches or stop recruitment and training. Yet it was significant that from 1990 to 1992 the ANC did not mark the 16th December with any formal speeches or public rallies. Indeed whilst the Day of the Covenant continued to be celebrated, growing public comment debated the continued relevance of the event. On the 16th December 1992 Peter Soal of the Democratic Party was quoted as saying the public holiday was “sectional” whilst on the same day Dennis Madide of the Inkatha Freedom Party said the day was “painful”. As it was, in Natal from 1991 onwards the provincial government recognised that for the majority the day had long been neither a religious nor political event, but a holiday for socialising and enjoyment, by repealing promulgations against the hosting of public events and all trading prohibitions. In Durban the 16th December had long acquired a very different connotation. With its huge harbour facility and industrial and manufacturing economy near entirely dependent upon migrant labour, the 16th December became the one-month shutdown period where migrants returned to the homelands. By reason of the influx control and urban areas acts, for Durban-ites the 16th December marked the beginning of the Christmas holiday season.

It was only from mid-1992 onwards as the National Party government and the ANC reached a series of mutual understandings which included the nature of an interim constitution and arrangements for a national non-racial general election that the ANC agreed to end the armed struggle. So, the 16th December 1993 MK parades were both MK’s first and last public military parades in South Africa.

In 1993 the main event was held in the Orlando Stadium in Soweto, with Nelson Mandela giving the keynote address. With his huge moral authority, Mandela’s speech was in essence a military order, repeated at each of the other events by the keynote speaker. Mandela spoke: “end armed struggle now”, as “The Spear of the Nation becomes the Nation’s Shield”. Cadres were to be integrated into and become loyal core members a new National Defence Force. The Durban event was held at Curries Fountain Sports Ground. Situated in the mixed-race Warwick Avenue area of central Durban, `Curries` - as the precinct was popularly known as - was the main vital area for non-racial sporting, cultural events and for anti-apartheid political and trade union rallies. At the Durban event, then ANC Southern Natal Regional chairperson and senior MK and SACP leader Jeff Radebe (now Minister in the Presidency) gave the keynote address. Behind him a huge banner read “From: The People’s Army, To: National Defence Force” A commencing military march past was followed by nine MK veterans dressed in Soviet Bloc camouflage battledress - as were the march past troops - introduced with acclaim to the crowd. Some amongst the nine were founding cadres of MK. A host of `cultural events` followed the military ceremony.

Whilst these national flag lowering parades were taking place around the country a huge crowd of Afrikaners were gathered at the Blood River monument. They were addressed by General Constand Viljoen, the immediately ex-Chief of the South African Defence Force and now a leader of the conservative Afrikaner Volksfront (AVF) grouping, with access to militia forces, opposed to the multi-party political negotiations, and seeking self-determination for the Afrikaner.

After the 1994 national one-person one-vote general elections, the ANC-led government of national unity retained the 16th December public holiday, now renamed as the Day of Reconciliation. The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission commenced work on the 16th December 1995. In November 1999 the Ncome Museum was officially opened. Designed in the shape of the Zulu bull horn military formation supposedly initiated by the founder of the Zulu nation, King Shaka ka Senzangakhona, the museum offers a re-interpretation of the 1838 battle and exhibits on Zulu culture in general, with the rich symbolism of the isiZulu language captured and explained through display items. The bridge over the Ncome River between the Blood River Monument and Museum and the Ncome Museum is called the Reconciliation Bridge.

SEEo For photographs by Rafs Mayet of the march past and salute at the Currie’s Fountain event see: The African Communist, issue no 194, First Quarter 2017, front cover: http://www.sacp.org.za/pubs/acommunist/2017/issue194.pdf
The Con, `Kasrils strikes back at Maphatsoe`, 16 September 2014: http://www.theconmag.co.za/2014/09/16/kasrils-strikes-back-at-maphatsoe/o http://www.anc.org.za/content/anc-mk-statement-32nd-anniversary-celebrations-mk
The Daily News, 15, 16 & 17 December 1993
The Natal Mercury, 16 December 1992