Freedom Day

Today (April 27) is Freedom Day, a national holiday that commemorates the first post-apartheid presidential election in 1994. I've seen pictures from that day showing lines of people over a mile long waiting to cast their vote. Ballots contained both the names and pictures of the candidates, since many of the Blacks were illiterate from being denied education by the White government. The hopes and dreams from those days are still very much here and people continue to work hard to acheive them.

The name Freedom Day is a bit misleading, though. People may be free to move around, discuss issues of the day, and gather in groups without fear of reprisal, but many people are not free to plan their futures because they can't see past today. Two cases in point:

Nomoyiso
Nomoyiso is a 16-year-old girl who lives in a two-room shack in Guguletu. Her mother died last year, leaving her to raise her 7-year-old brother by herself. Her father "doesn't see us," a euphimism for "he doesn't give a rat's ass about us." Nomoyiso has family, but they are in the Eastern Cape and they do not get together. They had tried to move her and her brother there, but the prospects for education bleak. (Her family also wanted to sell her shack to make some money, none of which would probably have gone to Nomoyiso.) She chose to stay in her shack and make the best life she can. To earn income, she and her brother go door-to-door and ask for laundry. She takes it to a shop to have cleaned, returning every Friday to get the clean clothes. She then takes the clean clothes back to their owners, hoping to collect a small sum for her troubles. She said that some people don't pay, or don't bother to collect their items for weeks or months, meaning that she has no income for that week. Then, she and her brother have to rely on the kindness of neighbors and strangers to survive.

Nomoyiso is 16 and a junior in high school. She is doing very well in school and has aspirations of going to University. However, she knows that money for college is not available. She is also worried about what will happen to her brother if she goes away to school, since she has no relatives nearby to care for him. She is committed to making sure that he has a future, even if it means putting hers on hold, possibly forever.

Nomoyiso is also very worried about where she lives. She says she does not feel safe there, as there are always drunk men around and people shoot off guns in the night. There are no locks on her doors, and it would be quite simple for someone to enter on a whim. As an attractive teenager, rape is a constant risk.


She misses her mother very much, as "she took care of us. I have no one to talk to about things."

Shepherd
Shepherd is 12. His parents died last year, leaving him and his 10-year-old brother Loyiso alone. Shepherd and Loyiso spend their nights in a one-room broken-down shack in Barcelona, a poor area of Guguletu. They have no electricity or heat in their shack, which means limited ability to cook, watch TV, or do their homework. They're fortunate in that their auntie lives behind them in her own shack and gives them some support. They also go to a cousin's house after school to play with other kids and get something to eat. (Thirteen people live in their cousin's house, a two-bedroom government-built house.) Their shack is a 15-minute walk from the house, and I cannot imagine what they think every day when they leave a brick house for a wooden shack that most people wouldn't put dogs in.

There's also some controversy about Shepherd's shack. Apparently his aunt has moved the boys into a different shack and her son is now living in Shepherd's place. I don't know if that's true or not, but if it is it's another example of how vulnerable children are exploited.

Because Shepherd and his brother do not have parents, they do not receive any financial support from the government (the same is true for Nomiyiso and her brother). The government pays about R190 ($27) per child, per month for children under 14. While not much, it helps to buy bread (a daily staple) and maybe some mealie meal or samp (mealie meal is like corn meal, while samp is like hominy). All of the kids who live on their own are forced to fend for themselves, in whatever way they can.

I have no idea what the future holds for Shepherd and Loyiso. The same goes for Nomoyiso and her brother. They'll be free, but unless something changes their futures will be meager existances of trying to find work; avoiding abuse, drugs and gangs; and surviving day-to-day. To me, it's hard to call that a freedom worth celebrating.


(In the picture, Shepherd is on the left and Loyiso on the right. They are standing in front of my car, the boot (trunk) of which is loaded with food parcels. The food was donated by Spar, a local grocery chain that provides about 50 parcels each month. People get mealie meal, rice, oil (extra-virgin olive oil, at that!), chicken, and several other items. Spar deserves to be commended for this contribution, and I hope other South African companies will follow suit someday.


By the way, I'm sure you'll appreciate that it took about two minutes of discussion to get the boys to stand together and actually touch. I guess brothers are the same everywhere.)