Chris Hani: The unyielding spirit of South Africa's freedom movement

“The interpretation of our reality through patterns not our own serves only to make us ever more unknown, ever less free, ever more solitary.” – Colombian novelist Gabriel Garcia Marquez

THIS year marks the 32nd anniversary of Chris Hani’s assassination, one of the most significant figures in South Africa’s liberation struggle. On April 10, 1993, Hani’s revolutionary voice was silenced.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez once said: “The interpretation of our reality through patterns not our own serves only to make us ever more unknown, ever less free, ever more solitary.” This resonates with Hani’s life and legacy.

A cathedral of a citadel who paid the supreme price for South Africans to be free from the shackles of apartheid, Hani was a steadfast political activist, a skilled and courageous freedom fighter who knew that fighting the apartheid regime carried with it the danger of being killed, but that did not deter him from continuing his fight for the total emancipation of his fellow compatriots.

Hani was a seminal figure in the struggle for liberation. He left an extraordinary legacy, and his life and career are worth emulating. His contributions encompassed exceptional commitment to the quest for freedom. He imparted a warmth of enthusiasm, encouragement, and interest that inspired everyone associated with the struggle for freedom.

Hani’s mind was always a storehouse, ready to illuminate perplexing and complex situations. His membership in the Communist Party and his strong political commitment proved to be of considerable significance.

Hani was an agenda-setter and not a figure of unquestioned authority. His lucidity and incisive edge were unparalleled. His oratory was always an inimitable masterpiece. Hani remained one of the steadfast advocates of the struggle for freedom throughout his life. That is surely so, and his legacy is one that is truly rich. He leaves a legacy that few, if any, can rival and will long endure. In short, the sum of Hani was greater than his individual gifts and accomplishments.

Anna L Peterson and Brandt G Peterson recount the story of Oscar Romero, an Archbishop of San Salvador, who a month before his death remarked thus in an interview: “If they kill me, I will rise again in the Salvadoran people... May my blood be the seed of freedom and the signal hope will soon be a reality.”

Romero was killed on the orders of a Salvadoran military colonel who organised both clandestine death squads and the far-right political party. During the civil war that spanned 12 years in El Salvador, the archbishop often denounced social injustices from the pulpit. His incisive condemnation of repression by the state security forces made him a target of the military’s death squad.

There is another account of Martyrs of El Salvador. A group of highly trained Salvadorian soldiers entered the campus of the University of Central America in San Salvador shortly past midnight in November 1989. While their primary target was the president of the university, Ignacio Ellacuria, SJ, they murdered and mutilated nearly the entire Jesuit community — Ignacio and five others.

A seventh member of the community, Jon Sobrino, SJ, was in Thailand teaching a course on Christology. On November 16, 2009, twenty years later, Professor William Reiser penned a piece remembering the martyrs of El Salvador titled Twenty Years Later: Remembering the Martyrs of El Salvador: The Road from Aguilares.

I would like to quote a passage from the piece which resonates as we remember Chris Hani: “… we develop friendships with the very ones who have made us unsettled and afraid. While we might not be as free as Jesus when it comes to seeking the company of those at the margins, at least as a start these friendships enable us to move beyond fears and insecurity, defensiveness, and hostility. These relationships reshape how we observe, interpret, and respond to the world.

“The lesson of the martyrs is that whether we think of the world in local or global terms, there is no way to escape the route toward the mortal conflict that tears society in two, except by what Paul called 'this ministry of reconciliation.' Working for justice is essential. But if suspicion and estrangement are not overcome, the kingdom of God beyond remains only partially realised. We may be able to read ourselves into the horizon of justice, but we cannot read ourselves into freedom of fear. The way to that liberation passes through the villages and homes of the poor — the road that leads from Aguilares (Hani in our case).”

Several of the Jesuits were associated with the liberation theology which sought to align the church in Latin America with the interests of the poor majority. After the killings, some of the victims were found with their brains scooped out, a gesture of warning to intellectuals and academics. The murders prompted a reevaluation of US policy toward El Salvador and accelerated momentum toward a settlement of the civil war. A formal cease-fire was declared in February 1992.

Hani, who stands out like a cathedral in a citadel, was not only a hero and a martyr but was one of South Africa’s foremost, courageous, and compelling champions, who, with stupendous stoicism, fought the apartheid regime. Armored with the courage of a righteous cause which was his greatest weapon, he uncompromisingly denounced the injustices of the apartheid government.

His act in this regard unceremoniously culminated in him being targeted and eventually killed by the evil forces that sought to delay the freedom of the majority of South Africa. It is against this backdrop, therefore, that it cannot be gainsaid that the blood of this gallant freedom fighter laid the seed that led South Africans to achieve their freedom marked by the first inclusive democratic elections in 1994.

Along with their resolve to bring about peace and justice, Hani was passionately committed to the plight of the downtrodden, often defending them against the injustices of the apartheid government under toxic conditions.

True, as Commander Randy Bowdish of the US Navy aptly puts it in his piece Honouring Heroes, Remembering Victims, heroes act out of courage, willingly facing danger, fear, and great difficulty to accomplish great feats, usually involving helping others at risk to themselves.

In remembering how Hanis met his death, one is reminded of the words spoken by Rosa Luxembourg, the Marxist theorist, uttered the day before she was murdered in which she retorted: “Your order is built on sand. The revolution will raise its heart again, proclaiming to the sound of trumpets, I was. I am. I shall be.”

Surely, Luxembourg’s retort in this regard is apposite to Hani given his indefatigable spirit to endure the cruelty of the regime of the day. Indeed, few people would disagree that Hani carved himself a niche in the annals of history for stoically fighting for justice which will last for time immemorial. Many have learned that it is impossible to kill both the revolutionary and the history upon which the revolutionary’s activism is predicated.

Arguably, revolutionaries die so that they can continue living in our memories. Thus, in remembering, we make the past present. It is against this backdrop, therefore, that we recall, honour, praise Hani’s sacrifice, who not only made the supreme sacrifice for our freedom, but also belonged to the innumerable heroes who died for their ideals. The callous manner under which he was killed qualifies him as a martyr of the struggle for liberation.

According to Amira Mittermaier, in his piece Death and Martyrdom in the Arab Uprising: An introduction, Martyrdom is construed as giving one’s life for a cause, a better situation, and simultaneously it can be about one’s faith in the afterlife.

As such, it seems to inherently be about the future. And yet, martyrdom is a label assigned retroactively. According to Christoph de Spiegeleer, in his piece, The blood of martyrs is the seed of progress, the role of martyrdom in socialist death culture in Belgium and the Netherlands, 1880-1940, martyrs overcome death through their achievements. They remain alive in the heart of the proletariat and the future struggle. Martyrs can be used to transcend death.

People need a sense of place in a cosmic scheme of things, and the commemoration of martyrs from a distant or recent past creates a sense of continuity with past and future generations. Martyrdom always implies a narrative that invokes notions of the “right ordering of the cosmos”, “an imagined system of meaning”.

Like many other freedom fighters, Hani received so many threats against his life, but that did not deter him from continuing the fight. Disregarding the possibility of death, Hani might have been inspired by Martin Luther King who during the struggle for civil rights in America remarked thus: “Some of us will have to get scarred up, but well shall overcome. Before victory is won, some will be misunderstood. Before victory is won, more will have to go to jail. Before justice is victorious, some of us may even face the physical death. But if physical death is the price that some must pay to free their children from a permanent lie of psychological death, then nothing could be more Christian.”

In his time, certainly, Hani was a celebrity. Intelligent and articulate, Hani was an enthusiastic and active proponent of the struggle against apartheid. When the late Eric Mtshali, who was a staunch and proud communist, was asked to make a few remarks at the unveiling of the tombstone of Johannes Nkosi, he famously remarked that “communists never die, the only change their mode of existence”. So be it with Hani.

In South Africa, the “shore” that we have certainly secured against great odds in 1994, is our precious freedom — or rather the end of apartheid. It behooves us to mark the contours of this vast shore with statues, memorials, and monuments that celebrate, commemorate, and remind us of the heroes, heroines, and martyrs who wrested it from the depths of despair.

We all miss Hani’s greatness, his relentless energy, and endless optimism. His legacy, however, and the values he cared about will remain a source of inspiration for generations to come. Indeed, to have had Hani in our lives was a privilege, in death an inspiration.

* Dr Vusi Shongwe is the former head of the Department of the Royal Household and Chief Director for Heritage in the Office of the Premier. He currently serves as Chief Director of Heritage Resource Services in the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture and writes in his personal capacity.

** The views expressed here do not reflect those of the Sunday Independent, Independent Media, or IOL.