The influence of apartheid

The Msiza and Bophuthatswana

The final blow to the Msiza's depleted finances came on 6 December 1977 when the South African government proclaimed the "independent" state of Bophuthatswana, and the district of Odi was incorporated into one of its six scattered fragments. The idea of creating a number of rurally-based independent Homeland states based upon the white government's perception of "ethnic" divisions in South Africa's black population was intended to be the culmination of Apartheid's policy of social engineering. It was based upon Verwoerd's vision of a balkanized South African society where each of the country's nine "tribal" groupings was to be allocated its own homeland area to govern independently. The inadequacies and contradictions of such a policy were self-evident to all but their originators, and it never achieved much meaningful recognition either in South Africa or overseas. Nonetheless the existence of a Tswana ethnically-based state was to create untold hardships for the Msiza for the next sixteen years.

This hardship took many forms. The first came almost immediately when the South African Tourist Board cut off its subsidy of paint and building materials to the village, and took KwaMsiza off its tourist itineraries, claiming that tourism to the area was now a matter for the Bophuthatswana government to manage. The next arose when the Bophuthatswana government refused to allow its Ndebele subjects the right to educate their children in their mother tongue, siNdebele, a Nguni dialect, claiming that all education in the Tswana state must be conducted in seTswana. Then Bophuthatswana demanded that all its Ndebele subjects swear loyalty to the Tswana state, as a pre-condition to being given state or state-subsidised jobs, and being issued with travel documents. As, for the purposes of Apartheid policy, South Africa was now a "foreign state", all Ndebele were now disenfranchised, legally prevented from traveling in their own country, and rendered stateless. Driven to the point of exasperation, a number of Ndebele leaders visited Pretoria in about 1981 and requested permission to establish their own independent state of KwaNdebele in the Dennylton-Groblersdal region. Delighted Apartheid bureaucrats saw this as visible justification of their "ethnic" policies and quickly made arrangements to add a tenth puppet state to the nine already in operation. Fortunately a popular uprising in 1986 brought these plans to an end, and the Ndebele had to wait until 1994 to have their civic rights restored fully to them. One of the results of this struggle, however, was that the village of KwaMsiza began to run out of residential land, and not wishing to impinge upon their already meagre agricultural resources, the Msiza opened negotiations for a fresh allocation of state land from Bophuthatswana. Although a stretch of open common was available alongside their village, not unexpectedly these requests were denied.

One positive development during this time was the establishment during the 1980s of the new industrial suburb of Rosslyn immediately north of Pretoria, some 20km from KwaMsiza. This increased the level of employment in the village and allowed its men to return to their homes each day, thus reasserting the structure of the nuclear family. Despite this, the historical role of tourism in supplementing the economic base of the village appeared to be beyond repair.

To make matters worse the village's water delivery system was driven by an ageing single-stroke diesel-powered water pump which, at best, could only deliver 5 litres per minute through a single water tap. By 1986 it had begun to break down to the point that, during the nation-wide drought, it could take up to 4 hours to fill a 25 litre container. As a result the community had begun to lose some of its younger families. It was found that, as their elderly parents had begun to pass away, so then the children's links to the settlement had grown more tenuous. At the same time the prospects of better education and a higher quality of life in the city had also begun to override traditional family loyalties. At its height in 1980 KwaMsiza had been the home to some 49 families, but by 1994 this number had dropped by 20% and the village had begun to take on a run-down appearance. Few wall paintings were being maintained, and gaps had begun to appear in its architectural fabric as the homes of deceased family members were abandoned to the elements.

back to top