The Day I wept for my Country

(source: Twitter)

Last night my heart wept.

We all knew it was coming. We were warned about it weeks ago. Newspapers reported on it. Radio anchors talked about it. Political analysts also came into the fray, and they all braced us. Unless a miracle happened, it was going to go down!!

Oh and our elected public representatives also told us it was going to happen. They were all determined that it would happen. Both sides publicly boasted about how prepared they were for each other. Weapons, on both sides, and in whatever form, were sharpened.

And it was all going to happen in the most sacred place of our democratic nation – the parliament chambers of the Republic. We were warned.

But nothing could have prepared me for this. Never did I think it would have such a huge impact on me like it did.

Like most South Africans, I dreaded this horrible day, but I wanted to see it for myself. I wanted to witness what had become of the nation I, and many others, naively thought we were. Yes. We thought we were the mighty South Africa. South Africa, the sovereign and African powerhouse who has for some time fashioned herself as a beacon of hope for Africa. The paragon of democracy in Africa.

So I took out my tablet and smartphone and searched for an internet signal. But YouTube wasn't working. I started growing anxious. I then went to the news networks I thought would carry live streaming to this dreaded event. The first two disappointed me. Finally, I found one news network whose link was working. I let out a huge sigh of relief.

I sat in my living quarters where I work, in a foreign country,  4000 kilometers away from Cape Town, and I was conflicted between whether I wanted to be home, sitting with loved ones to witness this thing that we have been agonizing over for weeks, or whether it was better that I was far away from the bloodbath that would be. I still don’t know which one was better.

I caught the broadcast just as the deputy president and his wife were greeting a line-up of some important people whose faces I could not make out because of the blurry picture - the signal was too poor.

Finally, there emerged the huge white vehicle ferrying the president and one of his wives. The link got cut-off. Again. My heart sank.

I quickly walked outside with both my cell phone and tablet in hand, hoping that the signal outside would be better. At this stage I was using both devices to see which one would give me a better “seat”, to watch the mayhem that was about to unfold.

Someone, a fellow South African with whom I work in the DRC, walked past me as I was standing in the dark trying to reconnect the link. “Apparently there’s drama in parliament” he said excitedly, trying to strike a conversation, I think. I responded with a cool “ja”, and with that, we ended our exchange. I wasn't there. My heart was home, in Cape Town, in South Africa.

The internet link was not getting any better. But there he appears, I see him, the president, walking toward the podium where he will stand solemnly as our national anthem is being sung, wherein we ask God to bless our continent, and our nation.

The link gets cut-off, yet again. This time i'm ready to throw this thing against the wall. Both of them.

But I restrain myself. I give up standing in the dark hoping for a better internet connection. I walk back to my room. I will catch whatever signal I can get from there.

But the link is still not cooperating. But as I sit and watch, images of an elderly praise-singer trickle in. She is praising, as is tradition, the president of the country. We get cut off again. They are now all in the House. Fellow South Africans are cheering as the praise-singer does her thing.

Again, the link goes.

But when it comes back, the praise-singing is done. We are ready. But wait, there is a problem. Apparently the cell phone signal in the parliamentary chamber has been scrambled. An opposition party member has stood up to raise a point of order or so such, to the Speaker of the House, about this jammed cellphone  connection. It appears whoever has power, does not want the people in the House to transmit any feed from inside. Yup. 

But after repetitive objections to and fro about whether to continue with the business of the evening while the matter is being investigated, the Speaker reluctantly accedes to adjourn the proceedings until the signal has been returned. And that was just the beginning of the mayhem. 

My signal lets me down yet again. I'm almost getting used to it at this point.

But the next time I am reconnected, the president is on that podium, finally addressing our nation. But not before he salutes all the dignitaries that he has invited to his address.

At this point, my anxiety levels are sky-high. When is it going to happen? Who's going to "fire" the first shot? I am sure every South African, throughout the country and abroad was nervously waiting for that moment. But not the president. If he was nervous, the president didn't show it. Earlier on in the week he had told journalists gathered at his presidential residence that he has never been nervous in his life. Looking at him, I was starting to believe him. He appeared to be a man without a nervous bone in his entire body.

And just then, at a very key moment when the president was noting that the year 2015 marks 60 years after South Africans from all walks of life adopted the all-important and famous “Freedom Charter”, the sounds come in from the floor, a tapping on the microphone, interrupting the president. The voice speaking sounds familiar. We've heard it many times before in the last year. And so does the accented line: “Eh Madame Speaker? Madame Speaker? Madame Speaker, I rise on a point of question of privilege”. Bang. Shot fired.

And as they say, it all went downhill from there.

South Africa, and the world (the few or many that are still interested in our story) watched as the South African parliament turned upside down. At this point, I had decided to rather listen to the broadcast via internet radio as that was far better.

Over the radio, I listened, and my heart just got stabbed with each word that was uttered. I heard some jeering which was met with opposing cheering from the other side of the House. Of course I knew which side was jeering. And I also knew which side was cheering. But I still couldn't understand why. I still don’t. How did things get so bad?

Voices reverberated in my ears as I listened to my elected leaders squaring up against each other. Some of the voices I knew very well. The familiarity of those voices stirred something in me. But so did the president’s silence.

Just then, the Speaker of the House made that “fatal” call. She summoned all sorts of security detail, in their different ranks, to come in and chuck out members of parliament of an opposition party. Of course no-one died, so the term fatal may be a little bit misleading. But that call certainly wounded something in me.

Mayhem ensued. Scuffling. Shouting. Cheering. Hurling of words. Clapping of hands. More shouting. I closed my eyes. "Was this happening to and in my country? Is this the South Africa I so proudly called home? Is this who we had all become? When did we stop actually talking and listening to each other? When did it become about who can make the loudest noise and jeer?" This was too hard to swallow.

I texted a friend  who had asked to be updated on what was happening. But that too was difficult.

After the dust had settled, after the jostling, shoving (and beating, apparently), the president stood and simply continued from where he had left off. He wasn't moved by what had just happened.

I was confused. How does he do that? How can he pretend nothing happened? How can he carry on with his prepared speech like nothing had just happened in that sacred chamber? How could he go on like we had not been wounded? How can the president be so oblivious to our pain, to our wounds and our tears? How can he turn a deaf ear to our wailing?

Our hearts were stabbed. It was as though death had paid us a dreadful and unwanted visit. But the president was not moved.

I wanted him to share in my pain, to commiserate in my wailing. "Not today, I've got a speech to give", his oblivion seemed to be saying.

I listened to his entire speech, hoping. Hoping that in there, in his speech, lay a miracle, that he was going to wave a magic wand that would simply scratch off what had happened earlier. Something, anything, that would take it all away.

But the president simply continued, without a scratch. Meanwhile the nation was bleeding. But not the president. He was unscathed. Saying nothing about the earlier events. 

He giggled here and there, made a joke about this and that. And his comrades, my leaders, cheered and spurred him on. They clapped for him. But he said nothing about my pain.

When security forces came in to drag out members of the opposition party, my president was seen laughing. What a sad day.

How I wished the president had spoken to my bleeding heart. How I wish he hadn't laughed. But he did, while we were crying.

Last night, my heart bled, and it cried for my beloved country.

(Greg Nicolson)