Zakes Mda - The Heart of Redness

Xoliswa Ximiya stands unyieldingly next to him. If only his mates at Giggles could see him now, in the company of this model-type in all her clinical elegance!

He has tried to observe the patterns of believing and unbelieving at this village, to try to make sense of them. And they remain beyond his comprehension. He has talked with Bhonco at length. Unfortunately he has not had any opportunity to talk with Zim. Camagu concludes that these people select positions in such a way that they are never found to be on the same side on any issue. Even at the inkundla , where they are both councillors and counsellors at Chief Xikixa’s court, they are always at loggerheads.

“The Unbelievers stand for progress,” asserts Bhonco, to the assenting murmurs of his followers. He exudes graveness and anger as he punches the air with his fist. The whiff of friendliness that Camagu once observed on his furrowed face has flown with the reproof of the elders. “We want to get rid of this bush which is a sign of our uncivilized state. We want developers to come and build the gambling city that will bring money to this community. That will bring modernity to our lives, and will rid us of our redness.”

Xoliswa Ximiya is proud of her father’s position. If only he had asked NoPetticoat to press his suit. But even a wrinkled suit is better than no suit at all. Far better than beads and traditional isiXhosa costume, even though a rock-rabbit-skin bag hangs over the elder’s off-white shirt and twisted tie.

Zim stands up, looking regal in his traditional finery. He is smiling.

“This son of Ximiya talks of progress. Yet he wants to destroy the bush that has been here since the days of our forefathers. What kind of progress is that?” he asks. He is very deliberate in his manner and in his speech.

“What does the bush do for you?” shouts Bhonco. He has lost patience with the stupidity of the Believers. “The new developments will bring tourists. The new developments will create employment for us all. The new developments will bring people from all over the world. From America!”

His last point, thinks Camagu, comes from the elder’s daughter.

“Yes. Those people!” scoffs Zim. “Those so-called tourists! They come here to steal our lizards and our birds.”

“Who wants lizards, anyway?” asks Bhonco contemptuously. “Do you eat lizards, Zim? Why do you complain about lizards and birds? Does a grown man like you eat birds like a young shepherd? Like a herdboy in the veld?”

“They come to steal our aloes and our cycads and our usundu palms and our ikhamanga wild banana trees,” insists Zim.

Bhonco is exasperated. He has never heard such foolishness oozing from every pore of a man who is supposed to be an elder of the village. Will progress and civilization stall because of such madness? Yes, people have been caught smuggling cycads and reptiles out of Qolorha, which is the height of foolishness. Why arrest a man for taking wild things that belong to no one in particular? And they are ugly too, these lizards. And these plants are of no use at all to the people. They are good neither as wood nor as food. And when there is progress, who would need wood from the forest anyway?

“People will be using fire from electricity,” says Bhonco proudly, “like my daughter does in her house in the schoolyard where, as you know, she is the principal.”

Xoliswa Ximiya has recently bought two hot plates, since the school joined the Blue Flamingo Hotel and Vulindlela Trading Store as the only places in the village that have electricity drawn from Butterworth. Well, the only places if you exclude the holiday cottages, most of which are connected to electricity lines or have their own generators.

But she is not pleased when her father mentions her great achievement. That is why she did not want to come to this imbhizo in the first place. She knew that in the course of the quarrel between the feuding families, things would get personal. She heard what happened at the store during nkamnkam day when her name was thrown into the fray by her own father. Camagu prevailed on her to come, so she now finds herself being pierced by a hundred pairs of eyes while her utilization of electricity is bandied about so shamelessly. Camagu gives her a reassuring smile.

“When there is progress,” adds Bhonco, “there’ll even be streetlights.”

“Why should we fight about this?” asks Zim. “We are all descendants of the headless one.”

Trust Zim to use that trick. Whenever he gets stuck in a debate he resorts to sentimental appeals to their common ancestry. Yet he will continue to hold desperately to a bad argument, as if his very life depends on it.

It is as it should be, for as a Believer it would be sacrilege to be in harmony with any position taken by the Unbelievers. Camagu suspects that even if a miracle were to happen, and Bhonco were to change his position and denounce the developers, Zim would suddenly do an about-face and support the developers.

“When it suits you we are all descendants of the headless one,” sneers Bhonco. “But when you laugh at my misfortunes, such as my not getting nkamnkam from the government even though I am an aged one, you forget that we are both of the headless one. Or when you want to destroy the people by standing in the way of progress. You are a wily one, Zim. You are just waiting to stab me in the back in the same way that your fathers stabbed my fathers. In the same way that your fathers led this nation to destruction by following the teachings of Nongqawuse.”

Zim resorts to ridiculing Bhonco. He laughs mockingly. His followers join the mirth. No one knows what they are laughing at. Bhonco is livid.

“This man who believes in progress—”

But even before Zim can complete his words Bhonco points his stick at him with indignation. “I do not believe in progress,” he shouts in a pained voice. “I am an Unbeliever. None of us Unbelievers believe! We stand for progress!”

“Okay, he stands for progress,” says Zim graciously. “Yet he hasn’t progressed from the old-style rondavel to the modern hexagon. Some of us have hexagons aplenty in our compounds. He has a single pink rondavel. What kind of progress is that?”

It is a cowardly thing to laugh at a man for his possessions or lack of them, mumble the people as they go their different directions. It is clear that Zim has run out of reasoning. If Chief Xikixa and his development committees had any balls at all, they would certainly follow Bhonco’s way. They would make a ruling once and for all that the development work should begin.

“Chiefs cannot just issue orders,” the history teacher from the secondary school says, trying to calm Bhonco as he walks with him towards his homestead. “That is what democracy is all about. Citizens must first debate these matters. There must be consensus before a decision is taken.”

“Such are the ills of democracy!” remarks Bhonco.

“But it was like that even in the days of our forefathers,” says the teacher. “Chiefs never made decisions unilaterally. That is why they had councillors who would go out to get the views of the people first. That is why they held imbhizos which all the men were obliged to attend. Things were spoiled during the Middle Generations when the white man imposed a new system on us, and created his own petty chiefs who became little despots on behalf of their masters.”

“Get away from me, small boy! Who invited you to walk with me?” shouts Bhonco. “Who are you to teach me how things were done in the days of our forefathers?”

The impertinent teacher withdraws. He sees Xoliswa Ximiya and Camagu walking away together, and rushes to join them. It is clear that the headmistress too finds his presence irritating. But Camagu welcomes him and wants to find out where he stands in this great debate.