Firstly I think it is basically my background, how I grew up. I come from a large family. I lost my father when I was very young. I don’t even know him properly. I just know the shadow of him. I therefore grew up in a kind of a collective handling by elderly people. Also because my mother had to go and be a domestic worker and could not stay with me all the time, I was handled by different mothers. All this and more made me appreciate Ubuntu, a culture of respect, which I was taught very strongly. Up to today you would never hear me losing respect, even when there is political debate, I don’t. And I believe even when you disagree with a person you still have to give that person respect, whether old or young people. I think this, to me, was a critical element that moulded me into what I am.
The speaker is Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma, president of South Africa. He is being interviewed by Elias Mnyadu and Adriaan Groenewald. (The full interview can found here: http://www.iol.co.za/business/business-news/q-a-with-zuma-1.1137856). The question put to him was, "what do you consider to have best prepared you to fulfil the task (of CEO of South Africa)"?
With my interest in question of boys and men, how we raise boys and how we father, I was naturally struck by his answer. The first thing that got hold of my attention is how he starts with his family circumstances, in particular the loss of his father when he was very young, as well as being raised by different mothers and elderly people. Not his experience as a worker, trade unionist and leader in the liberation movement in South Africa. He mentions these other shaping influences, but he appears to give primacy to his family circumstances.
The second is his choice of words. He talks about being handled - "collective handling by elderly people" and "handled by different mothers". Perhaps this is a metaphorical rendering of the Zulu word, "ukuphathwa", and nothing more should be made of it.
However, I want to think that Zuma, a master of the Zulu language, could have chosen other words. He could have spoken about being raised - ukukhuliswa - or gone on and used 'grow' that he mentions at the beginning.
I suspect that he used "handle" because wanted to communicate something more, in his own subtle way. That something more is being fathered and having your mother home every night. It is about presence. About a steadfast and intimate support that all children should take for granted. Zuma wanted to tell about the difficulties of a black boy growing up in a disrupted family life during apartheid. Not in so many words, he says, being without a father and my mother being away at the kitchens, I had to be strong, although I still got to learn about admirable stuff connectedness to others and respect.
The young Jacob must have been 6 when the apartheid governent came to power. Like many a black family in the 1940s, his must have felt the full effects of an enthusiatic white patrirachal supremacist government. Without a father, and with a mother trying to make ends meet, he couldn't have had adequate warmth and intimacy of present and close family.
As all the presidents of democratic South Africa have to differing degrees shown, one can reach as high as possible in one's career without having grown up with stable family environment. Mandela, Mbeki and Zuma, are examples of what men can do against the greatest of odds, when an oppressor denies a people's very humanity. It's called resilience.
However this growing up without constant and warm support of one's parents is not an ideal situation. Resilience is fine, but the warmth of a parent's bosom is irreplaceable. There is no doubt in my mind that it is better for a child's well-being to have a fully present father and mother, not just grandparents, aunts and uncles, if that child is to know what love and happiness means. This in no way privileges nuclear family or biological parents. Quite the contrary, it says the more family connection there is, starting from mother and father, whether adoptive or biological, the less harsh life is and the better outcomes for one's life.
One can't but wonder then what kind of man President Zuma would have become if his father had been more than just a shadow and his mother had been a professional woman. What great society will we be able to create if we manage to put black family life together. If we have been able to achieve so much with so little, to have a president who never went beyond primary school because he didn't enjoy the kind of family support and receive the education many others took for granted, how amazing will we be if we can fix black families and increase the love.
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