Destiny's Children
10 Years After The End Of Apartheid
JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA--At 23, Joy Methula is too young to fully remember the dark days of apartheid. Too young to remember her mother risking her life to demonstrate against oppression. Too young to recall her elder brother's treason trial and two-year prison stint for organizing student protests. "To me," she says with a shrug, "they sound like folk tales."
Methula is a "born free," part of the generation of 17 million post-liberation blacks who came of age after Nelson Mandela's release from prison in 1990 and inherited a free, though deeply troubled South Africa. Theirs is a South Africa where 1 in 10 blacks is malnourished, 1 in 4 black children are stunted, and 1 of every 2 blacks lives below the poverty line. Despite such statistics, theirs is also a nation where, for the first time, large numbers of young blacks are getting a good education, finding a good job, and joining the middle and upper classes.
Their journey from shantytowns, mud hovels, and modest brick homes to the suburbs demonstrates how far this country has come toward egalitarianism and nonracialism in a remarkably short time--and how much remains to be done. Their challenges arise from a legacy of 300 years of colonialism and four decades of apartheid that will continue to plague this nation for generations to come. And their aspirations show how young South Africans are breaking with past traditions and cultural norms to remake their country.
A new dawn. In his state of the nation address in February, South African President Thabo Mbeki painted a compelling portrait of the old South Africa, a land that as recently as 15 years ago seemed tragically destined for a race war. "Since time immemorial, the overwhelming majority of our people had known nothing but despair," he said. "They knew this as an incontestable matter of fact that tomorrow would not be better than yesterday; it was also . . . given that the following day would be worse. But then April 27, 1994, came and things changed radically . . . . Suddenly a new dawn broke."
The new dawn was the end of apartheid. Finally, blacks could vote, receive equal schooling, get good jobs, run businesses, and walk their country's streets with pride. Now, as the nation marks its 10th anniversary of freedom and equality, politicians like Mbeki are looking back, taking credit for averting a crisis as apartheid collapsed.
Young blacks, however, are looking forward. To them, the political struggle that so consumed their elder siblings and parents is ancient history. Now, they believe, is the time to enjoy the fruits of their elders' struggle. "Politics gave my brother and my mother a sense of purpose," said Methula, a law student at the University of the Witwatersrand, one of South Africa's top universities. "But for me, it is not interesting. If you get caught up in it, you lose yourself in the process. Now, everyone is looking out for themselves. . . . For me, money is the most important thing. You don't want to say it, but it is true."
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