Remarks by the Honourable Minister in the Presidency of the Republic of South Africa, His Excellency, Mr JT Radebe on the occasion of the Centenary Commemoration of the sinking of the SS Mendi
Her Royal Highness, the Princess Royal;
Lord Mayors;
High Commissioner of South Africa to the United Kingdom;
Chief of the South African Navy;
Senior Officers, Non-Commissioned Officers;
Distinguished Guests and members of the Diplomatic Corps;
Family members of the South African Native Labour Corps and fallen soldiers of the SS Mendi;
Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is a great but humble honour to be with you on this historic day, where we commemorate those South Africans who sacrificed their lives when the SS Mendi tragically sank one hundred years ago. Most importantly, we are here to honour and memorialize all South Africans who perished so far away from their homes and loved ones.
Before I proceed, I would like to apologize for our President who would have loved to be part of the centenary commemorations. During his State of the Nations Address he, in his capacity as Commander-in-Chief of the South African National Defence Force, proclaimed tomorrow, the 21st of February 2017, a South African Armed Forces Day. He will officiate at the 6th segment of the day where he will take the salute of the National and SANDF fly-past as well as the marching and mechanised columns of the SANDF elements.
On the 16th of January 1917, the SS Mendi troopship sailed from Cape Town en-route to Le Havre in France, carrying the last contingent of the South African Native Labour Corps, comprising eight hundred and five African privates, five white officers, seventeen non-commissioned officers and thirty three crew members. On the fateful morning of 21 February, in the icy waters off Southampton another ship, the SS Darro, collided with the SS Mendi which went down within 20 minutes.
Of the full complement, only four were washed ashore in the Netherlands, one is interred in Hastings, one in France and in this Hollybrook cemetery. This means 960 of those who set sail from Cape Town have not been accounted for. We should always be comforted by the fact that all of them never feared death. In the epic novel about Napoleon Bonaparte’s attack to Russia in 1812, Leo Tolstoy acknowledged this lack of fear when he said:
“Man cannot possess anything as long as he fears death. But to him who does not fear it, everything belongs.”
Today, pride and honour belong to their fellow sailors, to the families and to our two nations because these men of the SS Mendi deliberately chose not to fear death.
The SANLC was no rag tag collection of adventurers. They were brave young men who had responded to a call by the African political leadership of the time to voluntarily heed the call to serve. They were sons of brave fathers who had taken part in wars of resistance. They had been specifically recruited to learn and gain experience on how wars were fought in other parts of the world.
Honoured Guests;
While Reverend Isaac Wauchope Dyobha’s words of encouragement to the dying men will capture the last twenty minutes of their lives, it was the fact that they left the shores of our continent to fight in a war that had less to do with their own material conditions at home. They joined to help a global community as brothers in arms to make the world safe for all its people. They temporarily suspended all their demands for equality so that the human race could be saved from itself.
Imbued by the same spirit that had driven the SS Mendi volunteers, another contingent was dispatched to take part in the Second World War. The end of this war, like the war that preceded it, did not give joy to African political aspirations. On the contrary, the end of the War emboldened the then South African Government which was already discriminatory against its African citizens to codify laws which gave legal and constitutional legitimacy to oppress them even further.
With the requirement that they not be armed even with their rudimentary assegais, the only weapon at their disposal to face their imminent deaths was to drill the death drill. They did the drill because they knew even before they left the African shores, that death is a moral hazard of a soldier’s profession. An African idiom captures this well when, loosely translated, it says the grave of the soldier is along the path he walks.
Honoured Guests;
The event was indeed a tragic one, but humanity teaches us that we should be able to draw lessons even from our worst human experiences. In 1917 when the South African Native Labour Contingent was drafted, they were given the menial task of providing logistical support. Today no army in the world can claim to be one without an up-to-date logistical system. Logistics has become one of those competencies which armed formations have bequeathed to the excellence of business and commerce such that human existence has become an inevitable appendage to it. It is thanks to these men whose lives we commemorate today that they were among pathfinders in this field of logistics.
The second lesson to draw relates to war and war making itself. As humanity we should continue to preach peace and dialogue as the only method to ensure that we avoid the path of an eye for an eye which makes the world blind. Rattling sabres and beating war drums have always yielded to the basic tenets of human decency. While the inevitability of war has always been part of human existence, even to the most prepared soldier, the preference is to avoid conflicts. The Chinese General, Sun Tzu gives wise counsel when he states:
“The best victory is when the opponent surrenders on his own accord before there are any actual hostilities…It is best to win without fighting.”
Beyond this centenary commemoration, we seek to broaden our two countries’ bilateral trade. There is much trade and investment to be explored so as to surpass the estimated volumes of approximately R772-billion for the period 2014-2015. Apart from being the gateway to continental markets we seek to remain the largest supplier of African Foreign Direct Investment to the United Kingdom. We have to maintain and improve our tourism products so that the United Kingdom remains the key source of long haul tourism to South Africa. These, and other issues will be subject of discussion when, as I have been told, our Minister of Trade and Industry meets your International Trade Minister three days from today.
Honoured Guests,
As a relatively new democracy, we have embraced the lessons of our past so as to inform our present and help us to determine our future. As part of acknowledging this past, in July 2016, our President presided over the Centenary Commemoration of the Battle of Delville Wood in France. On that occasion, the President unveiled a memorial wall bearing the engraved names of all South African Forces who fell during the WWI, to ensure that the historical role played by South Africans of all races in the First and Second World Wars is awarded the necessary recognition. The President also unveiled the newly created Garden of Remembrance for those who fell but whose remains were never recovered.
In addition, a permanent exhibit within the Delville Wood Museum is being installed. Care has been taken that the new murals in the Museum also depict the involvement of the South African Native Labour Corps in the Great Wars, as well as the Sinking of the SS Mendi.
Our presence here today to commemorate the fallen soldiers of the SS Mendi, as well as the transformation of the Delville Wood Memorial, represent a powerful message of reconciliation and provide some redress that will further consolidate the diversity of our South African nation.
Honoured guests,
I would be remiss of us if we did not pay tribute, which I now do, to the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of the brave soldiers of the SS Mendi who have graced this occasion today. I am pained that for some of them never got an opportunity which is respected in the African tradition of being able to “bury the bone” of your next of kin. This was occasioned by the fact that the choppy sea of Southampton decided to keep their bodies of our heroes to itself. As we lament their foregoing of this critical African ritual, they have nevertheless acknowledged that the complexities of war lend themselves to such unintended outcomes. By coming to this commemoration, they have displayed a bravery that can only be matched by the one showed by their forebears.
1917 was another war in another setting. The greatest leveller to soothe these families of the SS Mendi would be not to ask for the impossible. I am of the view that the families would be consoled by military historians appropriately finding space within the annals of history to balance the achievements and sacrifices of all those who lost their lives for us to enjoy the lives enjoy today.
It is with this in mind that we should congratulate the schoolchildren of Wellow Primary School who have already embarked on this journey to correctly reflect on the history of the SS Mendi. There are many other themes and sub-themes to pursue and get deeper insight into what took place on that day. We rely on academics, historians and researchers to bring more light on the subject of the sinking of the Mendi and why this story of bravery was hidden for such a long time.
Our country also appreciates the role of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission under the stewardship of the Right Honourable Michael Fallon. We wish to keep the relationship mutually beneficial for a long time to come.
Let me take the opportunity to thank the naval authorities and officers who have made today’s commemoration possible. Your colleagues perished a century ago, but this cooperation at naval level makes a solid case for all the preparations and efforts that have been put into the preparations for this event.
In conclusion, allow me to use the translated words of the celebrated Xhosa poet S.E.K. Mqhayi on his take of the sinking of the SS Mendi.
“Be consoled, all you orphans!
Be consoled, all you young widows! Somebody has to die, so that something can be built;
Somebody has to serve, so that others can live;
With these words we say: be consoled,
This is how we build ourselves, as ourselves.
Remember the saying of the old people:
“Nothing comes down, without coming down.””
Ladies and Gentlemen, let us bow our heads and have a moment of silence for our fallen heroes.
I thank you.
