It is with great excitement that one has been accepted the honour to talk about one of the young, selfless and committed revolutionaries that have come to pass this life, Comrade Xola Nene whom I will later refer to as Xola Nene-Mophi.
He was a rare quality of a cadre produced by our movement, whose star, as a result of his age, started to shine in the mid to late 1990s. Those of us who came to know him remember him for his sharp intellect that had evolved organically through his involvement with bread and butter issues that affected his community in his home village in Peelton and the student community at large.
We remember him for his passion in everything he did. He loved brown bread and milk. He loved playing rugby and boxing. His love for physical activity earned him the nickname "Gangatha".
In his talk, he always displayed passion and conviction. We remember him for his militancy and an amazing ability to compromise without compromising his principles. We remember him for his singing and chanting. His leading in the singing of revolutionary songs had earned him the nickname "Mahlath'amnyama" as he had shown particular liking for the song "Kuloo mahlath'amnyama".
To be invited to give an account of Xola Nene is not just an honour, but a revolutionary privilege. It is indeed a responsibility that must be approached with the kind of zeal and commitment that Xola embodied during his life time. I intend not to deviate from what I and others know about Xola, and what we think Xola would have thought of the current political trajectory.
The working class child Xola was a humble offspring of that most potentially revolutionary class of our society, the working class. He was born and raised in Peelton near Bhisho, King William's Town.
His parents were and are still ordinary workers who with informal jobs but they were able to raise Xola and his siblings, Lami and Thembakazi, from meagre wages. Born out of wedlock and in keeping with custom Xola took up her biological mother's surname, Nene.
It had always been their parents' wish to change his surname to Mophi-Nene, Mophi being his father's surname since they had eventually united in matrimony. Growing up in the poverty stricken community of Peelton, Xola was able to link his dire conditions of life with the content of the struggles waged by his community in Peelton.
At a very young age he offered himself to the struggle to free his people from the racist system of apartheid and its attendant system of capitalist exploitation.
Talking about Xola during his funeral, the late Bro Steve Tshwete described Xola as a gallant, unflinching revolutionary who chose to risk his life in the trenches of struggle than to go play with cats at home. Bro Steve emphasised the point that the manner and the circumstances surrounding the assassination of Xola depicted a life of a fearless revolutionary that was committed until the last day of his life.
Crucially in this short depiction of Xola's early life is a political lesson that many of our young people ought to learn. That lesson is that Xola understood that his dire conditions of life were never going to be a spring board to a life of drugs, alcohol abuse and criminality.
He detested these things as anomalies that delayed the progression of the black child. That is why he chose the life of being a servant in the struggle to free his people from poverty, under-development, disease and the yoke of capitalist exploitation.
He chose to be with his people in the African National Congress (ANC) and its youth wing the ANC Youth League. These are the biggest political organisations that represent the aspirations and hopes of many South Africans.
The question is: What would have Xola thought of the state of these organisations today in relation to what he held dear to his heart, the liberation of the black people in general and Africans in particular from the life of poverty and want? I shall speak on this later.
The student activist as we noted earlier, the dire conditions under which Xola grew up never led him into a life that fundamentally contradicted the aspirations of his people.
He decided that his poor conditions of life were never going to deter him from attaining education. From being a high school student in the ranks of the Congress of South African Students (COSAS), he went on to register with the University of Fort Hare.
Fort Hare being the hub of political activities in the higher education institutions during the mid 1990s, Xola immediately made an impression on the many political activists of the time. He joined South African Students Congress (SASCO) without hesitation.
The likes of Andile Sihlahla, Mlungisi Lumka and Timothy Duka can attest to the fact that much as Xola was a young man with a small physic, his political prowess made him a giant in a very astounding manner.
He went on to lead SASCO and the Student Representative Council (SRC) at Fort Hare. Here he made such a huge impact in shaping student governance while ensuring that SASCO and the SRC were positioned in a way that ameliorated the conditions of poor students at Fort Hare.
His comrades at Fort Hare will always remember his small but very sharp and articulate voice as he addressed the intricacies and delicacies of student needs in the face of a very intransigent management of the time.
As a student activist who displayed such unwavering commitment, Xola's abilities were appreciated as he went on to lead the Provincial Executive Committee of SASCO as its Chairperson. He also made his impact felt in the national politics of SASCO both as an activist and an ex-officio member of the National Executive Committee of SASCO.
Xola had a passion for poor students because he himself was very poor. He knew that SASCOs existence on campus was first and foremost about students. He never sought to use SASCO as a ladder to enrich himself via the SRC.
He stood firm against those who used the SRC as a vehicle to be better off than other students. His poor background was never going to be a justification to be tempted to get rich quick. He detested and fought corruption with every sinew of his able body.
Understanding the dialectical and profound meaning behind the call that before we are students we are members of the society, Xola never ceased his community activism because he was now a student at the University of Fort Hare.
He was always there in the ANC and the ANCYL working tirelessly. He combined perfectly his responsibilities as a student and as a community activist because he believed that there was a fundamental and concrete interconnection between the two.
Xola was never a populist that only shouted at what government was doing or not doing. He saw himself as part of the problem and thus part of the solution. He understood that as a SASCO and ANC comrade, he had the responsibility to assist the government in many challenges it confronted. That never made him a lapdog critic of government.
That would have been impossible given his rare gift of intelligence and his robust but informed character. As a human being and a young person, Xola was not infallible. He had his own fair share of mischievous behaviour.
Those who were close to him will remember how he would humble himself if he was caught misbehaving. As an example, he loved sports very much, particularly rugby.
So, as SASCO was busy in a meeting discussing crucial matters of students, comrades would notice that Xola was not in the meeting because his contribution was missing.
As comrades went about looking for him, guess where Xola would be, in the pitch playing rugby with players much bigger than him. As comrades shouted and reprimanded him for missing the meeting, he would genuinely humble himself, apologising for such misbehaviour. That was the kind of a SASCO comrade that Xola was.
The alliance activist Xola was a strong believer in the relevance of the tripartite alliance with the ANC as the leader of that alliance. He understood the alliance as a political entity that was built out objective political conditions of our country.
He was convinced of the fact that, as a product of the suffering, sacrifices and struggles of our people, the alliance would stand the test of time.
He understood the alliance to be a tool in the hands of many of the poor and working people of our country to effect revolutionary changes in the conditions of the lives.
Xola was never a doomsayer when the alliance was going through a rough patch. As a member and activist in all these organisations that make up the alliance, Xola was able to grasp the theoretical connections between these organisations.
He always pondered the reason for the existence of the alliance, the forces that make up the alliance, the most revolutionary motive force in the alliance and the kind of society each force envisaged.
Xola was a consummate reader of political theory and everything that had to do with how we are governing the country. He was an ardent Marxist student. He was gifted in the Marxist-Leninist theory and never sought to use it as a dogma, but as a scientific and revolutionary theory in the disposal of the masses to change their lives for the better.
Contemporary political trajectory: Xola's would be views? In the light of monumental challenges faced by the liberation movement in today's political discourse, I have no doubt in my mind that Xola's contribution would have been immense.
As an optimist, Xola would never have left the ANC to join other organisations at the slightest sign of problems within the ANC. He would have stayed inside and advocate his views in support of the organisation fearlessly and robustly.
However, in the same vein, Xola would have thoroughly interrogated the reasons behind people leaving the ANC to go form or join other organisations. He would have used his skilful abilities to engage with those who seem to have fallen out of favour with the ANC rank and file.
He would not dismiss them as sell-outs before engaging and understanding their point of view. Xola would thoroughly engage the debate around the nationalisation of mines as a call by the ANCYL.
He would have delved much in the political sustainability of that call from the ANCYL as a particular kind of motive force within the broad motive forces in the liberation movement. The current relationship between the Congress of the South African Trade Unions (COSATU) and its Vanguard, the Communist Party, would have been his main preoccupation. He would be very concerned at the level of tensions that seem to be brewing between the two.
Overall, Xola would have been a revolutionary asset at the disposal of the masses in their struggles to deal with the legacy of apartheid and colonialism of a special type. I sincerely thank the South African Student Congress for its vision to recognise Comrade Xola Nene.
I thank you for having listened.
Source: Eastern Cape Provincial Government
Speech delivered by Eastern Cape Premier, Ms Noxolo Kiviet, on the occasion of Xola Nene annual memorial lecture
Province
