Gamal Nkrumah peers into South Africa's grim past, comparing images depicting life in South Africa before and after apartheid Ten years after the demise of the apartheid system in South Africa the South African Embassy in Cairo, in conjunction with the Apartheid Museum in Johannesburg, South Africa, is staging an exhibition of photographs depicting the varied aspects of life both before and after apartheid. The exhibition, the first of its kind in Egypt, was hosted by the American University in Cairo. "The exhibition is intended to be an inspiration to the downtrodden," Happy Mahlangu, South Africa's ambassador to Egypt told Al-Ahram Weekly. South Africa is a country still haunted by its past, but it is also a multi-racial and multi- cultural "rainbow nation" that has perhaps the world's most progressive constitution precisely because of its tortured past. The images chosen for display in Cairo were occasionally muted, but nonetheless powerful. There was a ghostly quality about the black and white photographs depicting life under apartheid -- a positive sign, perhaps, in as much as it suggests how far away events of little more than a decade now seem. They are an eerie reminder of the bad old days, and the distance is perhaps made possible by the fact that the photographs on display avoid any of the more graphic expressions of torture, violence and repression under apartheid just as those photographs included from present day South Africa circumscribe contemporary problems. But the depictions of everyday life under apartheid remain powerful. The opening of the exhibition was attended by a great many distinguished Egyptian and foreign figures including Egypt's Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Faiza Abul-Naga and South Africa's Minister of Communications Ivy Matsepe Cassaburri. The black and white photographs, courtesy of the Apartheid Museum, voice the spirit of defiance, the sometimes quiet but always dignified protest. Black South Africans were not permitted to live in the same areas as whites. Pass laws were promulgated in order to make it illegal for blacks to loiter in areas designated for whites. Under apartheid laws blacks were not allowed to use the same public facilities, the same public toilets and transport systems, as whites. A particularly poignant photograph shows a smartly dressed white man coming out of a white public toilet and a shabbily clothed black man emerging from the blacks-only toilet. Such images, with hindsight, now articulate the absurdity of the apartheid system. Not so, though, when such a ridiculous system was actually operating. Sexual relations between whites and blacks were forbidden under the Immorality Act. A photograph showing a magistrate peering through a bedroom window to see if a white university professor and his Asian wife were having sex gives a new and farcical twist on the increasingly popular concept of the neighbourhood watch. The vintage black and white photographs contrast sharply with the cheerful, forward- looking colourful images of contemporary post-apartheid South Africa. In between are pictures tracing the groundswell of resistance to the apartheid system from its inception in the 1960s to the crowning of the anti- apartheid struggle in 1994. The glorious moments of triumph over the unjust system are celebrated in print. An especially moving photograph of Nelson Mandela taking his first steps of freedom as he walked out of the Victor Verster Prison takes pride of place. Mandela, fondly called Madiba by his people, raises his clenched right fist in the victory salute with his then wife Winnie. The photograph encapsulates the triumph of the moment. "Ten years is not a long time, certainly not in the history of a scarred and traumatised nation. The wounds of apartheid have not yet healed," Ambassador Mahlangu told the Weekly. "Our celebration is a notice of the transitory nature of injustice and the permanence and dynamism of peace, justice, equality and the dignity of humankind," Ambassador Mahlangu explained. As if to drive the point home, all the photographs documenting the various aspects of life under the apartheid system are black and white images. Photographs depicting the new post- apartheid South Africa are in vivid colour. "Nor have the dreams for which so many sacrificed so much been fully realised," the South African ambassador conceded. But he stressed that the new dispensation in South Africa is making "tremendous strides to redress the inequalities of the past". Mahlangu said that the wounds of apartheid have not yet healed. But he was upbeat, still. South Africa has come a long way, he explained. His country is a shining example offering hope to other long-oppressed nations. "We hope that our humble contribution will be an inspiration to all people labouring under the yoke of tyranny," he said. A photograph showing a smiling South African President Thabo Mbeki embracing a young South African boy is a strong symbol of the hope and of the yearning for a new and better world from which such hopes grow. The South African president lost his only son during the anti- apartheid struggle. "In many ways, the history and experience of South Africa is the heritage of the entire world," Mahlangu said. Mandela and Mbeki are not the only two anti-apartheid leaders on display. There is a photograph of Steve Biko, the charismatic leader of the Black Consciousness Movement. Biko insisted that black was beautiful and cultivated pride in being black. Biko's fiery presentation of his ideas ignited the youth of the black townships across South Africa in the 1970s. "When our parents accepted Bantu education they said, 'Half a loaf is better than nothing.' We were saying we don't want any half loaves. We either have a full loaf or nothing at all. That became our slogan," remembers Susan Shabangu, a student activist in the 1976 uprising and now a cabinet minister. A beautiful photograph of Shabangu, incidentally, graces the Ewart Hall. For full details of the exhibition, see Listings
