“Are you free or are you dom?” The joke resonating from an already infamous cellphone advertisement is all that I can remember of 27 April 2009. This year my perspective changes as I realise that Freedom Day is more than just an advertising gimmick.
This year, Eugene Terre’Blanche was murdered. Before that Julius Malema sang a song about killing the boere.
“Are you free or are you dom?” The joke resonating from an already infamous cellphone advertisement is all that I can remember of 27 April 2009. This year my perspective changes as I realise that Freedom Day is more than just an advertising gimmick.
This year, Eugene Terre’Blanche was murdered. Before that Julius Malema sang a song about killing the boere.
Before that so much happened in the politically charged South Africa that I stopped caring. Yes, I cut myself off from anything political in South Africa, laughed along whenever someone told a Julius joke and simply shook my head in disbelief when I saw Samwu member littering our streets with their complaints.
The reality is that on 27 April 1994, I was too young to remember what that man was doing on TV when he put a neatly folded piece of paper into a box.
I never understood the magnitude of that gesture. I only understood that it was very rewarding to have a day off each year since that man put his neatly folded origami into the box.
For some in South Africa, especially me, these public holidays have lost their significance. Freedom Day simply means that you can sleep a little later than other days. And if we are lucky and it falls on a Friday then we all know it’s long weekend time.
Where did it all go wrong? Where did I lose that sense of pride in my country that I can not recall what happened on a certain public holiday a certain number of years ago?
After heavy introspection I diagnosed myself with a case of desensitisation. With symptoms ranging from lack of interest in political leaders’ good deeds, but increased interest in their bad deeds, to a slight case of greener-pastures-disease (the one that gives you the desire to want to leave the country).
Referring back to the joke about “are you free or are you dom?”, how did it happen that an act as great as Mandela putting his vote into a ballot box has become nothing but another means to create humour?
With all the politically crazy occurances in our country it is no wonder some of us have succumbed to the desensitisation disease. Faith in this rainbow nation has faded along with all its rainbow colours.
In the words of Nelson Mandela: “Never, never and never again shall it be that this beautiful land will again experience the oppression of one by another.” With this reassurance we can be sure that apartheid will never happen again.
But while we are assured of this we should not forget that it took time, tears and many lives to bring this country to where it is today.
Instead of desensitising myself from this country and its political affairs I should be embracing all seven colours of its rainbow, even if they fade at times.
I should be loving every one of the 11 official langauges and I should speak with pride of its nine provinces. For after Freedom Day 2010 has come and gone, I will still be free because of all those that made it possible for that man and myself to put our folded pieces of paper into a box.
