The Rural Women's Movement

THE RURAL WOMEN'S MOVEMENT HOLDING THE KNIFE O N THE SHARP EDGE by the Transvaal Rural Action Committee THE RURAL WOMEN'S MOVEMENT: HOLDING THE KNIFE ON THE SHARP SIDE This document was compiled by Lydia Kompe, Janet Small and Beauty Mkhize of the Transvaal Rural Action Committee (TRAC) for the National Land Committee. The material contained in the following pages comes from previously published material (eg. journal articles and newsletters) as well TRAC files of minutes, press cuttings and research interviews done during the course of our work since 1986. JANUARY 1994 PHOTOGRAPHS Page 2, 27, 29 and 30 by Elmond Jiyane, page 17 by Graham Romanes, page 3 from Black Sash Archives and page 22 by Gideon Mendel. All other photographs by Gille de Vlieg CONTENTS A Introduction..........................................................2 ▲ How it began .......................................................4 ▲ Our understanding of the conditions women live under .......................12 ▲ Approaches to organising .............................. 15 ▲ Regionally: Developing leadership and an organisational profile .......................18 ▲ Local level: Building structures, flexing muscles ......................................................21 Mogopa Moutse ▲ Coping with conflicts ..................................... 33 ▲ Conclusions .......................................................38 The Rural Women's Movement • 1 ▲ MamLydia Kompe (front right) with women from Moutse, September 1992 INTRODUCTION / / T he mother holds the knife on the sharp side," is the slogan of the Rural Women's Movement (RWM). It is a saying in the local language of seTswana and captures women's feelings about their lives. The Rural Women's Movement is a network of some 45 rural women's groups in the Northern provinces of South Africa. This publication tells gives the history of the Rural Women's Movement so far. We expect that it will have a long and proud future in the coming years. This account represents the story of the RWM in its first phase of life — from the old repressive regime through to the transition to democracy. The story of the Rural Women's Movement is intricately bound up with the Transvaal Rural Action Committee (TRAC), a non-governmental organisation working in rural areas. TRAC was established in 1983 by the Black Sash in response to the de mand from rural black communities for assistance to resist forced re- 2 • The Rural Women's Movement movals and incorporations into bantustans (government created racial homelands). Its role was defined as a rural service organisation which provides legal, advocacy and organisation-building support for the strug gle of communities against these policies. After a few years of work it had become apparent that the sector of the community most often directly affected was the women. And yet they were almost always excluded from meetings or deliberations about strategy and struggle. As a women's organisation, the Black Sash was al ready sensitive to the gender question, so when employing a new fieldworker in 1986, an ability to work with rural women was given consider ation. TRAC employed Lydia Kompe, herself a rural woman and trade unionist, as a fieldworker with a specific brief of targeting rural women. When I left the trade unions in 1986, my idea was that I want ed to be involved in organising rural women, and also as sisting rural people with their problems which I fou n d to be very neglected. I only left because I wanted to go back to my life and roots, to rural women. This is the work I most love. [Lydia Kompe, 1990] During the latter part of the eighties, TRAC work was dominated by the crises of trying to prevent removals and in corporations. MamLydia managed to work with women during this pe riod, though it often meant doing extra field trips to spend time with women's groups. She prioritised building women's groups to articulate women's voices in community forums. In the 1990s, with the reform era, some of the struggles over land have been transformed into questions about land claims and development. The early 1990s are a transition pe riod with some aspects of old style crisis work, such as anti-bantustan struggles, combined with challenges of fighting for a just land reform policy and the adequate development of rural areas. The Rural Women's Movement • 3 HOW IT BEGAN e brought the women together to build unity. All the women have the same kind of problems. For example, the women from W Brits and Huhudi are fighting against forced removal. The people of Majnkaneng, Braklaagte and Bloedfontein are fighting because they don't want their areas to become part o f the 'homeland'. [Lydia Kompe quoted in Learn and Teach, Dec 1986] In 1986, MamLydia brought rural women together for the first time. These women came from Braklaagte, Majakaneng, Kwa Ngema, Mogopa, Mathopestad, Oukasie, Huhudi, Bloedfontein and Driefontein and all were facing crises around forced removals and incorporations. MamLydia observes that the contact between the women had a major im pact on the progress of their organisation. It gave solidarity to them in a shared struggle, encouraged the formation of women's groups and brought hope of success of the struggle of the women and of the commu nity. We came to this meeting to talk about our problems as women. Since Friday night we have talked about many things. We talked about removals and self-help projects. We want to make and sell things so that we can use the money to help detainees in our area. We learnt from this meeting that if women are united, then there is nothing to stop us. [Ellen Khoza and Johanna Tele of Brits quoted in Learn and Teach] We have won our fight against the removals in Driefontein. We cam e to this meeting to help other women who are still having problems. We want them to know that women can fight their own strug gles and win. After the death of Mr Mkhize in ▲ MamLydia Kompe Driefontein, women took 4 • The Rural Women's Movement "WE, THE WOMEN SAY..." We, the women of Mothopestad, Huhudi, Brits, Broklaogte, Bloedfontein, Matjakeneng, Mogopa, Rooigrond, Driefontein and Kwa Ngema, gathered here at Mothopestad on 22 November 1986 soy: W e demand an end to all forced removals Our sisters from Brits are under doily threats from the bulldozers. Let them stay where they ore in peace. Oukasie has been their home for over half a century. They have a right to remain. We be lieve that oil communities under threat of removal have a right to remain. W e demand an end to the stealing of our citizenship Many of us, especially those from Bloedfontein, Broklaogte and Matjakaneng are in danger of losing our citizenship to Bophuthatswona. We are South Africans, we refuse to give up our citizenship. Mongope is a stranger to all of us. We want him to leave us and our land alone. We have seen the suffering of people in Bophuthatswona. We do not want to live in fear of that terrible place. W e demand help for all victims of forced removals We wept when we heard the terrible stories of how our sisters in Mogopa and Rooigrond hove suf fered. They have suffered the pain of forced removal. They were forced to leave their peaceful homes. Now they are so very poor, living as refugees and squatters. Let them go home now! Let them rebuild their homes and their lives. We demand the same for all victims of forced removals all over our country. We demand an end to detentions and for the police and vigilantes to leave us in peace Some of us have been detained, others have hod our children taken from us by the police. In Huhudi and Brits we have been attacked by the vigilantes. People have been killed and homes destroyed. We demand that we mothers be left to live in peace with our children. We wont this, not only for our selves, but for all South Africans. Lastly, some of us from Driefontein, Kwa Ngema and Mothopestad soy that we hove won our strug gles. Yet, this does not mean that we can now sit back. We connot live in peace until all communities, oil over the country, ore free from removal, free from losing their citizenship, free from detention, and free from the attacks of vigilantes ond police. We women pledge ourselves to stand together in unity with our communities and other communities who are struggling against forced removals and other evils. We will organise all of our women to do the same. In this way we believe we will move nearer to a free and equal South Africa. [LEARN AND TEACH] The Rural Women's Movement • 5 ▲ Beauty Mkhize over the fight and won. The only weapon we used was unity. [Driefontein women, Learn and Teach] The women drew up a resolution from this meeting (right). The reso lution made the following demands: • end all forced removals • end the stealing of our citizenship • help for all victims of forced removal • end detentions and the police and vigilantes must leave us in peace. These reflect the terrible conflicts that the communities were locked in at that time. The women, as the majority of permanent residents, were most deeply affected by these policies. In one section of the document, the women say: "We demand that we mothers be left in peace with our children. We want this, not only for ourselves, but for all South Africans." Their conclusion reflects their consciousness as women fighting for their lives, the welfare of their children and the survival of their commu nities. We cannot live in peace until all communities, all over the country, are free from removal, free from loosing their citizenship, free from detention, and free from the attacks of vigilantes and police.

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