Bernice Rubens

In the left-hand pocket of Southern Africa lies Lesotho. Formerly named Basutoland, it is a very poor country with a low rating in the developing world. In 1966, the  British withdrew their Protectorate and left the small country to its uneasy independence. The Basutos cast a bewildered glance at their now exposed terrain, its rampant  erosion, its overpopulation, its crippling unemployment, and most of all, at its unpalatable geography.

Surrounded on all sides by South Africa, Lesotho is a grace and favour country. Its only industry is the production of mohair and wool. In a land of such few resources, unemployment is high, and migrant labour is a sad but steady source of the country's income. Half of its male population works in South Africa: some in factories, but most in the gold mines of the Transvaal and the Orange Free State.

Behind them they leave a community of gold widows who battle to rear their children alone, to look after their fields, and , in a context of debilitating poverty, simply to survive. Their mothers and their grandmothers did the same. The woman alone in Lesotho has inherited a genetic condition of enforced rejection. She is lamed but not immobilised. She learns to live with the scars of a bequeathed wound, but a wound it is all the same. South Africa is the only country in the world that forbids the migrant labourer his family.

Mamodulela

The capital of Lesotho is Maseru. Rantokos is a suburb, sprawling on the fringe. Its habitation is partially underground, but when it surfaces and shows its sullen face, it is in the form of prisonlike compounds that contain the sheer violence of poverty. Mamodulela Senoea lives in such a compound and she is a long, long way from home. She was born 34 years ago in the village of Semonkong some 60 miles from Maseru.. .

Mamodulela's husband went three times to the mines, sending her nothing during his absences, but on each return, he left her with a child. For four years, she heard nothing from him, so she returned with her children to her mother's house, and hoed other people's crops for livelihood. In the market-place, she heard talk of Maseru, a city paved with gold, and she saved her hoeing earnings to fly there. She left her children behind with promises to send money for their education. The promises of a mother, not a husband, for Mamodulela was determined to break the migrant chain.

One look at Maseru proved that it was not paved with gold. Indeed it was hardly paved at all. So she tramped its unmade roads looking for work. She managed to get a domestic job, but the technology appalled her. She was thrown into confusion by a tin-opener, and soon she was out on the streets once more. She got a job as an assistant in a shebeen, but the shebeen queen exploited her, and expected her to perform duties beyond the simple serving of illicit beer. Back on the streets, she met a man to whom she told her story. He gave her f. 1.25 to start a shebeen of her own..

Mamodulela's room is a cell eight foot square. Yet within these confines she has managed, neatly and spotlessly, to apportion the separate compartments of her living. One wall is taken up by a single bed, covered with a counterpane of pink and flowered foam. Alongside the bed hangs her entire wardrobe, secondhand clothes bought at church bazaars. Her business activities consume another wall: the crates of beer, the glasses, and a small tin for her takings. Opposite is her domestic table, her paraffin stove, her pot for mealies, a jar of cocoa, a bar of soap.. .

Today is Friday and a busy day for the shebeens. "The white man comes back from the mines on a Friday." Mamoduleia says; in her language "white" means rich, and has nothing to do with colour. "Sometimes I worry that my husband will track me down. But he hasn't paid off my lobola, so at least he cannot take my children. In any case I have enough money for them now. Every week I send money back to my village. I can do without a man," she says, and then falls silent, hearing in her words the echo of a timid rebellion.

"We women can work together" she whispers, "because we are people in our own right. We must protect our children. That's the most important thing. If you can't hoe crops,you must sell beer. And if you can't sell beer, you've got to sell your body. Women are losers, I know, but I won't be beaten. We must bear our lot with pride and dignity". . . 

Matsolo 

Seventy-five per cent of all agricultural labour in Lesotho is done by women. If they are lucky, their husbands will have planted the corn before leaving for the mines. It is the women's job to tend the fields and to harvest. Matsolo Majoro hoes her small field of maize. On her back she carries Lebohang, 18 months old, the child of her husband's last mine-sortie. She fears yet another in her belly. Malefa, her four-year-old daughter, sleeps under a tree.Tsolo, her six-year- old son, is herding goats over the hill. Three children, perhaps four, each one a testimony of mine-departure.

" I miss him." she says. " I don't know why. He doesn't send money very often. But I'm lonely. I wish he didn't have to go. And when he comes home. I'm frightened. I'm shy, it's been so long...Sometimes I wish he'd never come back, and just that he'd send me money."

She hoes until the sun is noon-high. Malefa wakes with thirst. They trek back to the hut for water. No lunchtime punctuates their day. The time is told in the small and separate manoeuvres of a losing battle. The pig, that bonus from her husband's first mine sortie, must be fed. Then the three chickens, a spin-off from his second return. There is the mealie-meal supper to re-heat, and the homemade beer to brew..5he gives the children their supper, mealie-meal, with a few cabbage leaves.

"Tsolo will go to the mines like his father," she says."And Malefa will be like me. Waiting. I hope she never marries. It's better to be educated. To be a nurse, or a doctor even. But her father will want her bride-price. It's not fair. If you're a woman, you're trapped, you see."

Mamokhali

...Mamokhali Setabataba, 30 years old, three children, mining husband absent seven years. No maintenance. A story like thousands of others. Since her marriage she has been on the receiving end of neglect and humiliation. But sometimes the worm will turn, and when it does, it is with an outraged and splendid resistance.

Mamokhali lives in a small compound of huts with her parents-in-law and their children. Two of her own children are illegitimate, and it is her responsibility to support them all. In the whole compound, she is the single source of income. The family maize field was too small to yield a profitable crop. They were all hungry, unclothed, and the children without hope of schooling.

Her own mother had been in the same situation. After his second sortie, her father had never returned. Her mother took to making straw hats and selling them by the roadside. It was a skill that Mamokhali had inherited, and though she baulked at the idea of repeating a pattern, she set up a stand on the main road outside the village, and sold her straw wares. Customers were infrequent, and with a bargaining talent too powerful for her hunger. Some of them whispered amongst themselves, comparing her paltry prices to those of the Basuto Hat boutique in Maseru. She eavesdropped with profit. She took a bus to the capital with as many hats as she could carry.

In turn they were impressed by her handicraft, and offered to buy as many as she could make...She returned to the village and went into business. Other women called on her and watched and envied her industry. She took to teaching them the craft, and many of them discovered a hidden untapped talent.

They gave her their goods to market for them and clubbed together and paid her fare to Maseru, with a little extra for food on the way. One day on the bus, encumbered with craft and fearful of robbery on the way home, it occurred to Mamokhali that there was enough handiwork in the village to merit collection. This idea she put to the boutique. They were willing to give it a try .

She returned to her village and gathered the women together. There and then, she formed a Union. In economic and social terms she had no notion of what she was doing, but in her small quiet way, and unawares, she was starting a revolution.

News of Mamokhali's enterprises spread along the mealie-steak and other villagers followed suit. Now on a Wednesday, the Basuto Hat lorry is a common sight in the area, threading its way through the village tracks, collecting straw and dyes for the women's supplies, and very much on to a good thing — the result of the strength of will of one woman who'd decided she'd had enough.

Her hut has become a depot. All materials are kept there, and all goods ready for collection. There is a constant stream of women in and out of her hut, delivering their crafts and seeking her advice on design and technique. " I'm the treasurer of the Union , " she says, "and we're making a profit . Some of the women have opened savings accounts, and have enough money now for our food and clothing . All our children go to school. Other women could do the same as   us. You've just got to pull yourself together.

"When my husband left me, it was a blessing in disguise. I realise that now. Men aren't so important because women can earn money, too. And there are lots of other things if you work together. Women make good friends. We laugh a lot together, because we're all in the same boat. It takes the edge off our loneliness. That's the worst of it. I wish sometimes I had a lover. We all do. It's not right for a woman to live without lovemaking."

It's a Wednesday, and the collecting van has just left. Mamokhali's hut seems strangely empty. One child sleeps on  the floor. Behind her a pile of suitcases is all that remains of her marriage. His clothes and his chattels, which spell too much risk to collect. " If he ever came back" she says, "I wouldn't know what to do with him. In any case, he would be jealous of my earnings. It's funny , isn't it , but if you're a woman in Lesotho, you just can't win . 

Excerpted from The Observer Magazine, London, 11 June 1978. 

Reprinted with permission of The Observer Magazine

( c ) copyright 1978, The Observer Limited.

how the system works

In her book For Their Triumphs and For Their Tears, Hilda Bernstein cites these examples of how women are forced apart from their families.

 A. Mr. and Mrs. M. and their three children are typical of those forced apart. Although they each had a permit, the husband was working in Alexandra and the wife in Johannesburg, so they are not permitted to seek joint accommodation in another township. As he had not lived in Alexandra for 15 continuous years he does not qualify for a house. The husband is awaiting allocation of a bed in a hostel, the wife has been told to go to a hostel and that the children must be sent away. Where? To the homeland that is no homeland for they have never known it... to grandparents now dead... to strangers somewhere who might let them live in their own barren huts, if the parents can send sufficient money... anywhere. Away. (Black Sash, Feb.1973)

B. Mrs. Nxumalo was born in Alexandra and lived there all her life, and so have her children, who have birth certificates. But a few years ago she divorced her husband and moved to a new address, in her brother's house — but she was not enumerated on his housing permit. With some difficulty she obtained a new permit to live in Alexandra but it was made out on a single basis for the duration of her employment only. It excluded her children . She has been t o l d she must move into a hostel and that she should send her children to the homelands. {Black Sash, Feb. 1974)

C. Mrs. Opsie has no husband and lives with her only son, who is 16. She has been told to go to a woman's hostel and to put her son in a men's hostel. (Black Sash, Feb. 1974.

D. African women hired as servants in towns near Johannesburg are being made to sign away their children for as long as they work for whites. They have to pledge that they understand that they will lose their jobs if children or dependents join them on their employers' premises. Similarly whites who employ African women as servants must sign a document that they will dismiss them if they bring children or dependents onto the premises. Documents are being issued to all Africa n women from homeland areas who are allowed to work in the Johannesburg area on a 12-month contract. (Daily Telegraph, 21.9.73) 

E. A 35-year-old African woman who had lived in the Cape for 30 years was fined R 10 (or 30 days) for living illegally in the African township of Guguletu with her husband since 1968. She told the court she came to Cape Town , married in 1957 and lived in Nyanga East Township. In 1966, while she was away on a visit, her husband was transferred to the bachelor hostel at Guguletu. When she returned, she found a place to live there with him and their two children . (Cape Times, 5.12.70) 

F. A crippled African factory worker of Wellington, Mr. Harlem Msini, was informed that his wife and 4-year-old , child could not continue to live with him , after his wife had been convicted and fined R 30 for being in an area illegally. Because she left the place where she was born, Dordrecht, and has forfeited her right to return , and because she has been endorsed out of the area where her husband lives, she is not legally entitled to live anywhere, and is a displaced person. Her case was taken up by the Black Sash, finally reaching the Deputy Minister of Bantu Administration , Dr. Koornhof , who rejected appeals saying there could be no condonation, as this would open the door to more such situations. " If all Bantu men are freely allowed to marry women who do not qualify... and are allowed to enter the territory , the numbers of Bantu will more than double". Subsequently, Mrs. Msini was given a temporary permit to live in Dordrecht, where she will live with her children , apart from her husband. (Cape Times 14 .11.70- 2.1. 71)

G. Mrs. Victoria Madi, 53, was born in Swaziland, but has lived in South Africa since 1936. She married in 1937 and has five children all born in South Africa . When her husband died, she was told she no longer qualified to remain in the urban area of Johannesburg and must return to the country of her origin — Swaziland. Mrs.Madi works in Johannesburg, all her children live in Johannesburg, where two are still at school, she has not been to Swaziland for 33 years and does not know anybody there. (Rand Daily Mail 3.11.69).

 H. A domestic servant, Mrs. Sara Makhomola, used to have her husband visit her and spend the night with her, as he worked only three miles away. This is illegal, but they were only caught twice. Now a new proclamation makes not only the Makhomolas, but also her white employer, liable to conviction and fine if her husband is caught sleeping with her. Their three children were sent to school in Pietersburg and now cannot visit their parents in Johannesburg without a permit. The family have no possible chance of living together. (Rand Daily Mail 21.3.70)

I. Mrs. Bella Zwane, a widow , was deprived of her right to trade from her late husband's business. Her husband was formerly a grocer in Soweto, and under a government regulation a licence may be cancelled because of death. (No person can trade without a licence in the townships.) The local African Chamber of Commerce organised a protest on Mrs. Zwane's behalf under the slogan ' isithukuthuku senja' — Zulu for 'sweat of a dog'. 'We sweat for years to build shops in the hopes that these will support us and our children when we are gone. Then at the stroke of a pen, all is gone . " (Rand Daily Mail 4.9.74)

J. For 15 years Mr. Similo Mayor, a 48-year-old painter from Simonstown, has been trying to get a permit for his wife Manegela, whom he has seen for a total of less than four years in the 15 years they have been married, to stay with him in Cape Town . Mr. Mayor came to Cape Town in 1942 from his Transkei home near Tsomo. In 1951 he started work in the Naval dockyards, where he has been ever since. " I have no property or home in the Transkei. My wife must live with my brother in Tsomo. Our first five children went back to the Transkei with my wife . All of them died. The last three I have kept here in Cape Town , and they are alive but they have no mother . " (Cape Times 30.11.74)

Reprinted with permission from For Their Triumphs and For Their Tears, Hilda Bernstein, International Defence and Aid Fund for Southern Africa, 104 Newgate Street,
London EC1A 7AP, United Kingdom. 

c Copyright 1975, International Defence and Aid Fund for Southern Africa. 

IN THE FIELDS

Left behind in rural areas in Namibia, women bear the burden of subsistence agriculture alone. In a 1977 interview, two Namibian women Netumbo Nandi and Mathilda Amoomo talk about the plight of these women.

Netumbo: The South African colonialists and the Germans before them made a conscious effort to prevent subsistence agriculture from evolving into advanced commercial farming. They prevented mechanization and large-scale cultivation that would produce cash crops. The motive was to make sure that the largest number of African men would always be readily available for contract labor in the mines or on the plantations. As a consequence, much of the field work, in rural Namibia is still done with hand hoes, and it is the women who do most of the field work , using their hands for tilling , sowing, weeding, harvesting and threshing.

Mathilda:... The longest time a married contract worker can stay with his family is about four months before he returns for 12 to 18 more months on contract.
... Women in these areas work in the fields from 5a.m. to 1p.m. from Monday to Saturday every week. This is true whether you are talking about cultivation , weeding or harvesting seasons of the year. The men help when they are not on contract, except for threshing and grinding grain for flour, which is women's work.

After spending up to seven hours of back-breaking labor in the fields, women in rural areas do not retire to rest for the day. They must also fetch water, grind grain into  flour and prepare meals, not to mention washing the babies and their diapers.

I do not mean to suggest that our men do nothing at all. They cut and clear trees off the fields for cultivation , and dig wells to obtain drinking water for both people and animals. They look after the herds. But on the whole these are far less energy-taking duties when compared to those performed by women. 

(quoted in Africa News, 6 March 1978)