'I guess the best place to start a story is at the beginning. My name is Lindiwe Hani. I was born on 27 December 1980 to Limpho and Martin Thembisile Hani. My father was also known as Chris. My parents named me Lindiwe, which in isiXhosa means ''the daughter we have waited for''. In that year, a leap year, the world's population sat at 4 434 682 000, the Voyager 1 space probe confirmed the existence of a moon of Saturn that was to be named Janus (or Janusz) - how's that for prophetic - and Robert Mugabe was elected president of Zimbabwe.'
It took me a day and some to get over reading Lindiwe Hani's autobiography, Being Chris Hani's Daughter, because I desperately wanted to hang on to the fuzzy feeling of being a confidant to its brave author that developed as I read the book. This is precisely why some biographies are pure magic. They take the reader behind the scenes of major socio-political events and in the process, create a sense of temporary intimacy that comes from knowing someone on a level other than just for having a famous surname or a recognisable face from newspapers and social media pages.
On the 2nd of February, 1990, the system of Apartheid officially came to an end when South African president, F. W. de Klerk of the National Party, unbanned the ANC (African National Congress), the PAC (Pan-Africanist Congress), the SACP (South African Communist Party) among other political organisations. Nelson Mandela and other political prisoners of conscience were subsequently released from prison. Speculations about the reasons for De Klerk's monumental steps are myriad and range from incredible conspiracy theories, think extra-terrestrial, to downright banal, e. g. he fell in love with someone and just wanted out (especially his job). The reality was that the Cold War ended in 1989 when Mikhail 'Birthmark' Gorbachev, the last leader of the U. S. S. R., announced to the world his revolutionary glasnost and perestroika policies, and almost overnight, global alliances and sentiments underwent tectonic shifts. The two Germanies were reunited and long-simmering, suppressed nationalism spread like wild fire through flammable Balkan countries when the Iron Curtain was lifted and the windows opened. Meanwhile, on the chin of the African continent, white supremacists of the National Party quickly realised that the 'Rooi Gevaar' (Eng. transl. 'Red Danger', i.e. red for communism / communists) scare had morphed into nothing but a hyped-up has-been in a red T-shirt and plakkies, and even worse, that South Africa was in a terrible mess. No one, respectable that is, wanted to be seen with Apartheid South Africa in broad daylight, if they could help it. And so it was that new rifts formed and applied unbearable pressure on this increasingly isolated African pariah to reform yesterday already, or... It was against this tumultuous backdrop of sweeping global political changes that the shocking assassination of Chris Hani, a senior in the South African Communist Party (SACP), on the morning of Saturday, 10 April 1993, took place.
Lindiwe Hani's autobiography began innocently enough with an introduction to herself. Born in the village of Roma in Lesotho to Martin Thembisile Hani and his wife, Limpho, in 1980, she is the youngest of three Hani daughters. She also introduced the reader to her older sisters, Neo (or Momo) and Nomakhwezi (or Khwezi). She described how her parents had met, it was love at first sight, their civil union in a Zambian court and the Hani family's decision to move to Lesotho where most of her mother's family already lived. Her father, Chris, was away from home most of the time and left wife, Limpho, in charge of raising their children. Christmas and birthdays were memorable celebrations in her childhood home. Even though her father wasn't physically in their lives, he called home regularly, and she told him as much as she could while he patiently listened to her babbling. Her mother enjoyed cooking and baking. She and her sisters attended school and spent leisure time with family and friends.
Every sentence read like a childhood with an absent father, a domineering mother, except that before starting the car to take the children to school every morning, Limpho Hani would have her daughters stand some distance away while she nervously opened the bonnet, the boot and checked underneath the car for bombs. It read like a normal childhood except that Lindiwe and her sisters were never allowed to ask her father where he was whenever he called them and often had to sneak out of their house in the early hours of the morning, groggy with sleep, to hide in friends' homes after being alerted of a possible raid by the SADF (South African Defence Force). Her mother, Limpho, lived in constant fear. In 1981, the first of many attempts on Chris Hani's life was made when a bomb that had failed to detonate was discovered in his car. In 1982, another bomb was planted in his car but detonated during installation and killed the would-be assassin. Also in 1982, the SADF conducted the infamous 'Lesotho Raids' in search of so-called 'terrorists', during which 12 locals and 30 South African refugees were killed, and Hani emotionally traumatised when South African foreign affairs minister, Pik Botha, smugly announced on national television that the SADF had also killed Chris Hani's wife and children.
Throughout her autobiography, Lindiwe referred to the late Chris Hani as 'Daddy' and 'my father' which I thought was exceptionally clever because it forced me, the reader, to see the Chris Hani as simply Chris Hani, the father and family man, who genuinely cared for his family and constantly worried about their safety. But, even though I found the insight she provided into Chris Hani's personal life fascinating, I had to keep in mind that this biography was Lindiwe's story.
The Hani family moved back to South Africa in 1990, when Lindiwe was ten years old, and for almost three years thereafter, they adjusted to their new home in Dawn Park, the political changes in South Africa, new schools and friends, and tried to lead a relatively normal life. Their fragile togetherness was shattered on the morning of Saturday, 10 April 1993, when Chris Hani was assassinated by Janusz Walus, while Hani's fourteen-year-old daughter, Khwezi, was at home. Twelve-year-old Lindiwe and her mother had been visiting family in Lesotho, that weekend. They returned to Dawn Park the same day, their family in pieces.
Five days after Chris Hani's funeral, another great, Oliver Tambo, passed away, and two days later, F. W. de Klerk announced that South Africa's first democratic election would be held in April of the following year, 1994. The country was restless and angry, seething with rage; the temporary high on which the 'Rainbow Nation' had euphorically floated for a few years after Mandela's release, had crashed with Hani's assassination.
In a confident, frank manner, Lindiwe Hani shares with the reader how her family slowly disintegrated in the wake of her father's murder. She struggled to cope at school and was sent to boarding-school in Cape Town where she was introduced to drugs. Her sister, Khwezi, began to drink and use drugs, regularly. Their mother had immersed herself in politics and was often away from home. Lindiwe fell in love for the first time and when he, too, passed away in a motor vehicle accident, my heart ached for her. I was also deeply moved by the death of her sister, Khwezi, in March of 2001. In what seemed like a short time, Lindiwe had lost her father, her first love and her sister.
Without well-developed coping mechanisms and support structures in place, her dependency on drugs spiraled out of control. For a decade and more, her life, sense of self and emotional well-being depended on alcohol, marijuana and cocaine. During this period of her life, she fell pregnant, decided to keep the baby and completely gave up drugs until after the birth of her beloved daughter, Khaya - a child she believes is the reincarnation of her sister, Khwezi - but, went right back to her emotional crutches. It was the child, Khaya, and her unconditional love for her mother, who made Lindiwe realise that her addiction was out of control and would cause her premature death. I cheered for her in rehab, fervently hoped she would get well, and when that crucial stage of recovery was over, I also understood her reluctance to share the particulars of her life in a book, even though writing a book 'some day' had been a goal of hers.
In 2015, Lindiwe Hani did the bravest thing ever when she drove all the way to Pretoria in the rain to meet the man who had orchestrated her father's assassination, former South African Conservative Party politician, Clive Derby-Lewis. I kept thinking that Lindiwe was a better person than I because lipstick would not be the only thing I'd have had in my designer handbag. Amazingly, Derby-Lewis had invited Lindiwe Hani to his house where his wife offered her soggy quiche and chattered mindlessly between uncomfortable silences. This was an historic meeting and you simply have to read it for yourself to believe that it had actually occurred. I admired Lindiwe's steely resolve not to eat or drink anything offered by Derby-Lewis but most of all, I admired her focus when she purposefully asked him questions that had bothered her about her father's assassination. It made for thrilling reading.
And then, she did the ultimate. Lindiwe Hani contacted the lawyer of the man from Poland who had shot and killed her father, Janusz Walus, and arranged for a meeting with him in prison. Walus is currently still in prison for the murder of Hani after his last parole application had failed. Again, you have to read these chapters to fully appreciate the courage and strength of Lindiwe Hani. Just like with Clive Derby-Lewis, she focused entirely on getting answers to her questions from Janusz Walus. The actual dialogue between Lindiwe and her father's assassin was reported verbatim in her autobiography. She described how she came to understand (but not forgive) Walus and even empathised with him on some level.
What I liked about the autobiography was its content, the insight it gives the reader into the Hani family and what had happened to them after the tragedy of Chris Hani's death. It stirred up in me so many memories about a particular time in southern Africa. What I found odd about it was the tidy division into separate chapters of each stage of Lindiwe's life. It came across as too neat; almost clinical. Real life 'flows', in a manner of speaking; it struggles to compartmentalise. For example, her first love had passed away. She was understandably traumatised by his sudden death. There was no mention made of his funeral, whether she had attended it, and then he disappeared from her narrative as if he had never been, only to be mentioned briefly shortly before the end of her book. The human brain doesn't work like that. The environment is often full of triggers and reminders; the way someone walks, how they smell, food, music, often reminds one of loved ones who had passed away. It was strange that these details were missing from her biography.
I also sensed that a lot was missing from the pages about her relationship with her mother. Here was the idolised father and the demonised mother, I thought, but between the sentences of this autobiography lay oceans and rivers of unshed tears of a hurting, broken and angry family.
Of all, the most disturbing chapters in her autobiography were the meetings with Janusz Walus. This is only my opinion but, from what I could surmise, Walus came across as cold and manipulative during their meetings. He was playing to an audience - in this case, the slain Chris Hani's daughter - to gain sympathy for himself and merely mumbled an apology for what he had done to the Hani family. The fact that his parole was under discussion at the same time could also have significantly contributed to that half-hearted apology. I couldn't understand how it was possible for Lindiwe to empathise with her father's murderer, share meals with him and make him a gift in the form of a book.
Lindiwe Hani's Being Chris Hani's Daughter (N$ 229), co-authored by Melinda Ferguson, is a must-read for those even who have never heard of Chris Hani. Her battle against addiction is a work in progress, addicts are always in recovery, and I wish her truckloads of luck, just for today. I certainly am grateful this biography saw the light of day for the crucial behind-the-scenes information and the insightful meetings with her father's killers. Now in stock at Book Buddy Namibia, bookshop @ Sister Namibia, 163 Nelson Mandela Avenue, Eros, Windhoek, Namibia, T: (061) 302 711, E: bookbuddynamibia@gmail.com
It took me a day and some to get over reading Lindiwe Hani's autobiography, Being Chris Hani's Daughter, because I desperately wanted to hang on to the fuzzy feeling of being a confidant to its brave author that developed as I read the book. This is precisely why some biographies are pure magic. They take the reader behind the scenes of major socio-political events and in the process, create a sense of temporary intimacy that comes from knowing someone on a level other than just for having a famous surname or a recognisable face from newspapers and social media pages.
On the 2nd of February, 1990, the system of Apartheid officially came to an end when South African president, F. W. de Klerk of the National Party, unbanned the ANC (African National Congress), the PAC (Pan-Africanist Congress), the SACP (South African Communist Party) among other political organisations. Nelson Mandela and other political prisoners of conscience were subsequently released from prison. Speculations about the reasons for De Klerk's monumental steps are myriad and range from incredible conspiracy theories, think extra-terrestrial, to downright banal, e. g. he fell in love with someone and just wanted out (especially his job). The reality was that the Cold War ended in 1989 when Mikhail 'Birthmark' Gorbachev, the last leader of the U. S. S. R., announced to the world his revolutionary glasnost and perestroika policies, and almost overnight, global alliances and sentiments underwent tectonic shifts. The two Germanies were reunited and long-simmering, suppressed nationalism spread like wild fire through flammable Balkan countries when the Iron Curtain was lifted and the windows opened. Meanwhile, on the chin of the African continent, white supremacists of the National Party quickly realised that the 'Rooi Gevaar' (Eng. transl. 'Red Danger', i.e. red for communism / communists) scare had morphed into nothing but a hyped-up has-been in a red T-shirt and plakkies, and even worse, that South Africa was in a terrible mess. No one, respectable that is, wanted to be seen with Apartheid South Africa in broad daylight, if they could help it. And so it was that new rifts formed and applied unbearable pressure on this increasingly isolated African pariah to reform yesterday already, or... It was against this tumultuous backdrop of sweeping global political changes that the shocking assassination of Chris Hani, a senior in the South African Communist Party (SACP), on the morning of Saturday, 10 April 1993, took place.
Lindiwe Hani's autobiography began innocently enough with an introduction to herself. Born in the village of Roma in Lesotho to Martin Thembisile Hani and his wife, Limpho, in 1980, she is the youngest of three Hani daughters. She also introduced the reader to her older sisters, Neo (or Momo) and Nomakhwezi (or Khwezi). She described how her parents had met, it was love at first sight, their civil union in a Zambian court and the Hani family's decision to move to Lesotho where most of her mother's family already lived. Her father, Chris, was away from home most of the time and left wife, Limpho, in charge of raising their children. Christmas and birthdays were memorable celebrations in her childhood home. Even though her father wasn't physically in their lives, he called home regularly, and she told him as much as she could while he patiently listened to her babbling. Her mother enjoyed cooking and baking. She and her sisters attended school and spent leisure time with family and friends.
Every sentence read like a childhood with an absent father, a domineering mother, except that before starting the car to take the children to school every morning, Limpho Hani would have her daughters stand some distance away while she nervously opened the bonnet, the boot and checked underneath the car for bombs. It read like a normal childhood except that Lindiwe and her sisters were never allowed to ask her father where he was whenever he called them and often had to sneak out of their house in the early hours of the morning, groggy with sleep, to hide in friends' homes after being alerted of a possible raid by the SADF (South African Defence Force). Her mother, Limpho, lived in constant fear. In 1981, the first of many attempts on Chris Hani's life was made when a bomb that had failed to detonate was discovered in his car. In 1982, another bomb was planted in his car but detonated during installation and killed the would-be assassin. Also in 1982, the SADF conducted the infamous 'Lesotho Raids' in search of so-called 'terrorists', during which 12 locals and 30 South African refugees were killed, and Hani emotionally traumatised when South African foreign affairs minister, Pik Botha, smugly announced on national television that the SADF had also killed Chris Hani's wife and children.
Throughout her autobiography, Lindiwe referred to the late Chris Hani as 'Daddy' and 'my father' which I thought was exceptionally clever because it forced me, the reader, to see the Chris Hani as simply Chris Hani, the father and family man, who genuinely cared for his family and constantly worried about their safety. But, even though I found the insight she provided into Chris Hani's personal life fascinating, I had to keep in mind that this biography was Lindiwe's story.
The Hani family moved back to South Africa in 1990, when Lindiwe was ten years old, and for almost three years thereafter, they adjusted to their new home in Dawn Park, the political changes in South Africa, new schools and friends, and tried to lead a relatively normal life. Their fragile togetherness was shattered on the morning of Saturday, 10 April 1993, when Chris Hani was assassinated by Janusz Walus, while Hani's fourteen-year-old daughter, Khwezi, was at home. Twelve-year-old Lindiwe and her mother had been visiting family in Lesotho, that weekend. They returned to Dawn Park the same day, their family in pieces.
Five days after Chris Hani's funeral, another great, Oliver Tambo, passed away, and two days later, F. W. de Klerk announced that South Africa's first democratic election would be held in April of the following year, 1994. The country was restless and angry, seething with rage; the temporary high on which the 'Rainbow Nation' had euphorically floated for a few years after Mandela's release, had crashed with Hani's assassination.
In a confident, frank manner, Lindiwe Hani shares with the reader how her family slowly disintegrated in the wake of her father's murder. She struggled to cope at school and was sent to boarding-school in Cape Town where she was introduced to drugs. Her sister, Khwezi, began to drink and use drugs, regularly. Their mother had immersed herself in politics and was often away from home. Lindiwe fell in love for the first time and when he, too, passed away in a motor vehicle accident, my heart ached for her. I was also deeply moved by the death of her sister, Khwezi, in March of 2001. In what seemed like a short time, Lindiwe had lost her father, her first love and her sister.
Without well-developed coping mechanisms and support structures in place, her dependency on drugs spiraled out of control. For a decade and more, her life, sense of self and emotional well-being depended on alcohol, marijuana and cocaine. During this period of her life, she fell pregnant, decided to keep the baby and completely gave up drugs until after the birth of her beloved daughter, Khaya - a child she believes is the reincarnation of her sister, Khwezi - but, went right back to her emotional crutches. It was the child, Khaya, and her unconditional love for her mother, who made Lindiwe realise that her addiction was out of control and would cause her premature death. I cheered for her in rehab, fervently hoped she would get well, and when that crucial stage of recovery was over, I also understood her reluctance to share the particulars of her life in a book, even though writing a book 'some day' had been a goal of hers.
In 2015, Lindiwe Hani did the bravest thing ever when she drove all the way to Pretoria in the rain to meet the man who had orchestrated her father's assassination, former South African Conservative Party politician, Clive Derby-Lewis. I kept thinking that Lindiwe was a better person than I because lipstick would not be the only thing I'd have had in my designer handbag. Amazingly, Derby-Lewis had invited Lindiwe Hani to his house where his wife offered her soggy quiche and chattered mindlessly between uncomfortable silences. This was an historic meeting and you simply have to read it for yourself to believe that it had actually occurred. I admired Lindiwe's steely resolve not to eat or drink anything offered by Derby-Lewis but most of all, I admired her focus when she purposefully asked him questions that had bothered her about her father's assassination. It made for thrilling reading.
And then, she did the ultimate. Lindiwe Hani contacted the lawyer of the man from Poland who had shot and killed her father, Janusz Walus, and arranged for a meeting with him in prison. Walus is currently still in prison for the murder of Hani after his last parole application had failed. Again, you have to read these chapters to fully appreciate the courage and strength of Lindiwe Hani. Just like with Clive Derby-Lewis, she focused entirely on getting answers to her questions from Janusz Walus. The actual dialogue between Lindiwe and her father's assassin was reported verbatim in her autobiography. She described how she came to understand (but not forgive) Walus and even empathised with him on some level.
What I liked about the autobiography was its content, the insight it gives the reader into the Hani family and what had happened to them after the tragedy of Chris Hani's death. It stirred up in me so many memories about a particular time in southern Africa. What I found odd about it was the tidy division into separate chapters of each stage of Lindiwe's life. It came across as too neat; almost clinical. Real life 'flows', in a manner of speaking; it struggles to compartmentalise. For example, her first love had passed away. She was understandably traumatised by his sudden death. There was no mention made of his funeral, whether she had attended it, and then he disappeared from her narrative as if he had never been, only to be mentioned briefly shortly before the end of her book. The human brain doesn't work like that. The environment is often full of triggers and reminders; the way someone walks, how they smell, food, music, often reminds one of loved ones who had passed away. It was strange that these details were missing from her biography.
I also sensed that a lot was missing from the pages about her relationship with her mother. Here was the idolised father and the demonised mother, I thought, but between the sentences of this autobiography lay oceans and rivers of unshed tears of a hurting, broken and angry family.
Of all, the most disturbing chapters in her autobiography were the meetings with Janusz Walus. This is only my opinion but, from what I could surmise, Walus came across as cold and manipulative during their meetings. He was playing to an audience - in this case, the slain Chris Hani's daughter - to gain sympathy for himself and merely mumbled an apology for what he had done to the Hani family. The fact that his parole was under discussion at the same time could also have significantly contributed to that half-hearted apology. I couldn't understand how it was possible for Lindiwe to empathise with her father's murderer, share meals with him and make him a gift in the form of a book.
Lindiwe Hani's Being Chris Hani's Daughter (N$ 229), co-authored by Melinda Ferguson, is a must-read for those even who have never heard of Chris Hani. Her battle against addiction is a work in progress, addicts are always in recovery, and I wish her truckloads of luck, just for today. I certainly am grateful this biography saw the light of day for the crucial behind-the-scenes information and the insightful meetings with her father's killers. Now in stock at Book Buddy Namibia, bookshop @ Sister Namibia, 163 Nelson Mandela Avenue, Eros, Windhoek, Namibia, T: (061) 302 711, E: bookbuddynamibia@gmail.com
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