Mmusi Maimane: The kasie boy who knows the value of discipline

The DA’s first black leader had a very ordinary township upbringing, writes S’thembiso Msomi in ‘Mmusi Maimane: Prophet or Puppet?’ In these extracts friends remember the tall, gangly kid who was ’too much of a nice guy’ for the dog-eat-dog world of politics.

Thabo Shole-Mashao started school a few days later than the other pupils. On his first day at St Angela's Primary School, his teacher, Sister Christine Obotseng - by all accounts a strict disciplinarian who was feared and loved in equal measure by the entire school population - decided to put her Grade 1 class to the test.

She instructed the children to write down the numerical figure 1 in their exercise books.

Shole-Mashao did not know how to write at all. But sitting next to him was a taller boy who seemed an old hand in what, to Shole-Mashao, was a new world of writing and reading.

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The young Shole-Mashao watched in despair as the other boy effortlessly did as the teacher had instructed. He must have looked really desperate, because, without uttering a word, the other boy quickly took the exercise book and scribbled the figure for him.

On seeing her new pupil's effort, with the number written down so well, as if by a hand that had practised it several times, Sister Christine became suspicious. Who had done the work for him, she demanded to know.

Frightened, Shole-Mashao pointed to the boy sitting next to him, who he would soon know as Mmusi Aloysias Maimane. The memory is still fresh: "The teacher scolded him. He got into big trouble for helping me."

And so began a lifetime of great friendship between these two boys from Dobsonville Township on the West Rand.

When Maimane and Shole-Mashao started school in the mid-'80s, the apartheid system was already creaking, facing rejection and condemnation at home and abroad. Years later, two decades after apartheid had fallen, one of the boys would rise to become the first black leader of a party with deep roots in the whites-only political system. The other would be in radio and TV broadcasting, working as a producer, talk-show host and entrepreneur.

Shole-Mashao tells the story of how their friendship began to make a point about what he sees as Maimane's greatest attribute - his kindness and inclination to help those in need. It is a quality many who have known Maimane since his childhood and as a pupil at St Angela's or eRoma - the name Dobsonville residents prefer for the independent school on Mayikani Street - never fail to remark on.

Some thought he was "too much of a nice guy" to suspect that he would be in the dog-eat-dog world of politics some day, not to mention be the leader of a party whose mission is to aggressively challenge the dominance of the continent's oldest liberation movement.

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A week before his election as DA leader, the Sunday Times dubbed Maimane "the Soweto nice guy" who would be DA king.

And it is not difficult to see why the "nice guy" label has stuck. Always warm and courteous, even when interacting with his political rivals, there is an air of sincerity about him that is often lacking in politicians. Childhood friends attribute this to his upbringing and strong religious beliefs.

Maimane was born on Friday, June 6 1980, in Leratong Hospital. It was his paternal grandmother who gave him the name Mmusi, which means governor or leader in Tswana. His second name, Aloysias, came from his maternal grandmother, who wished he would one day grow to be a church leader - a dream Maimane later fulfilled.

He is the first of four children born to Simon and Ethel Maimane, migrants who met and fell in love in the then Transvaal some three years before Maimane was born. Simon, a Motswana from the Bafokeng clan, had left the then Bophuthatswana bantustan - now part of North West province - "landless and jobless" and settled in Kagiso township on the West Rand.

His mother Ethel hails from Cofimvaba in the former Transkei, birthplace of struggle hero Chris Hani. She grew up in a poor rural household with her parents and six siblings. When she was old enough, she left the Eastern Cape for Johannesburg in the hope of better prospects.

block_quotes_start I have never addressed him as just Jacob Zuma; it's President Zuma. It is about showing respect. There are cultural difficulties block_quotes_end

His friends describe the young Mmusi as a typical township boy who spent his afternoons after school doing his household chores and then playing football in the streets and on the local soccer field before heading home just before dark to do his homework.

Although he went to an independent primary school, his parents were by no means rich. St Angela's was one of the schools established by the church in the '60s and '70s for African children following the introduction of legislation that prohibited the existence of racially mixed schools.

According to Maimane, his mother Ethel was among those who "ran through the streets" of Soweto in the protests of '76: "She did it because she knew that this was a cause worth fighting for. She was fighting for black liberation, for better education for blacks."

It is no surprise therefore that when their first-born child was old enough to start school, Ethel and her husband sought "better education" for him by sending him to St Angela's. That they were both devout Catholics and that the school was a few blocks away from their modest house on Dobsonville's Mmutle Street would have played no small part in the decision.

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Ethel worked as a cashier at a Hyperama while Simon was a factory worker at a company that produced gas cylinders. Simon supplemented his meagre blue-collar worker salary by running a mini-shebeen at his house. The drinking spot catered only for a mature clientele that appreciated good music. As a result, Maimane snr was one of the most popular figures in the neighbourhood and locals say his love for soul music remains legendary.

Maimane describes his father as "what I call a high relater" who "knows everybody in Dobsonville". His father, he says, never discriminated against anyone in their neighbourhood and was "always accessible" to everyone. It is a trait the young Maimane, say his neighbours, has inherited from his father.

Whenever he is in Dobsonville to see his parents and his siblings - sisters Cecelia and Tumelo and brother Kabelo - Maimane does not leave without first walking around the neighbourhood checking up on friends and old acquaintances.

Among those who frequented his father's shebeen and became a close family friend of the Maimanes was keyboardist and songwriter Thapelo Khomo, founder member of the '80s superstar band Stimela.

Kgotla Molefe, whose own home is not far from the Maimanes', remembers: "Even though they sold alcohol, they were very strict.

"They did not want any children around when the elders were doing their thing."

They applied even stricter discipline when it came to their son, Molefe says: "Everything had its time with him. They taught him balance. He would play with us and then go home when it was time for books."

But, as the African saying goes, it takes a village to raise a child. So Maimane's parents were not the only ones responsible for his upbringing.

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The one person beside his parents who seems to have had the greatest influence on him as a child was his father's aunt, Lilian Morake - mother to Bafana Bafana spokesman and former SABC sports journalist Matlhomola Morake. In interviews, Maimane says Lilian Morake was a "devout, disciplined woman" who taught him that "all you really have in life is your own principles and convictions".

She also impressed upon him the values of ubuntu and respect for others, especially those who are much older than you. These are the values he still lives by, he says, even though at times they seem to be at odds with his political role. For instance, Maimane confesses that one of the toughest decisions he had to make as a leader of the DA in parliament was how to address President Jacob Zuma - a man who is "old enough to be my grandfather".

"I have never addressed him as just Jacob Zuma; it's President Zuma. It is about showing respect. There are cultural difficulties."

Kgotla Molefe recalls that as young boys, if anyone challenged Alu - Maimane's nickname, which was derived from his "school name" Aloysias - to a fight, "he would just walk home without a fight".

At school, Alu feared corporal punishment so much that whenever it loomed, Shole-Mashao says he would try to negotiate himself out of trouble with the teacher. Molefe also remembers Alu being so close to his sister Cecelia that whenever his parents gave Maimane a hiding for doing wrong, Cecelia would cry with him.

All of this, I suggested to Molefe, painted a picture of young Maimane as what other kids would call a "softie", a "mama's boy" or, to borrow from township lingo, "a cheeseboy".

"Never. He never was a cheeseboy. He was an ordinary kasie [township] boy - it is just that he came from a home that valued discipline," Molefe answered.

If the young Maimane loathed physical violence, it does not mean that he was not fiercely competitive. Even though they were the best of friends, Shole-Mashao says there was always competition between them over who would get higher marks than the other. The two were apparently always in the top five of their class's best pupils.

block_quotes_start I really thought he would grow up to become a soccer commentator. He used to love doing commentary. He loved football block_quotes_end

This competitive spirit was also visible on the soccer field. Both Molefe and Shole-Mashao say Maimane was mad about soccer as a child, and they describe him as an above-average midfielder when he played for an amateur club, Ontario, which was based in the section of the township called Long Till.

At school during lunch break, Shole-Mashao says, they would play football. Even after school, they would seldom leave the premises without playing a quick game. When they were doing Standard 4 (which is now known as Grade 6), a teacher discovered an exercise book among Maimane's belongings in which he had copied down the full fixture list of all the professional National Soccer League games for that season.

From a young age Maimane supported Kaizer Chiefs and decorated his school books with their pictures. On the soccer field, whenever he had the ball, he would start doing commentary, mimicking a radio commentator, and would refer to himself as "16V", one of the nicknames the Kaizer Chiefs and national team star [Doctor Khumalo] was known by.

"I really thought he would grow up to become a soccer commentator. He used to love doing commentary. He loved football," said Molefe.

The story of the young Maimane would not be complete without talking about religion, for that played a central part in his growth to becoming the politician he is today.

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Raised by dedicated Catholic parents, he was active in church activities at a very young age. Fikile-Ntsikelelo Moya, who was Maimane's senior when they were altar boys at St Angela's Catholic Church, remembers him as a "quiet and intelligent" youngster who got himself actively involved in church activities. He went beyond his duty as an altar boy, even starting his own junior liturgy class for fellow Sunday school children at the church.

"He was leading us, he would call us to meetings that lasted for hours. Sometimes we would start at 11am and finish at 7pm," recalls Shole-Mashao.

By the time he was in Standard 5, Maimane was a conscientious Catholic who many in his community believed would grow up to play an important role in the church. It therefore came as a surprise to many of his peers and friends when he suddenly left the church of his parents, broader family and close friends to join what Moya calls a "more Bible-based church".

The transformation appears to have happened in his mid-teens when he started attending Saturday classes and Christianity-based youth camps.

Maimane had been selected to be part of a group of scholars who did extra lessons in English, mathematics and science at Pace Commercial Secondary School in Jabulani every Saturday. Pace had been established as part of a joint initiative by local and American business communities in 1981 as a specialist school in commercial subjects. To be selected for the weekend extra classes at the school invariably meant that you were performing above average and the teachers believed you had a great future ahead of you.

Maimane regards his selection to participate in those classes as a life-changing experience. He told the Sowetan in October 2012 that two white teachers, Alec and Linda Galanakis, who ran the Saturday school, were "key in my getting a quality education".

Shole-Mashao and Molefe said it was during this period that Maimane became exposed to the Evangelical Student Christian Movement and religious youth movements. He became so deeply involved and committed to his new faith that, according to Molefe, he would insist that every meeting or communal gathering they attended started and ended with a prayer. He still played soccer, all right, but never on a Sunday.

"Mmusi Maimane: Prophet or Puppet?" is published by Jonathan Ball Publishers (R200) and will be available from Wednesday