Last week, a devastating fire swept through Free State farmland. It is believed to have been sparked by service delivery protests by the despondent shack dwellers of Malebogo in Hertzogville, Free State. The flames licked clean vast farm grazing lands and killed animals in its wake, causing much damage and devastation.
Sympathetic messages flooded social media, with several organisations advocating for donations and support for the farmers who were affected. The call was so compelling that we as the media had to see this expression of generosity and ubuntu with our own eyes.
It’s no secret that the Free State was a Boer stronghold and remains one of the provinces that uphold and defend the ways of the dark past in some communities. In this area, the white farmer owns thousands of hectares of land where their hundreds of quality breed cattle can graze – while blacks (many of them farmworkers) are crammed into the township close by with no water.
I was not surprised, but mostly disheartened, by my three-day experience in the area. It was the inequality that struck me the most; the sheer disproportion in quality of life.
A 56-year-old black farmer, like most farmers in the area, lost 90% of grazing land in the fire. Here there is no luxury of having a farmstead separate from the home, this farmer lives on the farm with no electricity.
When you drive into the richer neighbour’s farm you are welcomed by bags and bags of silage and countless bales of hay dropped off by the many trucks that flooded the area for donations. There is hardly space to store the feed, and he himself even boasts about it being more than enough.
But the same cannot be said about the farm next door. When you drive in, you are met by boerbokke (goat) and sheep competing for a small portion of feed and a few rolls of hay at the back. The farmer, who has been farming commercially for five years, said these had been donated by close friends.
Which begs the question: does charity see colour? Surely it does. Who donated the aid last week? When they did, who was in their thoughts? Did they perhaps not think there was a black farmer in need?
This farmer is a humble and wise person. When you ask these questions, the answers contain no bitterness or envy.
Grateful for the donations, there is an understanding that it remains a privilege to receive such a gift from a friend. In my observation, this farmer understands that to prosper in such a hostile environment, one needs to respect the hierarchy. The farmer knows that charity can be racist.
Ironically, we visited this farm after one of the big commercial farmers proudly told us he had a black farmer as a neighbour, again just illustrating the complex dynamics here.
What we know about this fire is that it was sparked by something that seems unrelated – a protest action against the municipality over lack of water. The farmers agree the fire was a mistake, a severe case of negligence.
But this knowledge is not stopping them from plotting vengeance and retaliation against the township dwellers who work at their farms. One farmer said that among themselves, there is a mission to punish the locals. They are infuriated, and justifiably so.
Another farmer confidently told me that though he lost a number of expensive cattle, he would recover. See, though tragic, the fire only set them a few years behind. It did not cripple their lives or change how they see black people.
One thing is clear, the locals are facing double oppression: from the black-led government and white capital dominance.
This fire that spread across the western region of the Free State speaks to the politics of the land.
Just like the racism that prevails in that area, it’s destructive. The inability of the local government to provide services to the poor has resulted in farmers losing their valuable cattle.
The municipality of Tokologo, figuratively, started this fire, and simultaneously, the racism here remains a barrier for black people to prosper.
