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‘We Will Teach Them How to Use This Building’: Acts of Accountability from South African Artists
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 February 2024
Extract
On 3 March 2021, almost a full year after South Africa's theatres were closed due to Covid-19 restrictions, renowned opera soprano Sibongile Mngoma walked into the Johannesburg offices of the South African National Arts Council (NAC) to meet with senior department officials. She was there to demand accountability over their non-payment of promised Covid-19 artist relief funds to the tune of R300 million (roughly USD 16.6 million). When it became apparent that no official would honour the meeting, Mngoma announced her intention to wait. She did not leave the building for another sixty days.
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- Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of International Federation for Theatre Research
Footnotes
I am grateful for the support of the ‘Reimagining Tragedy From Africa and the Global South’ project at the University of Cape Town (Andrew W. Mellon grant 1804-05734). I would particularly like to thank Sibongile Mngoma and Owen Lonzar for their generosity with time and insights.
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NOTES
2 As of publication, the group's membership stood at 41,400 members.
3 Interviews are available on the ACTivism fieldwork repository of ‘Re-Imagining Tragedy in Africa and the Global South’, Ibali: UCT Digital Collections, at https://ibali.uct.ac.za/s/RETAGS/page/activism, accessed 16 January 2024.
4 This identification was made possible due to the country's advanced genome sequencing capabilities, honed from decades of laboratory engagement with endemic tuberculosis. Many countries did not have the capacity, or elected not, to genome sequence.
5 Carla Lever, ‘ACTivism Interview | Sibongile Mngoma’, Ibali: UCT Digital Collections, 26 July 2021, at https://ibali.uct.ac.za/s/RETAGS/item/32836, accessed 16 January 2024.
6 Ibid.
7 The Marikana massacre of 16 August 2012 saw police shoot and kill thirty-four workers during a strike at the London Platinum mine in Marikana, in South Africa's North West province. It was the single deadliest use of force against protestors since the Apartheid-era Soweto Uprising of 1976 (also referenced by Mngoma).
8 All listed dates are synonymous with State and police violence against Black and poor protestors.
9 Lever, ‘ACTivism Interview’.
10 Ibid.
11 Ibid.
12 Ibid.
13 Ibid.
14 Translated from the isiZulu, ‘Sanibonani’ means ‘hello good day’, as addressed to a group.
15 Sibongile Mngoma, ‘Sibongile Mngoma Goes Live with Im4theArts’, 23 April 2021, at https://www.facebook.com/sibongile.mngoma.12/videos/2844032879203948/?idorvanity=166753357992354, accessed 16 January 2024.
16 Edward Tsumele, ‘We Are Going Nowhere: Artists Occupying NAC Offices Vow’, CityLife/Arts, 19 March 2021, at https://citylifearts.co.za/we-are-going-nowhere-artists-occupying-nac-offices-vow/, retrieved 16 January 2024.
17 Carla Lever, ‘ACTivism Interview | Owen Lonzar’, Ibali: UCT Digital Collections, 21 July 2021, at https://ibali.uct.ac.za/s/RETAGS/item/30488, retrieved 16 January 2024.