Ntokozo Qwabe could not wait to boast about his revolutionary
actions on Facebook. Qwabe one of the leaders from the “Rhodes Must
Fall” campaign at the Oxford University, was at the Obz Café, in Cape
Town, with friends and when the bill arrived, he wrote WE WILL GIVE YOU A
TIP WHEN YOU RETURN THE LAND.” In a typical radical fashion, the young
man boastfully resorts to hatred by calling for white people to return
the land.
One could question if Qwabe entered Oxford University by mistake on a
Rhodes scholarship. Whether a white or black waitress serves, there is
no reason for sarcasm and arrogance. The person was doing their job and
for a customer to act like a jerk and treat people with disrespect is
disgraceful.
Qwabe received support for his Facebook post, and many blamed the
media for unleashing violence to crush the Oxford University Student for
his Whiteness statement. One friend of Qwabe believes that all
non-whites will be part of the onslaught and said they must stand strong
or firm. He went on to say that the truth was spoken and that there
will be no rest until all the land is returned.
Here is the full transcript posted to Facebook. (unedited)
LOL wow unable to stop smiling because something so black‚
wonderful & LIT just happened! And of course‚ the catalyst was a
radical non-binary trans black activist — Wandile Dlamini — from the
Rhodes Must Fall movement. Because trans activists have BEEN the
ultimate blessers of this decolonial struggle!
To cut the long story short‚ we are out at Obz Cafe with the said
activist‚ and the time for the bill comes. Our waitress is a white
woman. I ask the said activist what the going rate for tips/gratuity is
in these shores. They look at me very reluctantly and they say ‘give me
the slip‚ I’ll sort that out’. I give them the slip.
They take a pen & slip in a note where the gratuity/tip
amount is supposed to be entered. The note reads in bold: “WE WILL GIVE
TIP WHEN YOU RETURN THE LAND“. The waitress comes to us with a card
machine for the bill to be sorted out. She sees the note & starts
shaking. She leaves us & bursts into typical white tears (like why
are you crying when all we’ve done is make a kind request? lol!).
Anyways‚ so this white woman goes to her colleagues who are
furious. She exits to cry at the back & a white male colleague of
hers reluctantly comes out to address us & to annoy us more with his
own white tears telling us that he finds our act “racist“.
We then start breaking it down for this white man & ask him
why they are catching feelings when we haven’t even started (like the
part where we take up arms hasn’t even come & yall are already out
here drowning us in your white tears? Really white people? Wow.).
We start drawing him to the political nature of the act & why
we couldn’t be bothered that they decided to catch feelings from the
note. We tell him it’s great that business as usual has stopped &
the pressing issue of land is now on the agenda in that space — seeing
the cowntry was celebrating ‘Freedom Day’ yesterday. We then chase him
back to do his job. And continue with our conversation before exiting
the café.
Moral of the story: the time has come when no white person will
be absolved. We are tired of “not all white people” and all other
bullshit. We are here‚ and we want the stolen land back. No white person
will be out here living their best life while we are out here being a
landless and dispossessed black mass. NO white person shall rest. It is
irrelevant whether you personally have land/wealth or you don’t. Go to
your fellow white people & mobilise for them to give us the land
back. That will be the starting point of all our interactions
from now. We will agitate all our spaces with the big question: WHERE IS
THE LAND?
Thank you to all the non binary‚ trans & all other black
bodies who have been at the helm of this decolonial moment in the
settler colony known as South Afrika. NOTHING will ever be the same
again. Alibuye Izwe Lethu!
By Laura Oneale
South Africa Today – South Africa News
May 1, 2016
http://southafricatoday.net/south-africa-news/white-people-will-not-absolved/
No comments:
Post a Comment