“History’s first draft,” they say of journalism, the so-called fourth estate. Although many such drafts have been written on Colesberg since its days as a vulgar frontier town, these have mostly been confined to colonial history and the traditionally”white” side of town. The stone court house, Kemper Museum, the Anglo-Boer (South African) War…brandy-guzzling bootleggers and highwaymen.
Kuyasa, the black township, left behind by history, remains ever shrouded in mystery. Products of a segregated era, reading the earliest publications in the area, you’d swear that the township or the ‘Ou Boks’ as it was known, didn’t even exist. That the other side of the koppie separating the dorp from from the kasi was nothing but a barren land filled with bush and locusts.
In later years with the advent of democracy, a liberal rag that sought to tell everyone’s story, the Toverberg Indaba, would fashion itself as the town’s most accessible voice. One that bravely ventured forth into a place where its predecessors and rivals had hitherto skirted. Still, as is often the case with indigenous African history, the intimate history of Kuyasa is mostly to be found in the oral stories told by residents of a certain generation.
One such raconteur is Ndoyisile Manzi. Born in 1953, the man is an amicable fossil who walks with an upright back and sturdy legs. (A lifetime of physical labour will do that to you). Long retired, he is still almost always seen in his familiar attire: a crisp blue overall that serves as a reminder of long years on the grind. He speaks slowly, less from speech impairment than an inclination to emphasise and is always sure to introduce himself by his clan name, Dhlomo – the impeccable Madiba.
His borough, Diep Hoek, one of the earliest settlements in the township he says was a haphazard, hasty ruffle-up. The roads – really nothing but glorified thoroughfares – are unpaved and some too rugged, or too small, to accomodate vehicles, are products of shovels and people’s feet.
Before apartheid’s mad scientists took to their segregation agenda in earnest, Tat’ Manzi grew up at a time when Coloured and Black residents used to call the area home. Afrikaans, Xhosa and tsotsitaal, the multilingual mash-up of the streets, were the lingua franca. Then, areas like Zwelitsha, Bongweni and Khayelitsha were nothing but vast expanses of trees and veldt – perfect territory for Manzi and his young friends to whistle up the dogs and go hunting for rodents and torment the bird population with their slingshots.
Given the racial troubles of the day, Manzi, whose Xhosa name was an impossible tongue twister for a former European employer would earn the anglicised “Solly,” on his ‘dompass’ – the despised document that Blacks were legally obligated to have on their persons at all times in those stupid years.
The land on which Lowryville, the so-called Coloured area, lies was where budding farmers of colour kept their livestock. There was no Towervallei, or Ringvasmaak. Majority of homes in Diep Hoek were built from stones sourced from the surrounding koppies. These structures, simple and adobe, were in vogue at the time – not to mention very cheaper to put up. They may not have seemed like much aesthetically but they stood strong, refreshingly cool during the harsh Karoo summer. Although a few remain – mostly dilapidated or abandoned – historically, they are no small treasure.
Noting how one resident recently demolished his one such stone dwelling, a local businessman lamented how it was all so tragic. He’d read somewhere that some of these houses were so old and important as to be considered for heritage status. Regrettably, it would seem, to residents they aren’t accorded the necessary weight – just featureless and unfashionable relics from an era many would much rather forget about.
A cursory Google search however turns up some interesting finds. Take 1 New Street for instance. Back in the day it was the local ‘kroeg,’ before housing the doctors in recent years and has since been revamped into a facebrick Clicks Store with huge glass windows and gleaming floors. Although much of the building was flattened to the ground during reconstruction, the two “bow-fronted wings with hood mouldings over openings,” seemingly had to be left untouched. Why? Formerly owned by one Fleetwood Rawstorne (Snr), an ex army officer and its unique features, it’s considered a heritage site and thus could not be altered. Interestingly, Colesberg boasts at least 80 such sites in town, none of them in Kuyasa.
According to Mbulelo Kafi, an ex councillor and member of the ANC Youth League, there have been several instances where a property developer would find his plans to develop a particular area thwarted by legacy issues. Although the council would almost always side with the investor, especially in as far as such projects would inject some much-needed jobs and money into the local fiscus, this is always difficult terrain to navigate. As such, this often results in lengthy talks and stalled projects.
History aside, it is quite apparent that there is much education on legacy to be conducted if anybody’s sincere about preserving Kuyasa’s own unique history. Of course endeavours of this nature will require not only the community’s buy-in but knowledgeable individuals to step up to the task. One such pioneer is Jeff Rademeyer. Having led an illustrious career in politics in various parts of the country, he wants to plough back into the community of his heart. Through his proposed project, he hopes to retrace and hopefully resurrect the rich history of the various once-marginalised communities. (For an in-depth report on his designs, we’d like to point you to our associate site, toverview.co.za).
But back to the old timer sat in an overall beneath a tree, Tat’ Manzi. Noting that his own home was falling apart deemed it better to erect a home of corrugated iron than to see to the old structure’s upkeep. For him, concepts like legacy may seem appropriate for everybody else but a man of his simple means. And therein comes other familiar rubs: land and common perception. The general consensus about the stone houses is that they represent poverty, a time when people were simply scrambling to put up a roof over their heads. They are too old. And, seemingly everybody wants a modern house with plastered blue bricks and a tiled roof. A house of stone makes the owner not only look poor but backward – not refined enough to latch on to new trends.
Land or lack thereof is the other rub that is evident. In Diep Hoek, Six Penny, New Brighton and surrounds, the ervens are cramped. Houses almost leaning or crumbling on each other. Likewise the roads. It was partly due to this that the now stalled Ou Boks Project that eParkeni has written quite extensively on, was conceived. But we all know how that turned out, leaving people like Tat’ Manzi to live in these homes hardly big enough to accomodate a batchelor. Ironically the further one moves into Kuyasa from these earlier settlements, the bigger the yards seem to grow. And the houses, formerly shacks or state-built have been developed and impressively worked over. Although one occassionally encounters refurbished homes in New Brighton, in the main, the yards appear too small for an owner to hope to work any appreciable magic to his property.
Amazing how something as seemingly negligible as a crumbling stone house spills onto so many facets of a community. A ripple effect that forces us to see how enjoined everything else is. For instance, unlike Ou Boks, Lowryville appears to have been a “planned” settlement. Most of the houses are uniform – set in that state-built matchbox style of the previous establishment. None of the “original” homes fall out of step except those that have been altered in later years. There are fewer standalone shacks. Roads are more orderly. Perhaps the one stark smudge in the neighbourhood is the Plakkerskamp, haggard and teeming with shacks in the distance.
Looking at that Plakkerskamp yonder, one must wonder how those people came to live there. Far away from everything. From everybody. And behind us, how – if we are to take Mr Manzi at his word – the Coloured community, once upon a time neighbours with baSotho and amaXhosa found their way up here? Were there District Six-like scenes? Government officials pulling up, pencils in hand, for that infamous ‘pencil test’? Were the ones through whose hair the pencil slipped duly bundled up with all their luggage and pointed to the new area on the other side of town? Were there babies, wailing and disconsolate, being yanked from their parents based on the test’s outcome? Was this our own sad case of forced removals? A Sophia town of the Karoo. Well, these are the sort of questions that Mr Manzi and his venerable ilk can answer and for Mr Rademeyer to ensure they are documented.
Sorry for my forgetting memory I now see clearly that 1New Street is were Clicks is and really it was a Kroeg and then Doctors Surgery. Thanks