That They Know Who They Are Makes Them Special

The people of the Eastern Cape and the People of the Delta have a remarkable spirit that keeps them together

By Jon Haywood

When the auditorium had filled for a community meeting in Port Elizabeth, the crowd erupted into an amazing session of song and dance, not unlike scenes of celebration in my home, the Mississippi Delta of the United States. I could not understand what they were singing and shouting, but I could feel their commitment to community, and their reference to their past for addressing current challenges.

Similarly, the Delta carries a sense of Southern culture and community that is unique. Indeed, James C. Cobb called it “the most Southern place on earth.”

Clearly, the Delta is unapologetically Southern, and South Africa is unapologetically African. Both places have their ups, but it is the downs that attract the most attention.

Similarly, the differences between the haves and have-nots in the Delta are shocking. For example, the Alluvian Hotel or the Viking Range Cooking School in Mississippi are both upscale. In nearby Baptist Town, vagrancy and litter characterize a neighborhood filled with substandard housing.

Although these two neighborhoods are within minutes of each other, they truly are miles apart in standards of living.

In the townships outside of neatly manicured neighborhoods of Port Elizabeth, there are dwellings with dirt floors and no running water.

The poverty in the townships is raw.

In the Delta, the poor also suffer from poverty. They have lost hope. In fact, when I talk of returning to the Delta, I’m almost scolded by people (both black and white) who think it is a waste of time to try to help.

Similarly, when I visited the townships, I felt that South Africans have given up on people there. Port Elizabeth has an abundance of resources — suitable living, grocery stores, spacious parks and sidewalks. Moreover, the City of Port Elizabeth works with the Nelson Mandela Bay Development Agency, a private organization that plans

and completes development projects for the metropolitan area (and even for the townships). However, the townships are terribly underserved and underdeveloped. Men wander around with nothing to do, young children head households without parents, and heaps of trash sit in several public areas. It seems inhumane for a nation like South Africa, with a bustling economy, to allow any of this to happen in its post-apartheid society, and South Africa’s government says it wants to change the dreadful conditions.

The poverty I saw in the townships is eerily similar to what Robert F. Kennedy saw on his tour of the Mississippi Delta during the 1960s. Kennedy saw crumbling shacks and little children running around with distended stomachs. That is how life in the townships is in 2012.

Moreover, the rate of HIV/AIDS is alarming, for the most part, because of traditional beliefs and myths. Some South Africans believe a healthy-looking person could not possibly have HIV/AIDS. In the Delta, the rates are alarming. Some people won’t get tested, because somehow they know they couldn’t possibly be one of “those” people — someone connected to several sexual partners or a homosexual. However, some men have sex with other men secretly, even though they do not hide their relationships with several women.

Police officers and security guards seem to be everywhere in the nice tourist and development areas of Port Elizabeth. However, I saw no police officers in the densely populated townships

where there is a great deal of crime.

The same can be said about the Delta. In Cleveland (a college town) police officers are everywhere in neighborhoods near the Delta State campus and Cotton Row (the business district). In the working class neighborhoods, fewer police are on patrol. Is that because folks really do not care about whether working folk feel safe?

Law enforcement is not the only element lacking in the Delta and in the townships of South Africa. Both are full of “food deserts” — places with few stores selling fresh fruits and vegetables. I did not see a place where residents could buy fresh food, but I did see a KFC restaurant. In the Delta, more than 84 percent of residents have little access to fresh fruits and vegetables. I am not sure if the city of Port Elizabeth has plans for distributing fresh food in the townships, but in communities like Cleveland and Greenwood, farmers’ markets have opened. Thus, even residents on ”food stamps” can purchase fresh food from local farmers and merchants.

During the apartheid era, the townships of South Africa suffered from higher rates of crime and joblessness. The apartheid government chose to smother the economic potential of the area, and discrimination seems to continue. The Delta suffers from the same problem.

For generations, various European groups swept into South Africa and mulled its resources and overpowered indigenous groups. Europeans were the ruling class and could control access to the best of South Africa.

The same can be said for the Delta. For years, cotton was king, bringing unbelievable wealth to fat-cat cotton planters and merchants who maintained a black underclass of workers. Eventually Delta-produced cotton lost its commercial importance. The fat-cat planters and merchants eventually died off or found business elsewhere, but many of those black workers and their families remained, and for decades the Delta has been left with no real economic strength.

The joblessness rate is high, no real political competition exists and few young professionals live in the region. African Americans are more than 70 percent of the Delta population and the Delta is heavily Democratic. In Congressional elections, a Republican candidate usually competes against the Democratic incumbent, but the GOP has not had a serious challenger for years.

Young people have given up on the Delta, and the de facto one-party system seems to guarantee the Delta is near death.

Economic development councils have invested in tourism and teacher training programs in an attempt to revive the area, but nothing has worked well enough to provide much hope.

In South Africa more than 18 years ago, the apartheid government chose to restrict the free market system and the political process. Today, the people of South Africa are demanding that the government right the wrongs of the apartheid era. The Delta is a different story; the people have chosen to halt the political process for more than

30 years, and nothing of substance has been done to combat the problems.

As a lifelong resident of the Delta, I am inspired by the conviction that the Delta can change for the better and that the region has a special place in American culture. Indeed, you cannot spend time with the people of the Delta and the people of South Africa without falling in love with their zest for life, their sense of community and the very real sense that they possess a spirit that finds joy where others might see sorrow.

These are incredible people.

If the Delta can find ways to take advantage of the best parts of its culture, the people may be able to preserve their traditions and culture. The Delta has made initial steps to promote blues music and civil rights history. Similarly, the townships need infrastructure and major social engineering to showcase who they really are.

Clearly, the people of the Delta and the people of the townships have not lost the remarkable spirit that keeps them together. They know who they are, and that makes them so special.