Beyond the Grant: Mathonga Elizwe: Spirits of the Land
Mathonga Elizwe – Spirits of the Land, a project supported by an NIHSS Catalytic Research Project grant, highlights the ongoing struggles of South Africa’s labour tenants. Despite decades of democracy, these former labourers still face oppression and obstacles to accessing the farmland they have worked on for generations. The slow pace of resolving labour tenant land claims is driven by ideological and political factors, reinforced by the misconception that these claims are only about small pieces of land near their homes. The exhibition and documentary expose the current oppressive social relations on white-owned farmland, while elevating the voices of former labour tenants and challenging the myths that undermine their recognition as skilled farmers.
This film tells a true story of the last remaining Black people living under oppression on white owned land in South Africa today. In pursuit of land justice, Mathonga Elizwe narrates how Black people lost land in the first place, and how they became workers, and landless tenants on the land of their ancestors. Embers of thriving Black lives prior to colonialism are rekindled, and the future imagined. The film ends on a optimistically sobering note, a realisation of white resistance to land redistribution in South Africa today, and what can be done about it, symbolised by the rising sun shining light onto the land, awakening the spirits of the land, and raising land politics consciousness for future generations.