Gregory Fortuin: Dreams of a nation in gentle harmony

COMMENT

I am deeply saddened by the vicious diatribe that is threatening to blow this nation apart. Of course there are many legitimate issues. It is, however, our approach to addressing them that raises concern.

A question posed recently was what kind of nation do we wish to be? While working towards a sustainable solution, I know it cannot be a nation where we make dangerous generalisations about Maori being lazy or forever heading off to tangi, or Maori doctors being less able than their Kiwi counterparts.

I know it cannot be a nation where we spit at or blow snot at the people we disagree with. Neither can it be a nation where we have contempt for the spiritual beliefs of others, or dismissively degenerate into name-calling.

For sure, our leaders need to be tough but I struggle to see how calling people "blackfellas" or "haters and wreckers" contributes to nation-building.

We will not survive in this Treaty of Waitangi-based Pacific nation of ours unless we are one sovereign nation under one flag. We are, however, two primary peoples with many complementary peoples. We don't have to be clones of each other, but we are all inextricably linked by a common bond called our humanity.

What we need is harmonised diversity - many strings on one guitar making music together, singing off the same hymn sheet, pooling our collective strengths for the betterment of us all.

To get us there, we cannot dismiss the important roles of the activists and the opinion-leaders on either side, but we desperately need nation-builders and peacemakers.

Let me hold up two examples of what I mean; two men who jointly were the deserved recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize. One was the right-wing candidate who succeeded the obnoxious P.W. Botha as president of South Africa in 1989. Into a momentous year for the world - when the Berlin Wall crumbled, Mikhail Gorbachev embarked on perestroika and students rose up in Beijing - stepped an unheralded nation-builder called Frederick Willem de Klerk. A man who in opening Parliament in 1990 delivered one of the top three nation-building speeches ever delivered in a South African Parliament. A man who dreamed about a nation in harmony, and backed up his words with actions.

A few days later, de Klerk unconditionally released his co-Nobel Peace Prize recipient Nelson Mandela from 27 years of incarceration. This was a man who in the pursuit of the restoration of the dignity of his people had been found guilty of treason, and was labelled a terrorist not just at home but even in New Zealand. A man who, as a strong 46-year-old African, dared to dream about equal opportunity for all, and looked Justice De Wet in the eye in April 1964 and stated it was a dream he hoped to see realised in his lifetime but, if need be, a dream he was prepared to die for.

In spite of the brutality, the torture, the isolation and the degradation, this man, when in the powerful position of President, turned his back on the Nuremberg model of statutory revenge and chose the model of truth and reconciliation.

When the overwhelming majority called for the dumping of the hated Springbok emblem symbolising white supremacy, Mandela appeared in front of 43 million South Africans and the rest of the world proudly sporting the Springbok jersey at the 1995 Rugby World Cup.

When many of us arrogantly assumed we would replace the Afrikaner anthem Die Stem with Nkosi Sekeleli, he encouraged all of us to be inclusive. A man who joined hands with his jailers at his inauguration as President, not to gloat but in the genuine spirit of national reconciliation and nation-building.

Only the naive would make quaint appeals about sacrificing personal goals for Queen and country. All I gently ask is that in the pursuit of dreams we are mindful of the fact that the nation we wish to be will not happen by default.

Or as Martin Luther King so elegantly said: "We will one day give an account not so much for the bad deeds of a small minority but for the deafening silence of us the majority."

Obviously not everyone can be a leader but everyone can (and should) be involved. Join a group that will suit your needs. Get to know someone outside your own social strata and comfort zone. Write a letter. Don't let a small social humiliation of someone pass without comment, and so on.

I wish to conclude on a personal note. I know the humiliation of calling the white farmer "master" while I worked in his vineyard picking grapes during the school holidays because we needed the money.

I know the resentment of having obtained a university exemption and a first-grade pass in my bursary year but being denied entry at the "white" University of Cape Town to study medicine because they had exceeded their quota of "blacks".

I know the heartache of having our land confiscated by the stroke of a ruthless regime. I also know the joy of taking my kids to where I was raised and responding to my son's question about whether I hated the 13 white families who occupy the houses where my family and eight other families once lived.

I know that I will remain my own jailer unless I learn to forgive. I am not talking about exonerating any perpetrators (they will live with their own consciences). Nor am I talking about obliterating my past. I am talking about knowing the power of having found a peace and dealing with my demons.

And so at the start of the new millennium, my two brothers and I, with all our families, went and gathered from our state homes the remnants of those eight families that lived in the outhouses on my grandmother's property. We spent a marvellous day reminiscing at a resort in Cape Town.

Suddenly an 80-year-old aunt remarked, "Gregory, I am so pleased that you and your brothers have not just done something with your lives but you have remembered us."

I said: "Aunty Anna, when we were just three so-called coloured kids without a dad, you were my mums and dads. Your kids were my brothers and sisters. God help me the day I forget my small beginnings. God help me the day I forget a widowed mum pushed two single beds together and she and three little boys slept on it."

Nation-building is, therefore, not just about the big stuff. It must start at home; it must start with me.

Let nation-building start by honouring our families and friends. Let nation-building continue by the role we play in our communities, and one day when we have achieved our dreams and hold these so-called important stations in life, let us never forget our small beginnings vested in our common humanity.

* Former Race Relations Conciliator Gregory Fortuin was delivering the keynote address at Massey University's college of humanities and social sciences' graduation ceremony.