COMMENT
It comes as no immense surprise that the collective resolution of the ANC is to appoint Bathabile Dlamini as the Minister of Women in the Presidency. Over the years, the ANC has proven a haven that houses and recycles misogynists into leadership positions.
It is therefore in the best interest of the ANC – and the protection of patriarchs – that Dlamini be made minister for women. Dlamini has outdone herself proving that she is to patriarchy what the ANC is to white people – a shield that ensures that those entrenched by the status quo do not face any threat from those who are most suffocated by it.
Bathabile Dlamini is the same representative of women who bolstered her delegation meant to represent the ANC Women's League (ANCWL) with six men, in an attempt to improve the "capacity in commissions". Dlamini is the chairperson of the ANCWL who ignored the values and principles of the league by not choosing women delegates from members of the ANCWL because women are "emotional during debates".
Dlamini also made an assertion that men are experts, further relegating all the women of the ANCWL to subordinates of men – in a structure that was meant for their occupation, to advance their struggle against the painful exaggeration of men and silencing of women.
Dlamini did this despite the fact that the ANCWL does not allow men to be members – as a consequence of the basic historical fact that patriarchs cannot be entrusted with dismantling patriarchy.
After the #RememberKhwezi protest demonstration in 2016 against then-president Jacob Zuma, Bathabile Dlamini was the first to jump to the defence of the man. Not to protest that he had been acquitted in the court of law, no. Instead, to dismiss the protest as mere political "grandstanding" – to further remind black women that they are "tea girls" who can be sent to do a man's dirty job.
This makes me wonder – if the new Minister of Women in the Presidency doesn't understand that women have agency and believes that women cannot speak for themselves, how is she the right person to "send" on behalf of women? If Bathabile Dlamini believes that men are the best representation to table women's issues, how is she going to represent us?
While serving as the social development minister – an office vital to beneficiaries of social grants, most of who are women and children – Bathabile Dlamini gambled with the livelihoods of black women and children in defence of corruption and self-enrichment.
The Constitutional Court concluded that Dlamini could not be trusted to do her constitutionally mandated job at the time – ensuring the delivery of social grants. To date, there still has not been a satisfactory account of what caused the South African Social Security Agency's (Sassa's) R1-billion irregular expenditure for the year 2016/17.
In 2016, Dlamini boldly defended a mediocre R753-per-month social grant for beneficiaries, claiming that it was "enough to buy adequate food as well as additional nonfood items". With the still very recent investigation hovering over our consciences – one that concluded that women and children remain the poorest in the country – how can the same unfortunate women who were almost left with no grant "send" the very person who caused the catastrophe to fight against their structurally designed position in this country?
I am not making this declaration against Bathabile Dlamini in the hope that the ANC is capable of delivering a better representative of black women – but solely to record in the history books that the liberation of black women has never been a priority of the ANC.
Secondly, I have never been party to the personal insults hurled at Dlamini; other than the political.
And finally, Minister Dlamini must know that the quest to deliver justice for black women will not be brought to a halt by her appointment.
From her office, we still demand and expect that free sanitary towels be given to young girls and women. We still demand a sex-crime court that will not only question the biases of the law, but also ensure that justice is not delayed and denied to sexual-violence victims. From her office, we demand the advancement and protection of queer women, who continue to be killed and ostracised.
We demand parental justice for women who are left to raise children on their own, while the ludicrous maintenance court places no tangible repercussions on men who do not pay child maintenance. We demand the legislation of equal pay – women cannot continue to earn less than their male counterparts solely because they are women.
Women in rural areas must have access to 24-hour healthcare institutions. Women in sports must receive support equivalent to that given to their male counterparts. The list is endless – but essentially, Bathabile Dlamini must know that attending the funerals of women killed by their partners is not the threshold this office can get by on anymore.