Lenin has made a comeback – on a T-shirt. Ferial Haffajee looks at new political designs
The T-shirt. For long an integral part of South African life, a collection of T- shirts from the Seventies to the present can tell the history of this country.
Often an important part of anti-apartheid campaigns, there was a bit of a slump in politically-inspired T-shirts after 1994 when they were fast replaced by the suit and tie as the preferred dress of strugglelistas turned civil servants.
At the African National Congress conference in Mafikeng this week, Lenin made a comeback. He is emblazoned on a T-shirt inspired by Levis and commissioned by the South African Communist Party.
Zia Afrika, the company which designed the T-shirt, has turned Levis’s red label on its head. The T-shirt reads: “Quality never goes out of style”; it includes a hammer and sickle where the copyright sign usually would be and a red label with the word “Lenin” on it.
The communist party’s message on a shirt is cleverer than the one which the African National Congress has chosen for this week’s conference. Deputy State President and ANC President Thabo Mbeki is the subject of this slightly pedestrian skipper which uses the theme: “Forward to the 21st century”. Mbeki is superimposed on an ANC flag in a first attempt to start building his image into Mandelaesque popularity.
In conference week, another T-shirt made its appearance. Produced by an outfit called Rogues Gallery, this one could get its wearers into a lot of trouble. Its only illustration is a photograph of Winnie Madikizela on the final day of her testimony to the truth commission, wearing that particularly ominous pair of glasses with a diamante-studded frame.
Below it is a quote from Amilcar Cabral saying: “Tell no lies. Claim no easy victories.” Its message on the back is not as deep: all it declares is Mandela United FC.
Like Lenin, Chris Hani too has been resurrected for this conference by the communist party. In a fairly standard design, Hani is pictured saluting in his fatigues. Zia Afrika’s owner Jerome Keshwar says that what is new about this T-shirt is not its ideology, but the hand-written message from Hani on the back: “Socialism is the future – Chris Hani.”