with the times
People who got themselves classified coloured in the old days are switching back – to black, writes Angella Johnson
Once upon a time in the old South Africa it was considered infinitely preferable to be coloured rather than black. At least that was what Frank Makoba’s family thought when they opted to fake their racial classification.
But times have changed. Today many former “coloureds” are racing to reinvent themselves as black because they think it will make life easier.
“When I was a boy I was black. Then I became coloured, but now I’m black again,” declares Makoba (48). Confused? Well, it is all about fitting in with the system of government. Different regime, but same pigmentation principle, they cry.
Makoba’s Xhosa parents pretended to be coloured and changed their surname to Mocoba – thinking it was a Muslim surname – because it meant they could find jobs easier “and we could get into good schools”, he says in fractured English.
He laughingly tells the story of how a white employer in Cape Town once remarked that he looked pretty black for a coloured. “He said, ‘Are you sure you’re not a kaffir?'” chuckles Makoba.
“I had to listen to them telling jokes about black people and sometimes even joined in because it was expected. I feel ashamed about this now, but I had to make a living.”
He and several friends from Murraysburg in the Western Cape survived under apartheid by changing their names and forsaking isiXhosa or seSotho for Afrikaans. They denied their heritage, stopped eating mielie pap and sometimes even disowned their families to masquerade as coloureds, who had more opportunities for better education and jobs – particularly in the Western Cape, which was legislated a p
reference labour area for coloureds.
Isaac Dokter, a Karoo community worker, started faking when he was 16. “The situation was that as a coloured you were reserved a better place in life economically and socially.”
So he forsook his seSotho name, Palamang Mosotho, and used the identity number of his Xhosa mother’s coloured friend to re-register.
Dokter remembers it was a painful decision. “My parents had 12 children, but I was the only one alive and it upset my father very much that I was prepared to disown them. He wanted to know why I could not take the punishment of apartheid like he had.” Do kter replied that he, like hundreds of other people in the Karoo, was not prepared to suffer.
His friend Willem Awkes (40) explains that after the death of his Xhosa father, his mother changed his surname to Jantjies so he could get into the coloured Karoo High School.
Local pastors helped families like his by signing false baptism certificates. “At first the authorities refused [to accept] my ID, saying I was black. So I went to court and the magistrate asked me questions in Afrikaans.”
In the spirit of racial madness that existed at the time, Awkes was also told to write a paragraph in Afrikaans. “After I did this the white magistrate said, ‘No way are you a Xhosa. You’re coloured,’ and I got my ID.”
Now he wishes he could speak isiXhosa because it would serve him better in the present political climate of affirmative action. “Being black is better now.”
The men have started a campaign to reclaim their identities, motivated, says Dokter, by emotion. “Personally I always knew who I was, but I want my children to be proud of where they come from.”
He also cites a strong desire to appease his ancestors for any slight they may have felt because of his betrayal.
It’s not just coloureds who want to be black. Dokter claims he walked into his office recently to find a woman he knew applying for a job. “She was calling herself Thandi, but I’ve always known her as Lorna. And she’s white.”