We may not know a lot about her, but we now know that Zanele Ka Magwaza-Msibi has many hats. We know this since she’s seen fit to show them off during her numerous court appearances in the past month.
The national chairwoman of the Inkatha Freedom Party has taken her party to court to prevent it from ousting her from its ranks. She is also demanding that the party urgently hold its elective conference which has been postponed six times since July.
But back to the hats. She’s worn two rather striking versions of the same pillbox design, but in different colours.
The first to make its appearance was lemon — to match her champagne-coloured two-piece suit — the other was lilac. They are the sort of fancy and frilly hats our moms wore either to funerals or weddings.
Stylish and regal
In fact, they are also reminiscent of the hats that Cabinet ministers’ wives used to wear to the opening of Parliament in the Eighties.
Stylish and regal, yes. But appropriate for a bitter court battle over your political future? I don’t know. There is no accounting for taste, I suppose. There was something burlesque about her attire and it was vastly at odds with that of her supporters, who filled the streets outside a Pietermaritzburg court to hear her fate.
They were wearing IFP T-shirts and some were waving sticks and other paraphernalia one has grown accustomed to associating with a traditionalist and patriarchal party.
Perhaps that was the whole point of the netted head gear: to send a strong message to the powers that be that change is afoot, regardless of what garb it comes in.
The ruse may have been suggested by her lawyer, legal bigwig Kemp J Kemp. He might have advised that while she takes on the great party machinery and its leader, Mangosuthu Buthelezi, she ought to look winsome and vulnerable.
Yet beyond the pastel-coloured outfits there was a steely resolve that emerged as she spoke to her supporters. Outside court, she has spoken with passion and conviction, but it has done little, it seems, to win over the women’s wing of the party.
Thembeni Madlopha-Mthethwa, the national secretary of the IFP Women’s Brigade, didn’t hold back when addressing Buthelezi supporters outside court. “As the Women’s Brigade, we support Shenge (Buthelezi’s clan name) as our leader,” Madlopha-Mthethwa said.
“A leader is not made up of only boobs and the fact that she wears a skirt. A leader should be intelligent as well. Clothing does not make a leader and boobs cannot give us votes.”
More than just hats, boobs or clothes
Ouch! Why would the Women’s Brigade come out so strongly against the chairwoman and in such a tacky, sexist manner?
Magwaza-Msibi should not be judged for her taste in hats — as I’ve done, unfairly — or on the basis of her gender, as her compatriots seem to have done. She is clearly more than just hats, boobs or clothes. She has risen to the highest echelons of the party as a result; I’m sure, of her ability, skills and political prowess.
She has held the position of chairwoman since 2000 and even served as a mayor back in the day when the party could raise enough voters to propel it into public office.
Presumably the party wouldn’t have elected her if she wasn’t “intelligent”, as Madlopha-Mthethwa would now have us believe.
Judging by the thousands who turned up to support her at court, there are those who view her as a formidable leader and a serious contender for the party’s top post. Those who are shoring her up are hoping she will revive the party’s ever waning fortunes.
Why, then, is there such resistance to her ambitions? Does the party not feel the need to refresh its leadership, given that Buthelezi has been at its helm since its inception?
Those who frown upon her campaign for presidency may, indeed, have a genuine political gripe about her leadership, but why do they have to use such common, sexist statements to try to discredit her, as opposed to raising whatever those quibbles may be? I say: “Throw your hat in the ring, ma’am!” The party should allow the democratic process to take its course.