The South African public has been overwhelmed by a steady flow of open letters over the past few years. The past week, however, has taken the cake. Or, as Mlungisi Xulu would say, "the endmost week certainly captured the item of soft sweet food made from a mixture of flour, fat, eggs, sugar, and other ingredients – baked and sometimes iced or decorated."
Xulu wrote one of the most difficult pieces I have ever encountered. I thought Shakespeare was really difficult to grasp when I was in high school. Obviously, I hadn't encountered the penmanship of Xulu. His open letter was in response to another open letter written by Kenny Kunene addressed to the president of the republic, Jacob Gedleyikisa Zuma. Do excuse the upcoming wrestling references, but the letter was filled with DDTs, suplexes, clothes lines, tombstone pile drivers, even a chair across the back of the president. It was brutal.
The open letter was scathing and pulled no punches. It went on to detail various "sins" of the president – how he abandoned his friends who kept him out prison, how he is a monster and tyrant, and how it is no wonder the ANC lost the election in Nkandla. He went on and on. ANC spokesperson Jackson Mthembu called Kunene's letter "an abuse of democracy".
We were still recovering from that when Xulu penned a letter with so many big English words it left many of us baffled. I have never doubted my comprehension skills, intelligence and education more than when I was reading that piece. It was legendary.
But what do open letters really achieve? The Kunene and Xulu open letters got me thinking about similar ones in the past. Most didn't achieve much. Very few have sparked any real change. Perhaps the pen is not mighty after all; maybe that's why many choose the sword to force change instead of the pen.
What open letters do very well, though, to paraphrase a now well known quote, is touch people on their studios.
I believe the greatest open letter of all time is Martin Luther's "95 Theses", which he impaled on the door of a Catholic church in 1517. His letter resulted in what historians call the Reformation.
Martin Luther's letter was a reaction to a teaching by a man who was known as the church's salesman, Johann Tetzel, who taught that one's sins would be forgiven if they paid a fee. This was interpreted to mean that one didn't really have to repent as long as they paid the fine.
This was pure and unashamed corruption by the church. Tetzel was not working alone; he had been enforcing the instruction of the Archbishop of Mainz, who had bought his position – the archbishopric – from then Pope Leo X. Yes, bought.
The Catholic Church was the most powerful entity in Europe at the time. Kings had to bend to the will of the church. The Archbishop of Mainz was interested in power, not in the church, like most people who ascended to great heights in the church at the time. This, of course, reminds me of some politicians who are not interested in serving the people, but rather themselves.
I argued in this blog that religion itself is not bad, but rather people who abuse it for their own benefit – much like the ANC. The party is not bad, but there are people in it who abuse it for selfish gain. To serve the people one must be selfless.
The archbishop encouraged these heretic teachings because money was coming in for him to pay the pope for the archbishopric he had bought. The pope also tolerated them because money was coming to his coffers too, which would help him finance his vanity project: the renovation of the majestic St Peter's Basilica in Rome. (Nobody make reference to Nkandla, I see you thinking about it already. Stop it now.)
The love of money is the root of all evil, even in the church.
Martin Luther's letter resulted in the Reformation and formation of other churches apart from the Catholic church. If anything, the letter saved the church from itself. Today, the Catholic Church is still the largest religious entity in the world and probably the most powerful.
I have made the comparison before, but I think that it is worth repeating – the ANC is in need of a reformation. It needs to be saved from itself. People should not seek its destruction, but rather rebuild it. The last thing anyone should hope for is its implosion. That would be a pity. So much of South African history is intertwined with the ANC – John Dube, Albert Luthuli, Oliver Tambo, Walter Sisulu, Nelson Mandela and the year 1994.
The ANC needs to change, but is it willing? It will need to in order to save its history and future.
And no, this is not an open letter.