Alternative Schooling for South Africans: Notes on the Solomon Mahlangu Freedom College in Tanzania, 1978-1992

Abstract

South African education was dramatically affected by the 1954 introduction of Bantu Education, a set of apartheid policies aimed at confining blacks to ethnically organized, predominantly non-technical and non-scientific schooling. Under those circumstances, the African National Congress (ANC) recognized the growing need to establish an alternative form of education where free and critical thinking would be emphasized. Efforts to set up alternative schools known as cultural clubs between the years 1955 and 1956 in protest against Bantu Education were simply crushed by the apartheid administration.1 With the outbreak of the Soweto uprising in 1976, the then-exiled ANC received scores of young people who had fled South Africa and put in place an alternative school aimed at counteracting Bantu Education. Thus came about the 1978 birth of Solomon Mahlangu Freedom College (SOMAFCO) in Tanzania, which became the ANC school for exiled youth and for the children of exiled activists at Mazimbu, near Morogoro. At the time of its closing in 1992, Mazimbu (as the settlement came to be known) had grown to include a pre-primary and primary school, secondary school, a farm, a furniture factory, and other divisions that helped support the school. The school itself was named after Solomon Mahlangu, one of the Soweto generation who was executed by the regime in 1979 for his military activities.2 After a brief overview of the establishment of the school complex, this article will examine how the ANC in exile attempted to create a system of education diametrically opposed to the intellectually crippling Bantu education. Following a summary of the school's establishment, four particular aspects will be examined here-the Tanzanizan context, the curriculum, attempts to combat ethnic tension, and student politics-in order to shed light on the ANC's experiment in education in exile. Building SOMAFCO in Tanzania For the building of the complex, the ANC recruited Oswald Dennis (or Uncle Dennis, as he came to be known), a qualified ANC civil engineer who had studied in the German Democratic Republic (GDR). Dennis started work at Mazimbu in July 1977. With funding from the GDR, the Scandinavian countries, the Soviet Union, the United Nations, solidarity organizations, and sympathetic individuals, the ANC was set to achieve its objectives. Soon 80 percent of the work force employed in the building project and subsequently in other divisions of the complex was made up of Tanzanians. South Africans generally remained as supervisors, with Tanzanians providing the manual labour.3 In the early days, teaching sometimes had to be done under the trees and some dilapidated sisal estate houses were renovated for the purposes of teaching and learning.4 Since all the students were in exile and were boarding at SOMAFCO, suitable accommodations had to be arranged. Workers built six units in all with about 144 students per unit and eight students per room.5 The Vuyisile Mini furniture factory played a crucial role in producing high-quality furniture for the school, including student dormitories and other living quarters of Mazimbu. The factory was so successful that it was proposed that the factory should take advantage of the broader Tanzanian market.6 The various divisions of SOMAFCO were designed to support the school. The farm and dairy, for instance, meant that the community had enough milk for its use, as well as eggs, pork, and beef. A good supply of maize fed the Mazimbu community; plans were made to sell the surplus maize to the Tanzanian agricultural sectors.7 The hospital division was officially opened in May 1984. Mostly staffed with trained ANC doctors, the hospital was able to handle a range of health problems faced by the community. Most problematic were tropical diseases like malaria. The hospital also had a maternity ward, so childbirth could be easily handled on campus. The hospital also handled minor operations. …