Johannesburg – The passing of renowned broadcaster and commentator Dumile Mateza is not important in itself. We have buried far too many good men over the last couple of years. But his death is more than just an additional statistic.
As a media personality, his passing is a story carefully chosen by the hand of history to shape our understanding of ourselves and the institution we built … only to be destroyed by the governing party under our watch.
If you were to study Mateza’s life, it will open a gateway into how black media professionals infiltrated apartheid institutions to reshape them into a voice of the people. He joined the media, specifically the SABC, in the 1980s. The political heat was rising.
Mateza’s life and role at the SABC do reveal the meaning of a true African broadcasting. It was more than how he twisted and twanged the Xhosa language to make it palatable to his audiences. He was a remarkable man. You felt his presence.
The way he presented and unfolded boxing, soccer, cricket and rugby matches was so vivid that it demanded conscious contemplation. You listened to his voice more than following the games with your own eyes.
I will not pretend to not know that the man was a reservoir of historical knowledge and intellectual depth. When you spoke to him, you got a sense that he was confident, assertive, and highly opinionated because he read and read wildly.
No one is born with knowledge. It can only be gained through reading. And like a man who was not afraid of his own company, he read a lot. He held such strong views on issues of national importance that he left people feeling
uncomfortable. He knew how to tell his story.
If you are true to yourself, your role is not to make people to be comfortable around you. This then leads us to the warning and promise of his life. When he quit teaching to pursue a career in broadcasting in the 1980s, it was because he knew who he was and what he could contribute.
Of course, no one thought that his move was about a desire to change apartheid and transform the SABC in a way that Africans could relate and identify with the institution. After all, it was a propaganda tool of the apartheid government.
But the presence of Mateza on the airwaves and its effects were completely unpredictable. No one knew for sure what Britishising isiXhosa would do.
It turned him into a household name. He was an African broadcaster who learned to be truly present in his job in a way that embraced sorrow.
Working in the media like the SABC is to commit suicide in slow motion. His desire was to make a difference, which he did. But he found himself confronted by layers upon layers of toeing the line to please political bosses.
The prerequisite for survival in South African media is to learn far too early not to question authority. There is no freedom, independence or impartiality. We do not know the details of his departure from the SABC.
Maybe he too was forced to take an early retirement package. Maybe he felt it was time to go stay at home rather than tolerate the suppression of freedom of thought and expression.
But over the last 30 years, we have learned that ownership of the media allows shareholders to decide what goes and what does not. Even sports were
riddled with politics of factionalism. Thus your reportage or commentary needed approval.
Freedom of the media belongs to those who own it.
But who owns the SABC for it does not belong to the ANC?
No minister has the right to dictate content or use a board to assert their political power. It is a threat to democracy.
These are the deeper issues that Mateza brought with him to any conversation. It was thoughts that grew out of his experience and depth over the last 40 years or so. He tried to make his audiences feel the winds of change. He was deeply connected with his spirit, the one that saw him abandon a tiny classroom for a national one.
If we as a nation, we did not want to base our lives on lies or untruths that no longer hold, we would have listened to Mateza.
Not only that, but choose to do something with his insights and knowledge. He survived until retirement age.
The good news is this: if you know who you are and choose to be true to yourself, you will lead a meaningful and purposeful life. Mateza lived, laughed, and loved.
Mateza was the wind of change, a gentle breeze. He knew that to change the world, he had to change himself. And he changed Xhosa broadcasting. May his spirit roam freely to influence a new generation of media professionals.
- Memela is a journalist, author, and former public servant
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