The face of South African crime is, of course, the black man

I sat stunned and paralysed with anger at an upmarket lounge a few days ago when a friend, sister and wife, Letta Mofokeng, told me with a heavy heart that she did not understand why she was a widow and her children were without a father.

Shimi Mofokeng’s neck, heart and liver were ripped into shreds when he was killed by hijackers as he was arriving home last Monday night. The murderers had ambushed his neighbour, Pieter du Toit, and tried to rob him of his bakkie. But it was Shimi that they killed.

“It just does not make sense to me why my Shimi — the reason for my life and existence — has been taken away from me. The bullets tore through his neck and shattered heart and liver. He is dead, now. Nothing will bring him back.”

I was among the mourners streaming to Shimi’s home in Mulbarton, in the south of Johannesburg. This was my very first visit to this decent, warm home that had love, warmth, hard work, resilience, determination and black achievement painted all over the walls.

But on that dark night the atmosphere choked my soul with pain and anger. What a way to be welcomed to a man’s home.

Another statistic was violently murdered not too far from his own home in Johannesburg. In bed by 8.30pm, Letta had heard the gunshots but it never crossed her mind that it was her own husband who was being slaughtered. Nobody deserves to die like that!

I sat stunned and silent with no words to say to Letta, who had turned into a widow long before celebrating her 45th birthday. She was emotionally drained. I could see that her soul was tired. Something in her had died along with the brutal slaying of her husband.

It was when I was sitting in the comfort of my car a few days later that it hit me. Of course, I am too ashamed and angry, as a black man (sic), to attend Shimi’s funeral. May he forgive me for not being there for him at this final send-off. He was a warm township soul dripping with self-love. But my attendance will not bring him back.

Hundreds of brothers and sisters dressed up to attend his funeral today. They spoke, drank and wept over his death, of course. But I have been haunted by the manner of his death and looking for an explanation to put my own soul at peace with what is going wrong in this beautiful land, especially the dark soul of the black man.

It is not a black intellectual or thinker like Credo Mutwa who answered back, but a white philosopher, his voice rising from two centuries ago. His name is Victor Hugo, and he said: “If the soul is left in darkness, sins will be committed. The guilty one is not he who commits the sin but the one who causes the darkness.”

Well, Mr Hugo does not know what he is talking about. He did not experience apartheid — which caused the darkness, presumably. But like millions of other blacks who do not know him, he expects me, too, to place the blame for Shimi’s death on the policymakers of the now dead apartheid regime and white society. He believes that white people created discrimination; they created the slums; they perpetuate unemployment, ignorance and poverty.

It is incontestable and deplorable that black boys and men commit violent crimes, but they are derivative crimes. They are crimes born of the greater crime of colonialism and apartheid. So, black people, especially the men, are not responsible for their actions!

Well, I refuse to console Letta and Shimi’s children by peddling sophisticated and complex political lies. Her husband was not killed by a white man or apartheid policies. He died at the hands of black thugs.

Shimi — an example of the spirit of defiance and determination to succeed and escape township hopelessness — was killed by black men old enough to be his sons, nephews or younger brothers. His soul was torn from his body by bullets fired from a black hand.

Leave the white man and his evil colonialism and apartheid policies out of this one. It is black men, themselves, who have deprived a sister of a soul mate and denied black children the right to live with both mother and father.

I sat stunned in silence as I realised that in this day and age — when it is very difficult for a black woman to find a sober-minded, focused and hard-working black man for a husband — Letta’s life had been emptied of its essence by a black man. The quality of her family life is instantly poorer because of what one black man did to another. What a waste, this senseless violence.

As I sat, stunned into silence and ashamed of being a black man, I had no words of comfort to offer Letta. Even the inane and hopeless excuse of “Sizothini — what shall we say?” could not come from my lips.

Of course, at some point Shimi had to die. Nobody lives forever. But I must confess, I did not expect him to die a brutal and violent death as if he were a soldier at war. This is senseless. It reminds me of how boys from my township in Diepkloof were ambushed by apartheid agents at a Silverton bank in 1980.

For God’s sake, Shimi died not too far from his gate. His sin, if it is that, was to pull up into his street when preying black thugs attempted to rob his neighbour. He was returning home from a long, hard day to hug his children, kiss his wife and enjoy a dinner while later tuning into jazz or some radio channel.

I have seen and known him over the years. We have shared company, a drink and engaged in critical intellectual discourse. He did not live by the gun. He did not deserve to die by the gun. Nobody deserves to die by the gun. The guns of liberation have long gone silent. Joe Slovo, Chris Hani and Joe Modise must come back to command their new troops.

After 350 years of war, there is now peace and reconciliation in this country. This is the best gift that Nelson Mandela has given this country and the whole world. In fact, the past 13 years is the only time that there has been no war between black and white over land or the wealth in its bosom. So, why are black men killing each other and wanting to blame the white man and apartheid for that?

Why can’t a woman like Letta hear the guns going off and not think that it is black men killing her husband? Why should a bleeding and trembling Pieter du Toit be the one who stumbles into her house to cry and apologise: “I am sorry, but they were trying to hijack me. Instead, they killed your husband!”?

It was neither a white man nor apartheid that killed Soweto’s exemplary son. It was a black thug. It is time for the black man to accept responsibility for his sins committed against the white and black people of what Alan Paton called “a beautiful country that man cannot enjoy”. The black man must just grow up and accept responsibility for the consequences of the decisions he takes every moment of his life.

I am stunned into silence. I do not have words of comfort for Letta Mofokeng. I had no courage to attend Shimi’s funeral today, Tuesday at Kromvlei cemetery in Johannesburg south.

May the ancestors bless his gentle soul! Indeed, he was a gentle giant.

Hamba kahle, mfowethu!