Dear Tjhabi You asked about my arrest and continuing detention. And now I have to tell you the story of our people because that is the only correct answer to your question. From it you will learn about yourself too, because you are part of the people. You will also learn the greatest lesson of them all-that life is struggle. And that without struggle life has no meaning. The story of my arrest goes back to 1450 that is a long time ago, not so? Well, in that year our African forebears were the inhabitants of this country. Of course, the history of the occupation of the land goes back even further to the San and Khoikhoi and farming communities in the interior. In 1450 our African forebears consisted of Nguni speakers on the East Coast and a Sotho-Tswana group on the inland plateau. From these groups developed tribes like those you know today, such as Basotho, amazulu, amaxhosa and so on. They were rich in stock such as cattle. They owned all the land and went up and down without laws to restrict them. They hunted wild game,
ploughed and planted wherever they chose. Among them were great hunters, chiefs and medicine-men. They had their problems too, of course. For they did not have the knowledge which we have today. There was no regular schooling as we know it and people could not write, as I am able to write to you now. They were threatened and often killed by wild animals such as lions and leopards. As in other parts of the world, these tribes went to war with each other too. But certainly no one tribe held another one in slavery or bondage of any kind. Fifty years or so later, plus or minus 1498, the first white men rounding the Cape by sea to the East Indies, touched and landed on the shores of this country. They met the Khoikhoi (white people called them Hottentots) who had moved to the south-western part of what is now South Africa when the Bantu entered the country. After initial peaceful contact between the Khoikhoi and the seafarers, clashes on a small scale occurred. The foreigners moved onto Khoikhoi land and the Khoikhoi fiercely defended their land and freedom. It was the beginning of the first phase or our people s struggle against colonialism.
I say our people s struggle because the Khoikhoi are African people themselves. Some historians speak of the so-called Bantu-speaking tribes as, at best, having arrived in southern Africa at the same time as whites. This argument ignores the fact that the whites met the Khoikhoi on the Cape shores the moment they landed there. The Khoikhoi are not treated as part of the African people by most historians. But we must never adopt the same mentality. The Khoikhoi are African people who occupied these southern African areas long before any white men were here. At the beginning of the Dutch occupation of the Cape, the colonizers tried to maintain peaceful relations with the Khoikhoi. They needed the cattle which the Khoikhoi could supply through barter. Later on, Dutch settlers tried to kill the Khoikhoi and Abathwa (those of the south) so that they could claim this country for themselves. But these people fought back and some fled to the northern areas of the Cape to escape total destruction by their better-armed attackers. The Khoikhoi tribes who were driven from the south-western Cape by the newly arrived white men joined the Namaquas of southern Namibia,
and the Griquas and Korannas who were settled in the north-western areas. The Namas had moved to the Kalahari but the Griquas had proceeded in the direction of the present-day Orange Free State and Natal. Soon they encountered Basotho, amaxhosa, amazulu and other tribes. And because their languages were different from Sotho and Nguni languages, these Khoikhoi and Abathwa units on the one hand, and the Sotho and Nguni tribes on the other, could not understand each other. The Nguni clicks derived from the Khoikhoi show us that some cooperation and cultural contact did take place, but all the same, armed struggles ensued over the occupation of the territory. Once it was clear that they could not defeat the Bantu-speaking tribes, Abathwa had to find elsewhere to settle. They were called Abathwa (Ba Borwa = Barwa = people of the south) by our Sotho and Nguni forebears because they were found in the south. Abathwa and Khoikhoi had lived in these parts long before the other tribes. You might say that they are the oldest South Africans of us all. With the best lands to the north and south occupied by stronger, hostile tribes, Abathwa were forced by circumstances to move westwards towards the Kalahari desert. Some of their unit had moved
there more or less directly from the Cape, more specifically from the Hottentots Holland mountains. In the Kalahari Abathwa found themselves in a dry area with a fair amount of game. Although water was scarce they did not have to contest occupation of the land with anyone. All they had to do was adapt, and that they did. Today people make all kinds of demeaning assertions about Abathwa and their so-called primitive existence in desert areas, but they do so in ignorance: that existence is a miraculous achievement of adaptation to grim circumstances. The Khoikhoi and Abathwa were the first people to fight in defense of the land and freedom of our people. They fought bravely and their fierce resistance is one of the reasons the Portuguese gave up the idea of occupying the Cape. It was only the Dutch who broke their power after 1652. But even then, the most renowned Khoikhoi chief, Awutshumayo, resisted so fiercely that he had to be jailed on Robben Island. He died there without ever turning away from the struggle of our people. Robben Island, as you know, is where many of the present leaders of our people are locked up. Mandela and Sisulu finished some twenty years there
before they were moved to Pollsmoor prison in April 1982. Many, many freedom fighters or our people are still held as prisoners on Robben Island. You were only two years and six months old when I was first sentenced to prison and locked up there, too. Can you see the first connection between us and the very earliest resisters? Yes, we are following in the tracks of Awutshumayo. In my next letter I will deal a little bit with whites and how they came here. It is important for you to understand that too. Please read this letter carefully and if there are questions let us discuss them when we meet. Keep up with your schoolwork. Your loving Dad.