This one time:A letter to Jeff Rhadebe

by kwezilomsom

Dear Minister Rhadebe

We, members of the black queer community, ask you to explain why?

This weekend alone we have buried four black people. Four blacks who dared confront and complicate the confines of gender and sexuality. They dared to live lives openly that are against the hetero-patriachal norms that are promoted by your political party. Four people who are black, queer and nothing to capitalism. Four people who will not give you more power. Four people who matter to us.

We write this letter with the knowledge that we will not be taken seriously; we have therefore buried them, with that knowledge. We continue to fantasize about the day you will start to care. The day where we start killing you and those that you love, we will possibly start to see how the wheels of justice can accelerate.

We write this letter knowing that you will find something about evidence collection in these cases, non-cooperation from communities, understaffed courts and police stations and all the usual bullshit excuses we have become so accustomed to. We are certain that you will brush us off and tell us that a process will be put in place, a task-team formed and education drive.  The second transition……Ales

We sit here-Jeff Rhadebe scared for our lives. Scared, because we know we are next. Scared, because we face verbal and physical violence every day. We are threatened and beaten, excluded and ostracised, told that we do not belong. Everyday.

 We sit here with the knowledge that the state you and your party have created is one in which there   is no penalty for the violence against the black queer body.

We sit here knowing that you are incapable of addressing the structural issues that lead to the violent societies to which we pretend to  live, pretend to breath pretend to  choose.

We sit here and we ask for the barest minimum

We ask that you take real steps in finding the perpetrators of the bodies we have just buried. Just these four. This one time.

We sit here knowing that the ANC is able to make the impossible possible. That the ANC is able to have funds to take to the EU, the same ANC is able to build stadiums in places where there are even no universities for black children, that the ANC is able to host guests and make THEM feel safe by arresting, prosecuting and convicting criminals during the world cup. We know that were we white, were we men, were we not sexually deviant negros you would care.

We sit here knowing that the two most efficient government agencies are those that put money in your pockets(SARS)and those that ensure your governance till Jesus comes back(IEC)

We know that this is no coincidence. This is why we ask for these small things. The arrest and conviction of the perpetrators of just four crimes. Even if it is to just shut us up, even if it is only for a little while.

We ask this in your White Master’s, Jacob Zuma’s yours and every other better black’s holy name. AMEN