Marikana The Musical commemorates a decade of post apartheid massacre

The reinterpretation of a groundbreaking eye-witness account of Marikana Massacre from a book to stage is significant. It was inevitable that at the occasion that marks a decade of tragedy that saw countless bodies of men fighting for the living wage of R12 500 then, be staged in some form of another art discipline to remind, resurrect and reposition our focus in a just and fair fight for many black people of South Africa living below the poverty line in the democratic South Africa 28 years on. It is interesting to observe that since the first all-black musical theatre piece King Kong debuted the stage in 1959, years later the musical in South Africa continue to enjoy share of honour and respectability. 

Marikana – The Musical theatre production at the South African State Theatre to commemorate the Marikana massacre. Picture: Supplied

Introducing the book We Are Going To Kill Each Other Today - The Marikana Story, Riaan de Villiers wrote: 'I was not at Marikana, and did not do any work on the ground...I was drawn deeper and deeper into the story to the point where I spent many hours studying the source material.' The book by Lucas Ledwaba, Felix Dlangamandla,Thanduxolo Jika, Sebabatso Mosamo, Athandiwe Saba and Leon Sadiki from which Marikana The Musical presently staged at the State Theatre is its source and adaptation. This production, which won six Naledi Awards out of 18 nominations a year after it was staged in 2014, is written and directed by Aubrey Sekhabi starring renowned artists Meshack Mavuso-Magabane, Aubrey Poo, Siyasanga Papu, Emma Mmekwa and Mpho “Mckenzie” Matome as musical director championing a 40-member cast and alongside a 13-piece band. 

The South African musical tradition has been for many years unleashing the variations of the genre of jazz motifs seeping into the main cultural stream. In Africa we communicate better in song and dance, though we use those elements to communicate with our ancestors, it came handy for mineworkers to employ such traditionan mechanism to communicate with their employer. No wonder there is a musical hybridisation employed to tell the story of 34 fallen mineworkers in that tragic day in Marikana at the platinum mine of Lonmin in Rustenburg, North West. Sekhabi though adapted the story from a book, he tells the story in song and there is a  singing of cappella isicathamiya and mbube music popularised by the Grammy awards winning group Ladysmith Black Mamabazo and myriad of struggle tunes on stage. What I find intriguing is how the dialogue occurs in Fanakalo. Fanakalo (also spelled Fanagalo) is a southern African pidgin that continues to be used more than a century after its inception. Fanakalo, is a language mostly found if not only in mines. This is because various people of African descent bounded by migrant labour with their multilayered cultures come together for work and Fanakalo became a bridge language to communicate, thus it borrows words from many languages. It originated in South Africa, and is also spoken in Zimbabwe, and Zambia (where it is usually known as Chilapalapa), Mozambique, Malawi, and Namibia.

Marikana The Musical presently staged at the State Theatre. Pic Supplied 

MARIKANA - The Musical is effervescent of varied phases of the Massacre including the clash of unions, mine management, mineworkers on strike, the state through police, the African medicine man and paramedics, photographers and journalists and the families of the mineworkers and the widows towards the end of the play. It is a reminder that workers should always remember their power in the economic chain of any country. Here is a story of 3 000 men armed with pangas, spears, knobkerries and other weapons taking on their employer head-on because unions failed them and also because the struggle and victory resided squarely on their shoulders. Sebabatso Mosamo remarked how 'extraordinary' it was to see irate mineworkers organised themselves in such orderly manner to present their just cause. 

The band is underneath a makeshift of the 'koppie' made of metal sheet, where the workers were gathering on that fateful Friday afternoon where the police indiscriminately fired live ammunition at the striking miners. The metaphorical symbolism of the metal sheet is in direct relation with the metal weapons such as pangas and sticks carried by the mineworkers as they chant their songs above the band. Led by Mgcineni 'Mambush' Noki (popularly known as 'The man in green blacket') played by Meshack Mavuso-Magabane, constantly addresses the mineworkers. We get to see live on stage the ongoing turmoil that would result in death. They portray the inner workings of the processes leading to the crossfire with the police. Backed by projection of text on the screen, we also realised that a sangoma from Bizana was involved through his African herbs to make them invisible and bulletproof when shot at.

South African actor Meshack Mavuso during a previous performance of Marikana – The Musical. Photo: Lucas Lwedaba

The side of the police is portrayed both by Aubrey Poo and Siyasanga Papu as the representatives of the men in blue uniform. This story of Marikana, as Sekhabi tells it in song, one sit and watch, disrupts your comfort and stays with you long after you've let the theatre, as evidenced by an eyewitness Lucas Ledwaba when he remarked 'The guns will explode in a murderous chorus, silencing the fearsome clattering of the spears; spears that have found bodies of men, leaving black spots of blood in the sand.' 

What I felt was missing was that somewhere Sekhabi played it safe. It is totally understandable that he couldn't tell the entire story in less than 2 hours of a stage production but I had hoped to hear the involvement of the sitting president in the narrative. I had expected the side of government including those implicated as evidenced from the Ian Farlon Commission of Inquiry. 

The entire cast did justice to the story of Marikana. They brought to life the tragedy in a melodic and mesmerising way. This musical carries with it a distinct change in haunting vocals, protested musical mesmerism, choreographic movements and dance techniques and to some extent has even influenced certain poetry and prose from the script. Besides being a tragic story and worthy to be staged, it fits the classics of the local theatre productions and will prove an invaluable contribution to the theatrical parlour entertainment. 

The musical is on stages from Tuesday until the 28th, with tickets available at R150 on Webticket.

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