MoAfrika wa Mokgathi Epitomising Mamelodi’s cultural pot

Mamelodi and the greater Pretoria’s multiplicity can probably be described well by MoAfrika wa Mokgathi’s words: “Re bana ba Tshwane, fela ga re tshwane,” which means, “We’re children of Tshwane, yet we’re not all the same.”

Mamelodi is one of the cultural hubs of South Africa. It is here that you can come across talented jazz artists jamming at a hangout spot, gifted writers exchanging ideas while unwinding, or just some young people enjoying the liberty of youth at social gatherings known as diSocial, which play the most thumping house music. GROWING UP IN MAMS

“Mamelodi is a boiling pot of energy, culture – it’s so multicultural. That’s what makes it unique. We’re known as the party people,” MoAfrika shares with Spot-On. MoAfrika, whose real name is Muriel Mokgathi-Mvubu, is a renowned writer and artist born and bred in Mamelodi East, Section 14.

“I’m moulded by the landscape and the soundscape of Mamelodi. I love jazz music. Mamelodi is full of jazz music and that somehow was embedded in me growing up here,” says the 35-year-old.

“It was a very lovely childhood upbringing; the home was a happy one. We didn’t have silver and gold, even though my grandfather worked at the South African Post Office and my grandmother was a kitchen lady. What I can say is that we never went to bed hungry, and for me that was a good childhood,” says the creative MoAfrika describing her childhood in Mams.

FAMILY FOUNDATION

MoAfrika is respected for her work throughout the world, but it was her grandfather and uncle who laid the foundation. “My grandad only studied up until standard 4 [grade 6] I think and, because the family was very poor, they could not afford to lose hands in the farm because that was their way of making money and he could not study further. He was intelligent; he somehow found refuge in literature, and he would pass away time reading Sepedi novels,” she says of her late grandfather. Her uncle was an English teacher fascinated by poetry.

“The passion that was around literature just somehow became organic for me to express myself within the two languages.”

MAMELODI TO THE WORLD

In April 2019, MoAfrika launched her debut poetry collection, My Tongue is a Rainbow, as part of the Azania to DC (#AzaniaToDC) Poetry Tour and Cultural Exchange (Washington, USA). The collection explores marginalised languages, race, inequality, as well as women and children abuse.

MoAfrika wears the hat of author, poet, performer, theatre actress, translator, cultural activist, teaching artist, arts codes adjudicator, band leader, curator, award-winning radio presenter/producer and serial civic leader. “I wear many hats for the pure reasons that, in South Africa, the creative and cultural career trajectory is not a one-way street – one needs to have multiple income streams. One needs to be able to survive or to live depending on how hard you push and the kind of connections you have,” she says. She is the co-founder of an NGO called Hear My Voice and is a non-executive director and board member of the Association of Independent Record Companies.

In 2020, MoAfrika won the Mail & Guardian 200 Young South Africa Alumni for her contribution in the arts and entertainment sectors. In 2021, she headlined festivals and literary events in South Africa, China, the US and Sweden. She was cocurator at the Nobel Peace Prize in 2020 through Hear My Voice.

“The Nobel Peace Prize happened because we – and I mean we as a cofounder and director of Hear My Voice – had been doing a whole lot of work in exchange programmes with Sweden since 2017. We made a number of connections. Sweden’s former cultural attaché, Hedda Krausz Sjögren – after her contract had expired as attaché – was working on projects and one of them was the Nobel Peace Prize, where she roped us in as Hear My Voice to co-curate in the heart of lockdown. It was a very lovely experience,” says a proud MoAfrika.

@Moafrika01 or @Hearmyvoicesa

mukgathi@gmail.com LOOKING AHEAD

This year, she embraced being behind the scenes doing more curation work and producing, having produced a Scandinavian book festival with about 60 000 people in attendance.

“The universe has just said, ‘You’re in the background for this season,’ she jokes. “I won’t be having any performances this year, but I’m commissioned for a music and poetry album. Hopefully, it will be released sometime next year – it’s one of those labour of love projects.”