Joseph tends the garden Malan's house
On friday evening, Mr. Malan smokes his pipe and hands Joseph his pay packet.
They discuss the roses.
Mrs. Malan has a parcel of nearly new clothes for him and his family.
The Malans' children play around the pool.
Joseph's wife and child are five hundred miles in Kwazulu.
Joseph makes a cup of tea in the kitchen.
He takes it out to his concrete shed at the back of the house.
He sits on his steel bed.
It is the weekend.
Tonight he will get drunk in a shebeen.
It will be many months until he sees his family.
It has been many months.
BANTUSTAN
Nelson, the son of Joseph, plays football with his friends
Sometimes he pauses and gazes down the dirt road
Today the bus will come??
Today his father will come??
Outside their hut, his mother pauses at her washing
Raw calloused hands on hips, she gazes at her son
She knows it will be many months until Joseph returns
Nelson kicks the football, the bus forgotten for a while.
Tribal Statistics
Give details
Who are you?
Zulu, Xhosa, Sotho, Venda
Everywhere you look now - questionnaires
They want every detail of your affairs
Oh so many people's lives
Wrapped up in those...
CHORUS
Statistics, statistics - figures on a page
Statistics, statistics - numbers on a tape
Zulu, Xhosa, Sotho, Venda
Everywhere you go now
You're in their sight
Yes, they classify you
Shades of black and white
Oh, so many people's lives
Wrapped up in those...
CHORUS
No chance of going back
And putting things right
These people rule with facts in the night
So many people's lives
Wrapped up in those...
Statistics, statistics - to keep you up to date
Statistics, statistics - the sign of the modern state
At night - they will think they have seen the sun
When they see the mad half pig man
At night - screams, battles seen fought in the sky
And the beasts will be heard to speak
CHORUS
Man, man your time is sand
Your ways are leaves upon the sea
I am the eyes of Nostradamus
All your ways are known to me
Think upon it - all of you who may read this verse
Listen and listen well
Think upon it - barbarians, idiots and fools stay far away
CHORUS
Oh, I had a dream
I thought I was alone
And the veil of all the years
Fell from my eyes like a stone
From the ground the seven year child
And a fire will come to the earth
From the sky at forty-five degrees
And the stone will crack with the force
Crisis in the night
No lighting in the ballroom
Voices come and go
Talking Michaelangelo
Down in the forest
The insect kingdom gathers
Pictures getting restless
Trouble in the night
Waiting for the monsoon
No lighting in the ballroom
Finger in the sky
They're jamming all the airwaves
Searching for the traitor
That blew the generator
Oh, Mother - couldn't find a candle
Man, this station's just too hot to... (handle)
Waiting for the monsoon
No lightning in the ballroom
Blood flecked voices
Distortion and gain
Static interference, short wave rain
And there's hot repetition of signals chime
But the feeble reception
Couldn't get the meantime
Tied to the tracks
And the train's just coming
Strapped to the wing
With the engine running
You say that this wasn't in your plan
Don't mess around with the demolition man
CHORUS
I'm a walking nightmare
An arsenal of doom
I kill conversation as I walk into the room
I'm a free line whip
I'm the sort of thing they ban
I'm a walking disaster boy
Tied to a chair
And the bomb is ticking
This situation just not of your picking
You say that this wasn't in your plan
Don't mess around with the demolition man
Brothers and sisters of Azania
It's still the same
The words they use are just a game
Brothers and sisters of Azania
The wind of change
Will break the man who holds the gun
Brothers and sisters of Africa
It's not for me
To say to you what you must do
Amandla
Maatla aruna
Brothers and sisters remember well
Amandla
They can't control
Awhethu
What's in your mind
What's in your soul
Maatla aruna
Brothers and sisters of Azania
Amandla
The chains of time
Awethu
Will break the man
Who holds the key
Amandla, Ametha
Maatla aruna
Africa Suite:
a. Brothers And Sisters Of Africa
Brothers and sisters of Africa
It's still the same
The words they use are just a game
Mothers and daughters of Africa
It's not for me
To say to you what you must do
Amandla
Awethu
Maatla aruna
Brothers and sisters of Africa
You always knew
That history belonged to you
Maatla aruna
Amandla awethu
Maatla...
b. To Bantustan?
What do they do with a man whose father was a Swazi?
What do they do with a man whose mother was a Zulu?
Where do they send him?
Where do they send him?
What do they do if that man's grandmother was a Tsonga?
Do they send him to Kwazulu, Bophuthatswana or Transkei?
I ask why?
What do they do to a man?
They take away his freedom
What do they do to a man?
They take away his woman
Where do they send them?
What do they do to a man?
They take away his children
Oh, they send them to Kwazulu, Bophuthatswana or Transkei
I ask why?
Amandla Amandla
Awethu Awethu
Maatla...
c. Koze Kobenini?
(approximate translation)
How long must we wait?
How long will they keep killing our leaders?
How long must we suffer
(No Kwazulu, no Kwazulu)
(No Bophuthatswana)
(No Lebowa)
Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery
None but ourselves can free our minds
Have no fear for atomic energy
For none of them can stop the time
How long shall they kill our prophets
While we stand aside and look
Some say it's just a part of it
We've got to fulfill the book
CHORUS
So won't you help to sing (no Kwazulu)
These songs of freedom (no Bophuthatswana)
'Cause all I ever hear (no Transkei)
Is redemption song
Soldiers march their freedom
Out into the city streets
Though it seems like a losing battle
There can be no retreat
Kwazulu, Bophuthatswana, Transkei, Lebowa are areas of south Africa called 'Bantustans' where black families live without their men folk who work hundreds miles away in the big cities.
Amandla, Awetha is the black power slogan, often chanted at funerals & meetings wherever opposition is expressed
Azania is the black power name for South Africa
Zulu, Sotho, Xhoso, Swazi, Tsonga & Venda are african tribes
The Runner
Through the night...through the dawn,
Behind you another runner is born.
Don't look back, you've been there.
See the mist as your breath hits the air.
And it's underneath the moonlight, passing some;
Still your heart beats in the moonlight like a drum.
Through the night...through the dawn,
Behind you another runner is born.
Don't look back, you've been there.
Feel the mist as your breath hits the air.
And it's underneath the moonlight, passing some;
Still your heart beats in the moonlight like a drum.
And you will run your time, a shooting star across the sky.
And you will surely cross the line, to pass on the flame.
Sun come up...sun go down.
Hear the beat, see the sweat on the ground.
Watch your step, keep your cool,
Though you can't see what's in front of you.
And it's underneath the moonlight, passing some;
Still your heart beats in the moonlight like a drum.
Through the night...through the dawn,
Behind you another runner is born.
Don't look back, you've been there.
Feel the mist as your breath hits the air.
And it's underneath the moonlight, passing some;
Still your heart beats in the moonlight like a drum.
And it's underneath the moonlight, passing some;
Still your heart beats in the moonlight like a drum.