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South Africa stands on the brink of a possible explosion of Covid infections. This is the time for us to put all our differences aside and focus on defeating the pandemic, writes Tinyiko Maluleke.
Rise, like lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number!
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you: Ye are many - they are few! (Percy Bysshe Shelley)
Proverbially, March is the month that is supposed to come in like a lion and go out like a lamb - probably because it sits smack in the middle of two seasons.
However, for South Africa in 2020, March came in like a lamb and went out like a ferocious lion, leaving in its wake, the stench of fear, panic and trembling.
On the 5th of March, when Health Minister Zweli Mkhize introduced us to Covid-19 patient zero, our sense of invincibility was wounded, our worst fears confirmed, and slowly, we started to bid farewell to our innocence.
By the last day of March, there were 1 353 confirmed infections and five Covid-19 related deaths.
Suddenly, our coronavirus jokes were failing to land and our funniest coronavirus stunts were no longer cool.
Suddenly, our place of pride among the nations who deploy humour as a weapon against calamity, was no longer secure.
However, the South African rumour mill has been forging ahead, moving from diminuendo to a new crescendo, without losing its penchant for innuendo.
Today, the foot soldiers of the rumour mill, swarm the streets of social media platforms, where they move in orchestrated formations, armed to the teeth, with unsubstantiated Covid-19 presuppositions and propositions.
All manner of horror video clips, purporting to be from Italy, Spain, China, you name it, are being frantically forwarded to and from friends, colleagues and acquaintances.
Esoteric recipes and cryptic formulae of Covid-19 cures, symptom registers and booster remedies, are flying around at great speeds.
Ours is a nation in trauma, within a world in distress.
Recently, an exasperated friend from Lausanne, Switzerland, sent me a text message describing the situation there as "a mixture of WWIII, apocalypse and widespread deaths".
He went on to say, "there are neither rich nor poor, neither Swiss nor foreigner, neither pretty nor ugly; we are all in the same war".
Friends in other parts of the world have relayed the pain of losing family members to Covid-19, and then not being able to attend the funerals, due to travel bans and lockdowns.
Our country is at the initial phase of the pandemic.
We therefore must do everything we can, to ensure the flattening of the curve.
For now, the GPs, medical technologists, public health practitioners and nursing professionals are in the forefront.
But soon, we will need clinical psychologists and counseling psychologists, as well as psychiatrists to step up to the plate.
Already, our social and mental health fault-lines are beginning to show.
A lockdown works best when all citizens have homes to go, not to speak of decent homes.
Similarly, for communities with neither water nor sanitation, practicing personal hygiene is a tall order, if not impossible.
While current efforts to house the homeless and supply water tanks to affected communities are commendable, it is a crying shame that it took this pandemic to jolt government into action.
In her recent article cast as a letter to the UK, Italian novelist Fransesca Melandri paints vivid word-pictures of the rollercoaster of neurotic behaviours which she and her compatriots have been through.
Her list includes: denialism, inability to focus, over-eating, excessive social networking, a compulsive turn to apocalyptic films and literature, anxiety over one’s next of kin, worry over looming financial ruin, domestic violence, compulsive laughter and wild singing.
It terms of numbers; we are not yet where Italy is - assuming that we (will soon) have as accurate a picture of the number infections as possible.
But in terms of panic and neurotic behaviour, we may not be that far behind Italy.
Our government must be commended for taking swift and proactive action with regards to the proclamation of a 21-day national lockdown.
But while a national lockdown is an excellent defensive strategy against the virus, in and of itself, it is not enough.
The psychological and spiritual cost of a national lockdown may erode its benefits, if it is not strictly observed and accompanied by widespread testing.
The repeated use of over-the-top language by the Minister of Police, Bheki Cele, which must necessarily be linked to the reports of excessive use of force by the army and the police in some townships, is regrettable.
These actions are the exact opposite of the promises made by President Ramaphosa on the eve of the national lockdown, where he pledged that the army will act "not as a force of might but as a force of kindness" because, "this is not a moment for skop en donner" (kick and beat up).
The Covid-19 pandemic presents South Africans with their toughest challenge since the years of the Struggle and since the advent of democracy.
We will need to be strong, mentally, psychologically and spiritually.
South Africa stands on the brink of a possible explosion of Covid infections. This is the time for us to put all our differences aside and focus on defeating the pandemic.
Two hundred years ago, the English Poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley, penned a poem - The Mask of Anarchy - in commemoration of a scandalous massacre of 18 people by the local police - the Peterloo Massacre - during a political reform rally, in Manchester.
In this poem, Shelley calls upon the "men of England, heirs of glory, heroes of unwritten story” urging them to, “stand calm and resolute”, against tyranny.
While our generation and Shelley’s poem are separated by two centuries, the words with which he ends it, still read as if they were written for us, at this time.
No wonder this remains one of the most quoted poems in the world today.
It popped up in Tahrir Square during the Arab Spring protests in Egypt.
Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the Labour Party in the UK, cannot have enough of this poem, either.
While the enemy faced at the Peterloo Massacre is different to the enemy we face, we can still benefit from Shelley’s encouragement.
If the month of March came in like a lamb and went out like a lion, it seems to me that the month of April provides us with a unique and once-off window of opportunity, to rise like lions against deadly advance of the Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa.
As many people have observed, April is the last month before our flu season starts.
In this sense, April may prove to be the tipping point in our battle against the pandemic.
We cannot afford to waste the current national lockdown.
It must be observed studiously.
In April, we must rise like lions, to defeat the virus and save lives.
Percy Bysshe Shelley speaks to us when he writes:
Rise, like lions after slumber In unvanquishable number! Shake your chains to earth like dew Which in sleep had fallen on you: Ye are many - they are few!
- Professor Tinyiko Maluleke is a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Pretoria Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship. He writes in his personal capacity. Twitter: @ProfTinyiko.
