The March Must Persevere Until Azania Achieves Freedom

“We will persevere until we traverse the streets of our homeland as liberated individuals, our heads raised high.”

This declaration by Robert Sobukwe, a founding member of the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC), was made with great significance. It was an invocation to the African deities and the very essence of the African land.

Three decades post-1994, the name on the map remains South Africa.

The anthem echoing in the stadiums still intertwines Die Stem with Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika.

The land register continues to reflect the 1913 Land Act.

Thus, the march is far from over.

Upon gaining independence, every other African nation chose a new name.

Southern Rhodesia transformed into Zimbabwe, South West Africa into Namibia, Gold Coast into Ghana, Northern Rhodesia into Zambia, Nyasaland into Malawi, Tanganyika and Zanzibar into Tanzania, Upper Volta into Burkina Faso, Portuguese East Africa into Mozambique… the list goes on.

These name changes were not merely superficial; they were acts of political significance.

A name asserts who the nation rightfully belongs to, severing ties to conquest.

In the case of South Africa, the terms of the negotiated settlement preserved the settler’s legacy.

The transition in 1994 ended legal apartheid but did not dismantle the economic and symbolic structure that apartheid upheld.

The term South Africa originated from the Union of South Africa in 1910, a white-dominated state established on African dispossession.

Retaining the name perpetuates the conqueror’s claim as the geographic standard.

Azania, the name championed by the liberation movement to signify an African future, was set aside.

Mandelamania and the notion of “reconciliation” rendered renaming politically impractical.

One cannot reconcile with conquest without retaining its labels.

The legal chain from 1910 to 2026 remains intact, now 32 years after 1994.

The beneficiaries of the 1913 Land Act continue to inherit lands under the same state name that issued the Act.

Altering the name compels one to ask: if this ceases to be South Africa, then whose nation is it, and on what basis do previous titles stand?

P retaining the name bypasses that inquiry.

Even more concerning is that South Africa not only retained the colonial name.

It also held onto the apartheid anthem, Die Stem van Suid-Afrika, which served as the musical endorsement of a crime against humanity.

The United Nations deemed apartheid exactly that in 1973.

In 1994, Die Stem was amalgamated with Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika.

The oppressor’s hymn was stitched to the African prayer for liberation in a disordered act of so-called unity.

Have we, as the oppressed citizens of this land, truly forgotten the atrocities of apartheid?

The anthem seems to suggest we are being asked to.

Die Stem speaks of “blue skies” and “mountains” while our people languished in chains.

It was sung in Parliament as the Group Areas Act, the Bantu Education Act, the pass laws, and the “Sobukwe Clause” were enacted.

To sing it today is to rehearse forgetfulness.

It conveys to the child born in a shack that the tune of her dispossession is equivalent to the melody of her liberation.

The abhorrent system, with all its structures, is destined for the dustbin of history.

It was constructed on theft.

No moral foundation can be established on stolen land.

The 1913 Land Act legally rendered 87% of the country white-owned.

This act of theft is the foundation supporting the banks, mines, and agricultural economy.

It was upheld through violence—Sharpeville, Langa, Soweto, June 16, and countless other massacres.

The police, the army, and the Bantustan system served as instruments of control. Apartheid systematized racism into law and was more than merely prejudice; it was a state.

It determined life opportunities at birth via the Population Registration Act. Its symbols perpetuate consent.

A name and an anthem teach you who owns the country.

When the dispossessed sing the conqueror’s song, they are indoctrinated to consent to their own landlessness.

A name transcends mere designation.

South Africa functions as a “colonial direction” on a compass.

Die Stem stands as a musical monument to conquest.

The PAC recognized this, which is why Azania served as the counter-name, centering Africans as rightful owners, not subjects.

To assert “until Azania is free” is to acknowledge that the quest for liberation remains unfinished. Political rights devoid of land are not freedom.

An anthem intertwined with that of the oppressor lacks dignity.

A colonial name retained after independence signifies a lack of sovereignty.

Sobukwe cautioned us: “Observe our actions closely, and if you detect any signs of ‘broad-mindedness’ or ‘reasonableness’ in us, denounce us as traitors to Africa.”

Maintaining South Africa and Die Stem exemplifies “broad-mindedness” with the dispossessor.

It is “reasonableness” with theft.

The foundations of apartheid—its laws, its economics, its names, and its songs—must all be consigned to the dustbin of history, for one cannot construct Azania on the pillars of South Africa.

You cannot sing “sikhalela izwe lethu” and conclude with the chorus from those who appropriated it.

Thus, the march persists.

Not out of nostalgia, but because the pillars of dispossession are still erect.

And we shall not cease until we traverse this land as liberated individuals, our heads held high, in a country that bears our name.

*Xola ‘eXTee’ Tyamzashe is an APLA veteran and a notable figure in South African history and politics, recognized for his contributions to the Pan-Africanist movement. The views expressed by Xola ‘eXTee’ Tyamzashe do not necessarily reflect those of The Bulrushes