Fezokuhle Mthonti
Frantz
Fanon’s Wretched of the Earth has
been described, in part, as a prophetic entry into the inner workings of a
decolonised and decolonising state. Without being reductive or essentialist, one
could argue that the first three chapters of this book typify and chart the
complexities that come with a people who have been denied their socio-political
subjectivities and their subsequent struggles to liberate themselves and in so
doing, try to maintain the sentiments of their revolution. However, as Fanon
shows quite consistently throughout the book, the transition into self-governance
is an inherently difficult position to navigate, especially, when your
personhood and political subjectivity has been eroded by the structural
mechanisms of colonialism. I would argue that it demands from the state and its
inhabitants, an ability to see the position which they have come to occupy
through repression and a further ability to see beyond that subjugation. It is an attempt to reclaim and to grieve
over that which was worn out by the European colony and forge out of that, a
political and social identity that is backward, forward and sideways-looking.
