A Martyr’s Lesson for Rural Schools

In September a South African school principal will be beatified. STUART GRAHAM looks at Benedict Daswa, the teacher.

Benedict Daswa with children at Nweli Primary School where he was principal.

Benedict Daswa with children at Nweli Primary School where he was principal.

On a field across the gravel road from the neat stone Catholic church, a teacher dressed in a pressed dark suit and tie shouts at pupils from Nweli Primary that its time to return to class.

The hot, rural environment is hardly conducive to suits, but formal attire for teachers is non-negotiable at the school, located in Nweli village outside of Thohoyandou in the northern Limpopo province.

Poorly resourced rural schools are not always associated with excellence, but at Nweli the belief is that setting an example is one of the first and most important steps in educating a child.

Its an approach that was started many years ago by a man named Benedict Daswa, who was martyred in 1990 and is to beatified in September.

Benedict insisted on the highest standards, says Chris Mphaphuli, a community leader and a close friend of Daswa.

He insisted that male teachers always wear a suit and tie and polished shoes. He felt that was important that the pupils had excellent role models whom they could look up to, said Mr Mphaphuli. That approach has lived on to this day. You wont find a male teacher at Nweli who is not wearing a jacket and tie.

When Benedict Daswa, who was born in a village nearby, was promoted to principal of Nweli Primary in the late 1970s the school was a collection of dilapidated mud buildings with a single temporary teacher.

Benedict was determined to change that. He immediately applied to the Department of Education to build a proper school. The department agreed and soon the dilapidated buildings were replaced with more modern structures.

In those days Nweli could cater for pupils up to what we now call Grade 8, but under Daswa the school was soon catering for Grade 7s.

There was another problem. The area is often hit by droughts and food shortages. In 1979, when a food shortage hit the area, Benedict approached Operation Hunger to start a feeding scheme at the school.

He realised that the children had to have food available. No child could learn on an empty stomach.

And so, while the buildings were going up, Benedict planted a vegetable garden in the school grounds.

Benedict, who was a keen gardner, believed that farming was a perfect way to teach youngsters about hard work, humility and respect for the environment.

If pupils couldnt afford to pay their school fees, they could make up for it by working in the vegetable gardens.

There were parents of learners who were very poor, says Mr Mphaphuli. Benedict would help those who couldnt pay their childs fees. He went to their parents and sometimes he would pay for them. Sometimes he would say: I will pay for you, but on Saturday come and work in my garden so that I can give you some money which you can use to pay.

Benedict also insisted that learners should wear uniforms. There were learners who didnt have money to buy their school outfits but he helped them one way or another, Mr Mphaphuli recalls.

Benedicts family and friends remember him as a resourceful man who believed in setting an example for youngsters to follow.

He had used his bakkie to bring rocks up from the nearby river bed to build the local Catholic church. He unloaded the rocks himself and was often seen building and laying stones for the walls of the church.

He was also a keen football player and had a pitch built so that the teams could take part in tournaments.

Women and men were equals in the Daswa home, despite the male-dominated culture in the Venda area. Benedicts mother, Theambi Daswa, recalls her son washing babies nappies and preparing dinners, tasks traditionally reserved for women in the area.

Benedict was always thinking ahead of time, she says.

He wanted to set an example for his children and for the pupils at his school. He wanted them to know that men and women are equal and that a marriage means you have to share the responsibilities.

The story is repeated by Benedicts brother Tanyane and son Lufuno.

He reared me, says Tanyane who was planting in a field nearby.

We stayed together until we started working…we were at the University of Venda. We studied together, he recalls.

In the Christian sphere, the social sphere and in our family, he was a leader.

Lufuno Daswa was 14 when he last saw his father alive.

I remember my final conversation with my father. I was going into the second year of secondary school, he says. He drove me to St Brendans. We chatted for a long time. He was teaching me some words in Sepedi, about how to greet my mother. We prayed and then we hugged and then he closed the door, and then I had to close my door, and then he drove off.

Lufuno, who is training to be a teacher at the University of Venda in Thohoyandou, says his father insisted that he study at St Brendans Catholic school, which was the best school in the area at the time.

He believed in the power of education. He was a hard worker. He was a visionary. He had future plans. He planned for our family, for our education.

Some in the area felt that Benedict might have been bewitched and was betraying his culture.

One day Benedict said, Gentleman, lets try to help our wives, says Mr Mphaphuli.

We grew up traditionally. Women were married to cook and carry firewood on their heads or water from the rivers. They would also look after little ones. Benedict said it was high time we think differently, he said.

The men would say, Your wife has bewitched you. She has given you some muti so that you say yes, yes, to whatever she says. Benedict said, No, that is not how you should think. Think of it as the way God created man. He created man and woman alike.

Benedict believed poor education and ignorance was behind the witch hunts that were prevalent in the area at the time.

In 1990 when lightning struck huts in the nearby Mbahe Village, the local headman and his councillors called for donations of R5 to hire a sorcerer, who would find the person responsible.

Daswa tried to explain that lightning was a natural phenomenon, but his explanations were met with scepticism.

At that time people had already started burning the witches, Mr Mphaphuli recalls.

If they saw that you were prospering in your work or garden or orchard, they would say you are using the zombies. These are people who are dead but at night they use them to work in the garden, Mr Mphaphuli explains.

That is just a superstitious idea. But many people were killed in those months because they had orchards that were bearing fruit.

On February 2, 1990, Benedict was killed by a mob. On the same night his uncle was identified as a witch and was also beaten and burned to death.

This uncle of Benedict used to have circumcision schools for boys, says Mr Mphaphuli. Some in the community realised he had money because the initiates pay a lot. They said, We better kill him, because they suspected that he might have been the one who was causing lightning that had burned houses at that time.

The community in Nweli was distraught when news of Benedicts death arrived.

They had lost a teacher, a principal, a father and a friend.

The community loved Benedict, Mr Mphaphuli says. When he started as principal they realised he loved children. He loved his work. He would stay behind after school to be with the children.

He has been gone for many years now, Mr Mphaphuli says sadly before he looks at the pupils following their teacher back to class.

But you can see from the teacher in that suit, he says. Benedicts example lives on.

Benedict Daswa will be beatified as a martyr at Thohoyandou Stadium on September 13.