Africa 2010 – Bridging the knowledge divide – Beitbridge

CONVERSATIONS WITH MAWERE

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Africa 2010 – Bridging the knowledge divide – Beitbridge – Part 13 of 30

Posted on January 06th 2010

Our past has helped define the present. We may not like or respect our total heritage but we are compelled to know it in the interests of progress and development.

Africa's heritage is too complex for us to pick and choose what aspects to preserve and condemn.

When I was growing up I knew like many of the existence of a bridge, which forms the political border between South Africa and Zimbabwe, but I did not know of its history and origins and more importantly why it was named Beitbridge.
I just assumed that Beit must have been one of the British colonialists.

The connection between Beit, South Africa and Zimbabwe is knowledge I did not acquire in my formal education.

I have often crossed the bridge that is located about 1 kilometer from the Beitbridge, the border town in the province of Matabeleland South, Zimbabwe.

The name Beitbridge refers to both the border post and bridge spanning the Limpopo River.

Today is the first day of the year 2010 and when I woke up I was inspired to write about this important address in Africa not only because it connects two important countries in Southern Africa but of the history and lessons inherent in it.

When I was growing up in Rhodesia, I had no idea that although the country was named after Cecil John Rhodes, whose English heritage is well known, the real movers and shakers of the colonial project were not exclusively English. Alfred Beit

What I have come to learn over the years is that the financing of the project was internally generated and there was no direct cash injection by the British administration to promote and sustain the colonial initiative.

The bridge was named after Alfred Beit, a Jewish German-born British financier; gold and diamond magnate, philanthropist, supporter of British Imperialism and a business associate of Rhodes. He helped finance the establishment of De Beers diamond mining company, a company that was founded by Rhodes.

Beit who came to Africa from Germany had no connection with the British Empire. He was sent to Kimberley in 1875 by his firm to buy diamonds and the rest is history.

He made his fortune in Africa and chose England as his adopted home and was knighted by Queen Victoria in recognition of his contribution to advancing English civilization.

From the wealth made from African resources, he became a major donor towards infrastructure development in central and Southern Africa, and to university education and research in several countries.

Beit was also a director of a number of companies associated with Rhodes including the British South Africa Company and Rhodesia Railways.

In 1929, the bridge was constructed at a cost of US$220,000 with financing jointly provided by the Beit Railways Trust and the South African Railways. Until 1995 when a new bridge was built by the Zimbabwean government, the bridge was the sole link between South Africa and Zimbabwe.

What is instructive is that post-colonial Zimbabwe did not produce another Beit who had the vision and selflessness to set up a Trust, Beit Trust, through which he bequeathed £1,200,000 for infrastructure development in the former North and South Rhodesia.

My image of settlers was shaped by the character and language of the liberation struggle.

A causal connection between colonialism and imperialism was made to the extent that I would not have imagined any colonialist to behave any better than any soldier of fortune.

Why would anyone with no vested interest in the future of the country bother to leave funds for the development of infrastructure that would benefit people beyond his/her circle of friends and family?

Any person who uses the bridge must know that he/she is an inheritor of Beit's legacy.

The Beit Trust was later modified to university education and research in Zimbabwe, Zambia and Malawi.

Although Beit died in 1906 or five years after the death of Rhodes, the bridge was only built in 1929.

At Beitbridge, three railway lines meet i.e. the South African Spoornet line to Polokwane, the National railways of Zimbabwe line to Gweru via Rutenga and the Beitbridge Bulawayo Railway.

Beit's brand has proved strong to the extent that even after independence there has been no call for a change of name.
Zimbabwe has comfortably accepted that Beit is part of the country's heritage.

He had no obligation to invest in the projects that he did in life and after death but believed in the future of Africa.
Africa is better because of the corporate social investments made by people like Beit.

There was nothing that prepared Beit for what was to come his way in Africa. He had no idea that Africa would be rewarding to the extent that it did to him and his family.

Without the resources that lay in Africa's belly, there would be no Beitbridge to talk about.
What is significant is that the resources in question would have remained where God deposited them were it not for the creativeness and ingenuity of people like Beit.

Rhodes without Beit's financial engineering would have just been another English dreamer.
The bridge is a reminder to all of us on what occupied the minds of the founding fathers of corporate Africa.
Their calling could not have simply been the plunder of wealth. For if it was, Beitbridge would not exist.

Through the Beitbridge story, we now know that it was private funds that were combined with public funds (from South Africa) to construct the important link between the then Rhodesia and South Africa.

Rhodes understood as the Imperial Administration must have understood that allowing private sector intervention can result in growth and development than invest in a business model premised on the state as the driver of economic and social change.
Beit was not invited to Africa but responded to the diamond rush that attracted many other people to the continent.
The class of people that Beit belonged to was adventurers of the first order.

They had no one to look up to but they knew that without investing in an institutional, legal and infrastructural system that would attract human and physical capital their dreams of being rich would soon evaporate.

In hindsight, how should we classify Beit as? Should he be included in the class of African drivers of change? Should he be categorized as a blood sucking capitalist? Can Africa's heritage story be complete without the inclusion of people like Beit?

As we grope for direction on what kind of society we want to see in Africa we have to challenge our minds informed by our past - good and bad - so that we can draw lessons on how best Africa can capture the human spirit and imagination to its advantage.

Through this important bridge, we can learn more about our past and the players who shaped our present.

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