Maloka, Eddy Tshidiso 1965–

(Eddy Maloka)

PERSONAL:

Born August 29, 1965, in Bothaville, Free State, South Africa; son of John Maloka and Agnes Mototo; married Ruth Mashalaba, December 19, 1994; children: two sons. Education: Rhodes University, B.A.; University of Cape Town, B.A., Ph.D.; University of Lausanne, Switzerland, M.A. Hobbies and other interests: Music and chess.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Africa Institute of South Africa, P.O. Box 630, Pretoria 0001, South Africa.

CAREER:

Historian, educator, researcher, and consultant. Africa Institute of South Africa (AISA), Pretoria, South Africa, chief executive officer, 1999—. Formerly adviser to the former premiers of Mpumalanga and Gauteng; Mellon Research Fellow at Cape Town University, 1992-95. Also University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa, lecturer, 1992, 1997; University of the Western Cape, Bellville, South Africa, lecturer, 1995; University of South Africa, Pretoria, associate member of the history department.

MEMBER:

Association of African Political Science (vice president for Southern Africa), South African Association of Political Studies (president).

AWARDS, HONORS:

Ernest Oppenheimer Fellow, University of London 1994; Visiting Research Fellow, Princeton University, 1996; Visiting Research Associate, Brown University, 1996.

WRITINGS:

(Editor, with Elizabeth le Roux) Problematising the African Renaissance, Africa Institute of South Africa (Pretoria, South Africa), 2000.

(Editor, with Elizabeth le Roux) Africa in the New Millennium: Challenges and Prospects, Africa Institute of South Africa (Pretoria, South Africa), 2001.

(Editor) A United States of Africa?, Africa Institute of South Africa (Pretoria, South Africa), 2001.

The South African Communist Party, 1963-1990, Africa Institute of South Africa (Pretoria, South Africa), 2002.

(Editor, with Korwa G. Adar and John G. Nyuot Yoh) Sudan Peace Process: Challenges and Future Prospects, Africa Institute of South Africa (Pretoria, South Africa), 2004.

Basotho and the Mines: A Social History of Labour Migrancy in Lesotho and South Africa, c. 1890-1940, Codesria (Dakar, Senegal), 2004.

Also author of a weekly column for the Sowetan.

SIDELIGHTS:

Eddy Tshidiso Maloka is the chief executive officer of the Africa Institute of South Africa (AISA), an independent research organization and think-tank that focuses on Africa. He has also has been a consultant to various governments within South Africa and is the author or editor of several books focusing on Africa.

In his 2004 book, Basotho and the Mines: A Social History of Labour Migrancy in Lesotho and South Africa, c. 1890-1940, the author provides a major historical study of migrant labor in Lesotho, South Africa. "Basotho and the Mines is Maloka's solidly researched, detailed look at the development of an important subset of the migrant labour economy of Southern Africa," wrote Teresa A. Barnes in the Journal of African History. "But for a few accidents of history, Lesotho would be part of South Africa today."

Focusing primarily on the period of 1890-1940, the author looks at the Basotho migrant workers in South Africa and Lesotho's dependency on migrant labor. The author writes of migrant labor's major impact on Losotho, noting that 5,000 Lesotho were working in the South African diamond mines by 1877. They later worked in gold mines and approximately 30,000 Basotho (indigenous people to South Africa who make up the modern Losotho nation) were working in mines annually by the mid-1930s.

In his book, the author examines the social and cultural consequences of so many men leaving home to work. The author's historical account is placed within the history of colonialism in Lesotho and South Africa and its impact on the modern geopolitics of the two interconnected nations. The author begins his book with the chapter titled "From Diamonds to Gold, C. 1890-1930s," which outlines the mining industry during that time period. He goes on to discuss the labor shortages and the use of recruiters in Lesotho to get men to come and work in the mines. The author then discusses the deepening dependency on migrant earnings and the competition for jobs. Maloka also describes work conditions in the minds and the life of the workers living in the mining compounds. For example, he points out that they used their old tradition of lipabi, which once focused on aiding the people to face wars and raids, to deal with their new working life.

While their local chiefs visited them at the working camps, the laborers, according to the author, were under pressure by government officials, missionaries, and their mining bosses to act in the Western moral way while conducting their leisure activities, which included not visiting local black townships. The author ends with an analysis of the impact that migrant workers had on Lesotho and a look at how women in Basutoland early on created brothels and beer shops that local authorities tried to hinder and put out of business. The author writes that these women went against their patriarchal society to provide succor to the work- ers while also making money off of them, if not outright robbing them.

"I found this to be a very good book, and it provides a solid study of the South African mines and the Basotho who worked there," wrote Scott Rosenberg in a review on the International Association of Labour History Institutions Web site. Noting that the "book usefully fills a gap in the history of migration to the South African mines," T. Dunbar Moodie went on to write in the same review in the Historian: "In conclusion, this book is a useful regional contribution to our widening knowledge of the migrant labour system in South Africa and how its consequences for rural life vary depending on local circumstances."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Africa, June 22, 2006, T. Dunbar Moodie, review of Basotho and the Mines: A Social History of Labour Migrancy in Lesotho and South Africa, c. 1890-1940, p. 447.

Historian, March 22, 2006, Surendra Bhana, review of Basotho and the Mines, p. 125.

International Review of Social History, April 1, 2005, Wessel P. Visser, review of Basotho and the Mines, p. 109.

Journal of African History, November 1, 2005, Teresa A. Barnes, "Following the Migrant Mineworkers Home," review of Basotho and the Mines, p. 527.

ONLINE

African Books Collective,http://www.africanbookscollective.com/ (April 18, 2008), brief profile of author.

H-Net Reviews,http://www.h-net.org/ (April 18, 2008), review of Basotho and the Mines.

International Association of Labour History Institutions,http://www.ialhi.org/ (April 18, 2008), Scott Rosenberg, review of Basotho and the Mines.