What if Steve Biko and Chris Hani were still alive?

When it comes to the great “what ifs?” of South African politics, then there can be no greater points to ponder than what this country might look like now had Chris Hani and Steve Biko lived long enough to make an impact.

Hani was assassinated in 1993 by a white extremist, ahead of the country’s freedom election.

Biko died in police custody in September 1977, eliciting the famous comment from the then police minister, Jimmy Kruger: “I am not pleased, nor am I sorry. Biko’s death leaves me cold.”

Had Hani lived, he would undoubtedly have had an influence on the ANC’s politics of succession and may have one day become president himself – perhaps even obviating Jacob Zuma’s rise through the ranks.

Biko, widely regarded as the father of the Black Conscious philosophy, was never part of the ANC – but it was his adherents in the student movement who forever changed history in the Soweto uprising of 1976.

The ANC later claimed to have been instrumental in the revolt … and reaped a harvest in hundreds of youngsters who fled into exile, eager to fight against apartheid.

Ironically, it was the followers of Black Consciousness who were among the first targets of the “necklace” at the hands of ANC activists in the townships… Biko is often misunderstood, especially by whites, as a man behind a racist ideology – whereas, in reality, he believed in nonracialism and that black people needed to respect themselves first in order to change society.

One of the strongest tenets of Black Consciousness was that Africans should not attack each other.

That belief might perhaps have manifested itself in a strong stance against corruption, whose victims in this country are overwhelmingly poor and black.

Had he lived, that may have been Biko’s biggest contribution to nation-building.