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90 6 Hidden Discourse in the Public Transcript Ceremony and Subversion The formal pitso of 3 July 1880 was the stage on which the hidden transcript of resistance was performed publicly, but it was disguised in the discursive tropes of loyalty from the colonial repertoire. Griffith was right to trust his intuition that the speeches were meant to be misleading , even if he couldn’t quite interpret them himself. Yet an analysis of the pitso speeches reveals the very strategies that so confounded colonial officials, who could not condemn the BaSotho for either what was said or what was not said. Lagden was wise to be alert to significant silences, but in the case of the pitso of July 1880 the BaSotho speakers, including Letsie, revealed a great deal about the hidden transcript of rebellion in the words that they did speak to the crowded assembly. In chastising Masopha the previous February for holding a pitso without obtaining colonial consent Griffith had made it clear that the BaSotho chiefs could not hold public meetings independently or privately, hidden from colonial scrutiny. Their only option for conveying public messages was in public pitsos attended by the colonial government, but they could disguise the real messages through spoken strategies of dissembling. Using the tropes of colonial discourse against itself, the BaSotho spoke of colonial rule as the “Queen’s peace,” an ironic reference to the so-called Peace Preservation Act. The BaSotho had sent a delegation to Cape Town in the hope that they could speak directly to the Cape Parliament to convey the BaSotho opinion with regard to disarmament. There they were not allowed to speak for themselves, but their opinions were voiced by others, and they heard the issues and evidence discussed. They had convinced the colonial government to delay enforcement of the new law until the return of these delegates, and this pitso was ostensibly held in order to hear from them, although most of the contributions to the discussion were made by others. The first speaker, Ramadibikoe, was one of the delegates who had just returned from Cape Town. He told the assembled crowd that they had been able to see the Governor personally, that the debate on disarmament had lasted three weeks, and that the final vote was thirty-seven members of Parliament supporting the extension of the act to Basutoland and twenty-eight opposing it. Perhaps the most significant news he brought was that the delegates had heard the evidence read out in Parliament and that Griffith himself, without informing the BaSotho, had supported their position: Before we went to Cape Town we did not know that Mr. Griffith had interceded for us.—In the House of Parliament letters from the Governor’s Agent, Mr. Griffith, and Major Bell were read: by those letters the Governor’s Agent and Major Bell fought for us. Major Bell told the Government that he disapproved of the disarmament ; that he had himself granted 4000 passes to Basutos who were going to the Diamond Fields to get guns.1 He also told the BaSotho that the delegation had been told that “Her Majesty would not interfere as we are part of the Cape Colony.” The BaSotho were well aware that their status under the government of the Cape was not the same as it had been under the Imperial protection of the Crown, to which they had originally submitted a dozen years before. The next speaker, Jonathan Molapo, who was to become known as a “loyal,” pledged to support Letsie. Implicitly insulting “white men,” he addressed his words directly to Letsie: Peace is a young girl we have wedded against her own will. . . . We have enjoyed peace under the British Government; we have become rich and we are prospering in every way. . . . Mogato (Letsie) is the only one who has a right to speak. . . . Even if he wants us to do what is painful for us, we will follow him because his will is the will of God.—This matter is yours Mogato, the white men are yours.—Retain for us the lands, corn, prosperity and peace which is a nice thing.—We do not eat guns, they are pieces of wood. The tropes of BaSotho discourses of power and local power were used by speakers. Jonathan said to Letsie, “There can be only one Bull and you are that Bull,” and Mphoma, identified in the minutes as “an Hidden Discourse in the Public Transcript 91 [52.14.240.178...

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