The strange truths about pangas

It seems that the panga is a very popular dispute resolution tool among a large proportion of the population, especially on a Saturday night.

A protesting resident holds up a panga during a blockade of the R558 in Orange Grove, Johannesburg on 4 December 2017. Residents protested against evictions rumoured to occur this week. Picture: Yeshiel Panchia

We all know truth is stranger than fiction, but the degree of strangeness is at times completely fascinating.

I get confronted with this strangeness every so often when my youngest daughter, a medical student, visits. Her anecdotes about her experiences in various hospitals are hair-raising and, at times, bordering on the surreal.

The worst part, though, is that her stories reflect the bizarre world we live in. And no, it’s nothing like Grey’s Anatomy.

Newspapers carry daily articles about the poor state of government hospitals. Most South Africans have heard true horror stories about maternity wards where babies are delivered in passages due to a lack of beds. And we all know the waiting list for specific surgeries are years long.

But my daughter, being a storyteller of note, has a whole repertoire of colourful anecdotes involving a traditional weapon called the panga.

In a short time, she has become an expert at stitching up head and other wounds inflicted with a panga. It seems this instrument remains the weapon of choice among those looking to attack, or arming themselves for self-defence.

It also seems that the panga is a very popular dispute resolution tool among a large proportion of the population, especially on a Saturday night when beer-fuelled debates centre around the heroics – or lack thereof – displayed earlier in the day on a football field.

Or when there is a debate about who the real owner of a chicken might be. Any dispute and the panga, in too many cases, makes the final judgment.

And so it was one Sunday in the early hours of the morning – so my daughter tells – that a patient entered the trauma unit of the hospital where she was stationed, with a dispute resolution tool firmly lodged in his shoulder blade.

It had to be removed surgically, but the friend who accompanied him to the hospital waited patiently, every now and then enquiring about the well-being of the patient.

Only after the surgical procedure did it become clear that the “friend” was everything but. He only accompanied the patient to the hospital because he wanted his panga back!