Strikes are united. strike teaches the mines’ workers

Strikes and revolutions are represented as parts of the communist principles in Mine Boy. Strike is a means to open the eyes of the South African workers to the real world . It shows them that they can struggle against the capitalist system. They can revolt against their capitalist managers, but strike will succeed only if they are united. Strike teaches the mines’ workers to think about the whole working class, since they are  under the same economic circumstances as a cheap labor forces.

This rebellion comes  against the impacts of exploitation imposed by the capitalist leaders. Xuma demonstrates good and brave qualities like courage, masculinity and manhood. He fights against the Western authorities. Abrahams represents Xuma as a model who is  courageous in his struggle against the Westerns . Later Xuma meets  Leah’s friend, a mine worker called Johannes, who works for an Irish man called Paddy O’Shea, also known as the Red One. Paddy hires Xuma as boss boy who is responsible for a group of mine workers.

At the beginning, Xuma does not like it  because of the hard conditions, but later he tries  to work hard and gain the respect of Paddy and his friends. Paddy has liberal thinking. He believes that Xuma is the future for the black society due to his strength and courage. Paddy and Xuma report that the mine is not safe for working, but the white engineer ignore that. Later, when Xuma goes to work, he gets astonished because the mine is collapsed; unfortunately, his friends Johannes and Chris  are detained inside the mine. Paddy and Xuma try to help them but they are late because their friends are dead. This accident fuels the anger of Xuma who rejects to work until the mine is  repaired. Xuma shouts that even the blacks are humans: Xuma felt good suddenly.

Strong and free. A man. ‘ We are men!’ he shouted. ‘ It does not matter if our skins are black! We are not cattle to throw away our lives! We are men!”  His friends joined him. Even Paddy the white man, supported the black workers that what motivated Xuma . He smiled:” Now he understood .

. . One can be a person first.

A man first and then a black man or a white man. But the white owners do not appreciate his opposition and consider it as strike, so the workers are arrested by the police. Xuma does not keep silent, and he asks  for his rights and revolts  against the colonial oppression. At the end , he uses  Paddy’s view “ Is not the blood of black man red like that of white? Does not black man feel too? Does not a black man love life too?”