Address By KwaZulu-Natal Premier Sihle Zikalala During Human Rights Day Commemoration
21 March 2022
MEC’s and MPLs present;
Mayors and Councillors;
Traditional and Religious Leaders;
Senior Government Officials;
Community of Ixopo and KwaZulu-Natal;
Members of the Press;
Distinguished Guests;
Ladies and Gentlemen;
It is a humbling honour to mark Human Rights Day with the community of Harry Gwala District Municipality and KwaZulu-Natal here in Ixopo.
The 21 of March 1960 marked a turning point in the history of our country.
It was a day where 69 African patriots were brutally massacred on the day, as well as the more than 180 protestors who were injured in Sharpeville.
Treated as subhuman and a cheap source of labour, their human rights were violated and their lives cut short for demanding to call their souls their own in the land of their birth.
Their crime or sin was to demand the abolition of the diabolic pass system, as well as the evil system of apartheid colonialism itself.
Today we remember heroes and heroines who were injured and murdered in cold blood for adopting a principled stance against the apartheid legislation that required that every indigenous African male above the age of 16 must carry the dompas, day and night, and to produce it on demand by the police.
History recalls that these were peaceful, unarmed civilians who fell so that we as a nation could rise and create a society that is truly united, non-racial, non-sexist, equal, and prosperous.
Our long history of struggle tells us that there are countless others, hundreds of thousands, who fell before them, and many more who followed after Sharpeville and Langa.
In this regard, we recall that opposition against Pass laws, dates back to the 18th Century when slaves at the Cape were forced to carry Passes in 1709. In the early 20th century, the 1910s saw significant opposition to pass laws being applied to black women. We dare not forget the role of Charlotte Maxeke and the Bantu Women’s League, a forerunner to the ANCWL, in opposing the pass laws.
In 1919, the International Socialist League of South Africa, in conjunction with the Industrial Workers of Africa and the African National Congress, organized a major anti-pass campaign.
The 1950s saw the ANC begin the Defiance Campaign to oppose the pass laws. As our history testifies, on the 9th of August 1956, 20, 000 gallant women of all races marched to Union Building expressing their outrage against pass laws.
We also recall the historic women uprising by rural women against pass laws in Lehurutse near Zeerust in 1957.
The peaceful protest on 21 March 1960 followed this long struggle of protest against passes. So indeed, across the ages many fell so that as a nation we could rise.
There can be no doubt that the Sharpeville Massacre became a landmark moment in our history because it reshaped the struggle and changed the tempo, the course and momentum of the march towards our appointment with history.
Subsequent protests and strikes were met with ruthless fury and repression by the racist Pretoria regime, resulting in a number of critical and strategic milestones.
o The ANC, the PAC, the SACP and other progressive formations were banned by the regime, consigning thousands to exile and to prison.
o As a result of the Sharpeville Massacre, the oppressed resolved to usher in the armed struggle to defend themselves and fight for freedom.
o The world began to listen to our demands for sanctions to be imposed against the racist regime. The exploitative South African economy witnessed the flight of international capital from its shores.
o The international isolation of racist South Africa gained momentum, resulting, six years later, in the General Assembly of the United Nations proclaiming 21 March as the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. Eventually, the racist regime was suspended from the General Assembly of the United Nations, and the international solidarity movement moved into gear.
o The Sharpeville Massacre mobilised internal resistance against apartheid, rousing workers, galvanising the youth, inspiring the student movement, awakening the peasantry and rallying the unemployed to resist oppression, exploitation and degradation.
And so it is with a deep sense of courage and inspiration that we reflect upon this historic day because it was on 21 March 1960 that gallant fighters fell so that a nation could rise and take its place among the family of nations in the world.
Ladies and Gentlemen, we also recall that because of its symbolic significance, it was in Sharpeville on 10 December 1996 that Founding President Nelson Mandela signed the final draft of the Constitution into law.
It is a tribute to our gallant fighters who fell at Sharpeville that the South African democratic government declared March 21 as Human Rights Day to commemorate and to honour those who fought for our liberation and the rights we enjoy today.
In many ways, our Constitution provides a historic bridge between the past of a deeply divided society characterised by strife, conflict, untold suffering, and injustice, and a future founded on the recognition of human rights, democracy, and peaceful co-existence and development opportunities for all in South Africa.
Compatriots, from the innocent blood that was shed at Sharpeville, Langa, Nyanga, Soweto, Mlazi, Boipatong, Edendale, Shobashobane, at nearby Mahhehle village and many parts of our country, we must renew our commitment to defend the gains of our democracy and that never and never again will the blood of our people be shed in vain.
Human Rights Day must remind us about the sanctity of life and the need to protect life. Let us all live up to the Bill of Rights which protects the right to life.
From the ruins of a violent past, we must create a new society that advances peace and justice for all.
On Human Rights Day, we call on all stakeholders to make a contribution to the call for a creation of a new, model citizen of the province of KwaZulu-Natal. We see such a model citizen as a person who rejects and condemns the use of violence to address disagreements.
Compatriots, twenty eight years into freedom and democracy, KwaZulu-Natal continues to carry the infamy and stigma of being a violent province. The July 2021 deadly civil unrest which led to more than 300 people losing their lives, property destroyed, and economy in tatters could only add to the bad name that we have come to assume as a province.
The report from all organs of state that investigated the July 2021 riots indicate that the deep level of poverty and unemployment are the ticking time bomb that need urgent attention of the government and business community. We must build on the social compact to create more jobs and expand economic activities to all people. The implementation of radical socio-economic transformation should find expression in all our government spheres and departments.
Radical socio-economic Transformation through legal prescripts is the only instrument that can resolve the current socio-economic imbalance and ensure that indeed there is a better life for all.
On this day, we invite cultural activists, religious leaders, our traditional leaders, civil society, and scholars to work closely with our communities to restore positive social values and Ubuntu.
Let us use Human Rights Day to remember that Women’s Rights are also human rights.
We are deeply disturbed by the high levels of violence perpetrated against women and its gruesome nature. We must arrest this scourge that is defiling the gains of our hard-won democracy and is an assault on the dignity of women. In this area, we learned for instance of a man who set alight his partner in a shack fire.
Cruelty cannot even begin to describe these crimes. We hear daily of women being murdered by their partners and their bodies cut into pieces or disfigured or burned. Something has really gone wrong with such violation of the human rights of the women of this country. While our province has enjoyed the longest period of relative peace since 2004, there is no doubt that the shameful crime of GBV and Femicide has really given a bad name to our province and country. It has been disappointing to see GBV on the rise at the height of the lockdowns which government had to implement in order to save lives and livelihoods. The rights of women and their dignity was grossly violated at a time when we needed the greatest effort towards Ubuntu and human solidarity.
We applaud all the men and their organisations that are addressing the culture of violence. We thank them for confronting patriarchy and for making a contribution in ensuring that boy children grow up treating girl children as their equals, not inferiors. We call on all our schools to inculcate and promote the ideals of Generation Equality in the curricula and the classroom.
Equally, we call on all communities to work with our law enforcement agencies to rid our Province of the murder of amakhosi nezinduna. We cannot afford to live in a society where life has become vulnerable and cheap for our kings and headmen.
We need a new ethos and a new culture where the people of KwaZulu-Natal will exercise their right to protest within the ambit of the law. We condemn and call for an end to violent service delivery protests which are counterproductive and end costing the government and the people more and delaying the delivery of other basic services.
The people of KwaZulu-Natal do not want violence – they have suffered immensely from the political violence of the eighties and nineties. The only way we can heal the orphans, widows, and survivors of the recent violence is for all of us to honour the dignity and human rights of all. We can only heal our people if we focus on sustainable development which will proscribe poverty, unemployment, inequality, and violence to the dustbin of history.
We can only heal this community of Ixopo and KwaZulu-Natal by making sure that we respect all their rights and deliver on the demands of the Freedom Charter. South Africans, black and white, young and old, agreed in the Freedom Charter on 26 June 1955 that in a free, democratic South Africa:
o All National Groups Shall Have Equal Rights!
o The People Shall Share In The Country's Wealth!
o All Shall Be Equal Before The Law!
o All Shall Enjoy Equal Human Rights!
o There Shall Be Work And Security!
o The Doors Of Learning And Of Culture Shall Be Opened!
o There Shall Be Houses, Security And Comfort!
o There Shall Be Peace And Friendship!
Ladies and Gentlemen, since our democratic breakthrough in 1994, the ANC-led government has sought through new legislation and policies to ensure that the demands of the Freedom Charter are met.
Day by day, we continue to mobilise South Africans behind their own development to ensure that indeed South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white.
In the recent State of the Province Address, we accounted to the people of KwaZulu-Natal on our service delivery record and also recognised where there are challenges. We continue to ask our communities to work with us and to bear with us where we cannot address all their challenges at once.
We are aware of the commitment that was made a decade ago in this community regarding the delivery of houses for the families of young people who died in the political violence. We are aware that the MEC for Human Settlements has undertaken to ensure that commitment is fulfilled. We hope we can work more closely with our traditional leaders to get land for the delivery of human settlements and other developments.
Ladies and Gentlemen, our Constitution enjoins government to deliver water to the people of this country as it guarantees the right to water. Indeed, water is life. Much of the challenges that KwaZulu-Natal face in the delivery of water emanate from the legacy of colonialism and apartheid spatial planning which neglected the provision of water to black communities in particular those in rural communities.
We are also faced with aging water infrastructure and sadly, sometimes, the vandalisation of water resources and water infrastructure. That must stop and we must encourage communities to pay for water services unless they qualify for exemption like many poor and indigent communities that benefit from free municipal services.
The 6th Administration of KwaZulu-Natal committed to make the provision of water a priority when we took over in 2019. Last year we published the KZN Water Master Plan which seeks to attend to the water backlog at a cost of R150-billion in the next 10 to 15 years.
Some of you will also recall that at the end of September last year, we were here at Harry Gwala District Municipality where we launched the Water Master Plan as well as the borehole intervention project to help in the short to medium term address the water backlog for communities like Ixopo, Bulwer, Highflats, and Umzimkhulu. We also welcome the financial commitment towards the building of the Lower Umkhomazi Bulk Water System that was made by the Minister of Finance in his recent Budget Vote Speech.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
The provincial government has a clear plan to achieve economic recovery, grow the economy, and ensure that previously disadvantaged groups benefit from it. We are unapologetic about changing the ownership patterns, deracialising the economy by bringing more black people in general and Africans in particular to the centre of the economy.
We are transforming the economy through such initiatives like Operation Vula Fund, RASET, and the KZN Youth Empowerment Fund. We have a bias to empower women and vulnerable groups like the disabled. We will continue to use set asides and state procurement to direct policy so that we create an environment that enables women to break the ceiling, restore their dignity, and honour their rights.
We call on all social partners, including the private sector, to work with our government in lifting our people out of the indignity of poverty, unemployment, inequality, and violence.
If we succeed in empowering the vulnerable in our society including women and the disabled, if we succeed to achieve economic and income equality between racial groups, we would surely be creating a conducive environment for all South Africans to enjoy their human rights.
We, therefore, need to pay serious attention to the recent reversal of transformation policies by courts. While we all have to respect and uphold the independence of the judiciary, we need to review the dilemma imposed by the system of constitutional democracy. This system places one organ of the state above others. It is time we should debate whether the country does not need Parliamentary Democracy where laws enacted by Parliament should be above all and not reviewed by another other organ. It cannot be correct that transformation and the will of the people gets undermined by one arm of the state, possibly making a mockery of the idea of democracy itself.
Blood was shed in Sharpeville and many parts of our country to free this country.
We can only pay forward these sacrifices by restoring the dignity of all the people of this land and ensuring there is justice for all.
We do not need another Sharpeville massacre.
We do not need another July civil unrest.
Let us seize the day to deepen the human rights of all and rid our land of the violence that vulnerable groups like women and the disabled get subjected to.
It is in our power!
Together Growing KwaZulu-Natal.
Issued by the Office of the KZN Premier, 21 March 2022
