City and tertiary institutions commit to joint action in fighting racism

On Tuesday afternoon, 26 March 2015, a meeting was held as part of the Inclusive City campaign. It was attended by City of Cape Town Executive Mayor, Patricia de Lille; Professor Tyrone Pretorius (Rector and Vice-Chancellor of the University of the Western Cape); Advocate Lionel Seymour Harper (Acting Dean of Students at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology); Professor Wim de Villiers (Rector and Vice-Chancellor of Stellenbosch University designate); and Professor Francis Petersen (Deputy Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cape Town).

All of the institutions present expressed their unequivocal support for the campaign, which is geared towards to promoting a human rights-based culture where all forms of discrimination, especially racism, are rejected.

This meeting is the first step in laying the foundations during our current race dialogue. DuringTuesday's engagement, which was the first of many to come, we could begin to work towards a long-term partnership between local government and the tertiary education institutions.

‘Universities are actively developing the next generation of leaders and these students will one day invariably lead the consolidation of these issues we are dealing with today. We need the rejection of racism to be embedded within the students, as the future citizens of our city,' said Professor Francis Peterson.

Mayor De Lille noted that it is a mammoth task for any nation to truly transform.

‘I was part of the negotiations for the new dispensation where we agreed to transform our institutions instead of destroying them. Now we have to address the legacy of our sad past and the way it has been embedded into our institutions,' she said.

The City of Cape Town, together with these tertiary institutions, agreed on four areas of collaboration. They are that:

1. the universities commit to share the campaign message through the platforms available at their disposal, in order to raise awareness amongst their students and staff

2. a range of debates will be hosted on each of the campuses, so that students and staff have the platforms to share their experiences of discrimination as part of the ongoing commitment after the dialogue

3. after the campaign, we will meet once more to share key learnings and practices in order to ensure that we learn and improve on them going forward

4. Mayor De Lille has committed to meeting with the respective unions and Student Representative Councils so that they can add their voices to the current discourse as well as part of the commitment after the dialogue

We made the additional commitments to meet annually on 21 March, to evaluate the impact of the dialogue, and to amplify the positive examples of reconciliation we bear witness to as well.

These commitments will provide the basis of engagements going forward. We pledge to hold one another accountable in maintaining our newfound partnership.

Statement issued by Executive Mayor Patricia de Lille, City of Cape Town, March 26 2015

Click here to sign up to receive our free daily headline email newsletter