Statement delivered by Marius Fransman at Salt River on Post-School Education Summit hosted by SAYC-WC, April 12 2012
Programme Director
Honorable guests
Summit Delegates
Ladies and gentlemen
On the 16th June 1996 on the occassion of the 20th anniversary of the Soweto uprising President Mandela addressing a Youth Rally in then Pietersburg said and I quote: "Not long ago, a school in a town that is situated just a few kilometres from here captured the news headlines throughout the world for refusing to admit black pupils." Sixteen years on black pupils from the Eastern Cape are still regarded as refugees in this province when the Freedom Charter and our Constitution says South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white.'
As the proceedings of this second Youth Summit gets underway we are confronted with the stark question: "what kind of future are we creating for young people of thIs p4ovince when old patterns of race, class and gender discrimination are still being perpetuated within a political, social,economic,cultural and spatial context." I call on this Youth Summit to adopt a strong position and raise your voices against this scourge that still rears it's ugly head.
Not so long ago Cape Town was rated as the most unequal place in the world according to the UNDP Human Development Report. It is therefore no surprise that a young white matriculant has a much better chance of obtaining employment than his black (coloured and african) counterparts.
At a tertiary studies level we suffer the same pattern. I want to single out UCT as an example as it is currently engaging in a very robust debate as to whether it should do away with its current admissions policy which is intended to address the historical apartheid legacy of access to tertiary education. Yet even in terms of the current admissions policy the transformation for historically disadvantaged african and coloured students in general and the Western Cape in particular are dismal in the extreme. Let us begin to interrogate some of it's consequences.