Youth Day address by Marius Fransman, ANC Western Cape leader and Deputy Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, at the youth training centre in Michell's Plain

16 June 2012 

Today, we commemorate 36 years of the June 16th 1976 uprising when our young people faced the might of the Apartheid war machine and etched into history the fearless, gallant and revolutionary spirit that motivated the generations that followed to struggle to death or freedom. 

To these revolutionary spirits and those that followed them in the '80's, 90's and even today I dedicate the poem by the revolutionary poet from El Salvadore Roque Dalton called:

THE FALLING OF THE FREEDOM FIGHTERS

The dead are more unmanageable every day. Before it was easy with them: 
we gave flowers to the uptight ones
we gave the relatives the names on one long list:
to these we gave national orders
to those we gave remarkable peace
that one we gave a monstrous marble tomb
Then we saluted the memory of the corpses
and went to their cemetery rows
marching to the compass of old music.
But where the dead go
is different now.
Today they ask 
ironic questions.
And it seems to me that they fall more and more 
on account of being
more and more
the majority.

"Today they ask ironic questions..." The question they ask is: Why 18 years into democracy the rule of white privilege is entrenched again in the Western Cape?

The question they ask is: Why Zille declares our people "refugees" in the land of their birth;

The question they ask is: Why the DA government which already has billions to spend in the Metro and province says it is waiting on a share from national government for a youth subsidy;

The question they ask is: Why the young people of Elsies River, Mitchells Plain, Blikkiesdorp, Khayelitsha, Philippi, Langa, Gugulethu and Delft have to suffer the harshness of winter flooding, hunger and unemployment whilst they continue to cobble the pavements of Blaauwberg, Table View, Protea Valley, Constantia and Bishops Court;

The question they ask is: How does Zille claim to be best premier when the Western Cape has the most service delivery protest; Cape Town is the most unequal city in the world and farm-workers in the Western Cape still suffer under the "dop" (tot) system of alcohol remuneration and exploitative conditions as if we are still in the feudal age?

The question they ask is: What are the youth of today doing to put an end to this last outpost of white privilege, neo- colonialism and backwardness?

The Fallen Heroes of 1976 and the generations that sacrificed for the freedom that we won in 1994 demand that we stamp out the scourge of DA rule and stop the cancer of white privilege from spreading. Youth must play a pivotal role in this regard.

In just over a month from now on the 19th July we will commemorate 30 years since the murder of Ashley Kriel by the brutal Apartheid machinery. The life of Ashley Kriel and other youth icons of our struggle remind us of the power of youth. Basil February, Anton Fransch, Colline Williams, Robbie Waterwitch and Solomon Mahlangu all sacrificed their lives so that you and I can enjoy freedom in our lifetime. It is now our turn to follow in their brave footsteps and take the next steps to economic freedom in our lifetime.

In the 1990's we said we are Ready to Govern - Today we tell our youth be "Ready to Work" because economic liberation requires a change in mindset. The biggest damage that Apartheid and the structural remnants of its system have inflicted on our people is the damage to the psyche of our people. 

The "dop" system ingrained in the psyche of our people a sense of inferiority that they were useless and only good for manual labour.

Gutter education prepared our people for their place in the shadows away from the ivory towers of academia, away from the boardrooms of power... - far from the places where the future of our country's economy is engineered.

The DA government and their embedded partners in the media are making a lot of noise about a youth wage subsidy. 

This is just to hide their failure to address the needs of youth in the Metro and the province where they are giving most of the contracts to the old white-boys club of privilege. The DA government has failed to come forward with any innovative policy to address the economic imbalances in this province, to shrink the gap between rich and poor, and to shift privilege from the haves to the have-nots.

Dawie Roodt in a recent blog said: "Perhaps the DA's poverty alleviation plans are just cheap opportunism" and further: "the Democratic Alliance's plan to protect the poor from increases in the cost of living is boring, unimaginative, not original and in certain areas totally wrong." 

Our youth must be "Ready to Work" and we are pushing for an alternative strategy for addressing unemployment, creating real jobs in construction and the public sector, business and labour-SETA and alternate sources of funding. 
Last week we made a call for a socialisation fund as an alternative to nationalisation. 

We must give real meaning to the words of the Freedom Charter that says: "South Africa belongs to all who live in it..." Wherever the DA governs it entrenches privileged white ownership of the economy, we must ask our young people if we want this disease to spread elsewhere in the province.

Eighteen years into democracy 72 percent of managerial jobs in the private sector are still held by whites. According to a study of the JSE Afrikaner capital grew from 14 percent in 1994 to 48 percent in 2008 and a white school-leaver has seven times more chance of getting a job than a black student.

I want to make a call on our young people to adopt the (ANC's provincial) Path to Power programme and take your rightful place in our struggle for economic freedom. Youth must lead and lay the ground for the future. Only through addressing the challenges that youth face are we going to be able to build social cohesion and strengthen the social fabric.

An important factor in building social cohesion is to have a strong sense of identity. 

We must know our roots, where we come from, and what our social and cultural legacy is. The indigenous African people of the Western Cape-the Khoi-khoi and the Saãn, historically classified by apartheid as "coloured", must take their rightful place as the majority in this province. How can we continue to perpetuate white rule by strengthening the DA and compromising the sacrifice of generations of young activists who gave their lives for South Africa and the Cape in particular?

I also want to make a call on young people to build bridges with youth all over this country and the world. One of the key pillars of our struggle is International Solidarity. This was one of the key factors in bringing apartheid to its knees. The struggle of youth is the same all over the world. It may differ on minor issues but everywhere youth face alienation, frustration and marginalisation. 

We must embrace the struggles of our young people in places like Palestine, in North Africa, in Latin America and the Middle East. Che Guevara said that as long as there is one human being suffering anywhere in the world, our struggle cannot be over.

I want to come back to the example of Ashley Kriel. I want our youth not to suffer from defeatism, loss of hope or demoralisation. 

Fidel Castro said: "We are not the liberators of people. The people will liberate themselves. Our duty is only to serve." 

I want to borrow those words and say: We are not the liberators of youth. The youth will liberate themselves. In an era of rampant unemployment where youth bear the frustration of being unskilled and unable to access economic opportunities the example of Ashley Kriel is inspiring and our youth must take a leaf from the example of his life. 

This working class youth sold (Cape newspaper) Die Burger at four in the mornings to help feed his family before going to school.

Two days ago President Jacob Zuma said that one of his priorities before the end of his first term in office in 2014 is to ensure that there is a meaningful reduction in the country's high youth unemployment rate. 

We want to call on youth to partner in our programme "Ready to Work". 

In the words of President Zuma: "The youth of 1976 should serve as an inspiration for you to be active agents of positive change. Generation after generation of the youth of South Africa have led this country towards achieving a common goal to benefit all. Your generation is no exception."

Issued by the ANC Western Cape, June 16 2012

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