Remembering Sharpeville Day in Grahamstown

Thursday, 20 March 2014

Press Statement for Immediate Release from the Masifunde Education and Development Project Trust Together with the Rural People’s Movement & the Unemployed People’s Movement

Remembering Sharpeville Day in Grahamstown

Date: 21 March 2014

Time: 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

Venue: City Hall, Grahamstown

Speakers:

M.P. Giyose, Jubilee South Africa Activist

Jane Duncan, Right2Know Campaign Activist

Aubrey Mokoape, Black Consciousness Movement Stalwart who was arrested on 21 March 1960 at the Age of 15

Richard Pithouse, Leading Radical Intellectual

On the 21st of March 1960 the white racist minority regime jailed, killed and maimed thousands of black people across the length and breadth of our country. This was as a result of protests against the dompas by black people. The response of the white racist minority regime was heartless and inhuman.

This protest was led by one section of the liberation movement. Since then the 21st of March was known as heroes’ day and after that as Sharpeville Day. However since 1994 the state has referred to this day as Human Rights Day which is an attempt to water down the political significance of this day and its significance in the history of our people which has been written in blood and pain.

Our people were massacred in 1960 and again in 1976 and again in 2012. Our people continue to be murdered under the new dispensation. Andries Tatane, Nkululeko Gwala and Nqobile Nzuza are just some of the people who have been killed after apartheid.

We call on all our people and the media to come and observe this day with us. This is not a day to celebrate human rights that exist on paper but not in reality. This is a day to mourn and to steel ourselves for the struggle ahead.

The lives of the black majority continue to count for nothing in South Africa. The struggle is not over.

Khayakazi Mabali, Masifunde Programmes Manager – 083 505 5822

Nomwabo Tshisa, Rural People’s Movement Deputy President – 083 311 4884

Ayanda Kota, Organiser, Unemployed People’s Movement – 078 625 6462

/ends