South Africans need to come together and fight against racism mentality and racism whenever it rears its ugly head, ANC national chairman Gwede Mantashe urged yesterday.
Mantashe was speaking to the media after delivering a memorial lecture in honour of the late ANC chaplain general and former Ethiopian Church of SA president, Henry Ngcayiya in King William’s Town.
He was reacting to a weekend upset when former Springbok winger turned TV analyst Ashwin Willemse walked off set in a fury after an apparent disagreement with co-presenters Nick Mallett and Naas Botha on Saturday.
“The fight against the racist mentality must be intensified on all fronts especially in work places. There is a strong feeling among some whites that blacks do not deserve the accolades they get and that they have been done a favour.
“That is a psychological warfare that we must gear ourselves for and fight it every time it presents itself even in workplaces,” he said.
Sports and Recreation Minister Toko Xasa expressed similar sentiments in a press statement and called for Mallett and Botha’s suspension.
“This behaviour of entitlement by some white South Africans who continue to think that their whiteness represents betterness must come to an end. If it was not for the barbaric, nonsensical apartheid system that privileged them we need not have implemented a quota system to normalise an otherwise abnormal system,” said Xasa.
Mantashe told his audience at the second annual memorial lecture that the ruling party needed a vibrant chaplaincy.
He called on the church to lead the fight against against corruption.
“You must come and tell us when we are being corrupt. You must come and tell us specific cases of corruption and see if the ANC will not respond by action,” Mantashe challenged the clergy.
Ngcayiya played a vital role in the formation of the South African Native Congress (SANC) in 1898. The SANC later became one of the leading liberation movements in South Africa, the ANC.
Mantashe was accompanied by Buffalo City Metro mayor Xola Pakati and ANC Eastern Cape provincial executive committee member Mncedisi Nontsele.
Turning his attention to another burning topic – land – the Mineral Resources Minister said the Eastern Cape should be one of the provinces leading the charge in the land question.
“The issue of land has been described as a complex issue but in its complexity the Eastern Cape must be one of the provinces that leads the conversation” he said.
While the church’s presiding bishop, Reverend Dr Sibonda Luphuwana, did not echo former president Jacob Zuma’s sentiments that the ANC would govern until Jesus came back, the man of the cloth predicted the party would remain at the helm for years to come.
He cautioned the party against taking its responsibilities lightly, saying it was more than just a liberation movement, but an organisation that should ensure that the gains of the democratic society were not reversed.
Failure to do this would be mean the party had failed black South Africa.
“Black people have no other citizenship other than South African citizenship. We have nowhere to go to – by plane, by bus or even by ship.
“This is all we have it must be protected and it must work for its people. That is the duty of the current ANC,” he said. — simthandilef@dispatch.co.za
Gwede asks SA to tackle racism amid ex-Bok storm
Mantashe was speaking to the media after delivering a memorial lecture in honour of the late ANC chaplain general and former Ethiopian Church of SA president, Henry Ngcayiya in King William’s Town.
He was reacting to a weekend upset when former Springbok winger turned TV analyst Ashwin Willemse walked off set in a fury after an apparent disagreement with co-presenters Nick Mallett and Naas Botha on Saturday.
“The fight against the racist mentality must be intensified on all fronts especially in work places. There is a strong feeling among some whites that blacks do not deserve the accolades they get and that they have been done a favour.
“That is a psychological warfare that we must gear ourselves for and fight it every time it presents itself even in workplaces,” he said.
Sports and Recreation Minister Toko Xasa expressed similar sentiments in a press statement and called for Mallett and Botha’s suspension.
“This behaviour of entitlement by some white South Africans who continue to think that their whiteness represents betterness must come to an end. If it was not for the barbaric, nonsensical apartheid system that privileged them we need not have implemented a quota system to normalise an otherwise abnormal system,” said Xasa.
Mantashe told his audience at the second annual memorial lecture that the ruling party needed a vibrant chaplaincy.
He called on the church to lead the fight against against corruption.
“You must come and tell us when we are being corrupt. You must come and tell us specific cases of corruption and see if the ANC will not respond by action,” Mantashe challenged the clergy.
Ngcayiya played a vital role in the formation of the South African Native Congress (SANC) in 1898. The SANC later became one of the leading liberation movements in South Africa, the ANC.
Mantashe was accompanied by Buffalo City Metro mayor Xola Pakati and ANC Eastern Cape provincial executive committee member Mncedisi Nontsele.
Turning his attention to another burning topic – land – the Mineral Resources Minister said the Eastern Cape should be one of the provinces leading the charge in the land question.
“The issue of land has been described as a complex issue but in its complexity the Eastern Cape must be one of the provinces that leads the conversation” he said.
While the church’s presiding bishop, Reverend Dr Sibonda Luphuwana, did not echo former president Jacob Zuma’s sentiments that the ANC would govern until Jesus came back, the man of the cloth predicted the party would remain at the helm for years to come.
He cautioned the party against taking its responsibilities lightly, saying it was more than just a liberation movement, but an organisation that should ensure that the gains of the democratic society were not reversed.
Failure to do this would be mean the party had failed black South Africa.
“Black people have no other citizenship other than South African citizenship. We have nowhere to go to – by plane, by bus or even by ship.
“This is all we have it must be protected and it must work for its people. That is the duty of the current ANC,” he said. — simthandilef@dispatch.co.za
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