The EFF called for a national shutdown on Monday. (Photo by Xabiso Mkhabela/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
President Cyril Ramaphosa on Tuesday hit out at the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) over what he said was an attempt to force South Africans to join protests against their leader the day before, citing human rights abuses.
Ramaphosa spoke at an event in the Northern Cape to mark Human Rights Day, a day after the EFF led a “national shutdown” in protest against rolling electricity cuts and pressured the president to resign.
EFF leader Julius Malema has hailed Monday’s demonstrations as a success, but the government remains a failure, saying most businesses are open because they have refused the party’s call to remain closed and those closed are only to enjoy the “long weekend”. , culminating in Human Rights Day.
On Tuesday, Ramaphosa said the day was one “in which we celebrate the great progress we have made as people and as a nation, in building a democracy founded on equal human rights for all”.
“Even if other people want to reduce this democracy, even if other people want to violate the rights of others, to intimidate, to force them to participate in protests, to force them to participate in days when they do not have to work, I am happy that the majority of South Africans do not listen to this call, ” he added, in clear reference to Monday.
Human Rights Day is observed in honor of the 69 people killed and 180 injured in Sharpeville on March 21, 1960, when apartheid police opened fire on a peaceful crowd protesting against laws that discriminated against black people.
“We cannot claim to be a country that respects human rights if we do not commit all our powers and resources to ensure that all South Africans have access to land, housing, food, water, health and education,” said Ramaphosa, whose ANC has criticized for not doing enough to improve the lives of black people in the nearly 30 years of post-apartheid rule.
He noted that this year’s commemoration is significant because it is the 100th anniversary of the adoption of the first bill of rights in South Africa’s history.
“This was an act of extraordinary vision when the majority of South Africans were denied the most basic human rights by law. The adoption of this bill of rights, which did not have legal status at the time, took place only ten years after the Native Land Act. [of 1913] has resulted in the mass dispossession of Africans of their land,” he said.
The 1923 bill of rights stated: “That all Africans have, as sons of this soil, the right given by God to unlimited ownership of this land, their homeland.”
Ramaphosa said that those who wrote this 100 years ago would be happy to see that today’s bill of rights recognizes “property rights” and “equal access to land”, as well as socio-economic rights, such as housing, health care, food, water and education.
“The bill of rights says that everyone has the right to basic education and further education, which the state must do progressively and make accessible,” said Ramaphosa, while acknowledging that many students still face financial barriers to access higher education, as highlighted new. protest at the university.
He said that although the number of students from poor and working-class backgrounds receiving funding from the National Student Financial Aid Scheme has increased, “we have seen in recent weeks that many students are still having difficulty financing their studies, accommodation and living costs”.
“This year, the government plans to finalize a comprehensive student funding model for higher education,” Ramaphosa added.