Rights Day
21 March 2006
Members of the Executive Council,
Members of the legislature and the national Assembly present,
The Mayor and Councillors,
Distinguished guests,
Comrades and friends,
We are celebrating yet another Human Rights Day! This year marks another
important occasion for us a people and province to celebrate and simultaneously
remind us ourselves of the past but also recommit ourselves to the future, a
future which is characterised by human rights culture!
This year theme is indeed very appropriate in that it guides our work around
the most profound and challenging aspects of our democracy. The provincial
theme is 'Women's Rights are Human Rights.'
It also coincides with the 50th anniversary of the women's anti-pass law
march. We celebrate those brave women and mothers who dared the apartheid might
and set the ball rolling for a concerted campaign an struggle to achieve one of
the most fundamental and universally acclaimed right. We also do so at a time
when the world body, the United Nations (UN) has just voted for a revamped
global human rights body to oversee the issues of human rights.
We also gather to reflect on the present in order to ensure that the future
we are seeking to create and build for our children, is indeed based on a solid
foundation which will withstand any attempt to dilute and or erode our hard won
rights.
These rights were realised through the blood and tears of the many gallant
freedom fighters and conscientious people across the globe. The culmination of
our South African Human Rights Day, are a number of events that date back to
Sharpeville day, the 1985 massacre in Prot Elizabeth of 18 people who were
marking the 20th anniversary of Sharpeville day.
We celebrate this day each year to remind us of the great suffering and loss
of life that accompanied the struggle for human rights. It is to remind us that
people in South Africa will never again be denied their human rights.
Human rights are the rights that everyone has simply because they are human
beings. They are the rights we all have from the moment we are born. We do not
have to earn them and they cannot easily be taken away from us. Human rights
are fundamental cornerstone of our democracy.
We need to consistently remind ourselves of these because nothing should be
taken for granted. We can easily be lulled into a false sense of security and
forget the existence of huge challenges to ensure that sustainable democracy is
the only guarantee we have to a growing and flourishing economy to address the
huge socio economic challenges that confront us a people.
We want to contend that every citizen of our province and country must
demand his or her rights and that as government and the country we are
compelled to provide these. Therefore, the few stories we come across in our
daily in our lives which blot our script only serve to undermine the efforts of
all of to speedily realise these rights fully.
Among others it is concern that some people would deem it fit to challenge a
court decision to allow schooling of disadvantaged children not based on
language and other preferences, but the human rights and access to education.
Notwithstanding, their democratic right to use available channels to seek
redress, to many of this leave a bitter taste in the mouth.
Because everyone has these rights regardless of their race, age or gender we
all have to respect other people's rights as well. It is no good saying that
you have these rights if you are doing things at the same time which go against
other people's rights. And we must all respect and follow the laws of the
country as well.
Indeed we move to find each other in the endeavour to create a home, place
and opportunities for all the people of the province without exception! This
province has traversed a long road to where we are today and we need to nurture
that and build on the positives that has signalled out, not in competition to
others but as remarkable people committed to change to realise a better life
for all!
As government we are compelled by the Bill of Rights and the Constitution to
ensure that every citizen of this province and country enjoys these rights. We
will continue to move in this direction and explore all avenues that will make
it possible for us to achieve this goal.
As we challenged in our daily lives, we also seek the collaborative efforts
of others to complement the work of government. In fact the most possible
direct route to realising the benefits of all of the rights enshrined in our
laws, is the direct and participation of our people in their sphere of life.
The dignity of people is realisable in the pride we take part in those events
that shape their lives.
The challenge for all of us is ensure that irrespective of our political
affiliations, gender and race we take serious the challenge of defending and
advancing our human rights' based Constitution and Bill of Rights through a
concerted effort to continue to make advances on those basic rights especially
of the poorest of the poor in society.
In promoting and rallying all behind the theme 'Women's Rights are Human
Rights', we should unflinchingly struggle to realise this goal. This challenge
is not only institutional but hinges on the attitudes of our society and its
moral fibber. We are challenged to ensure that our mothers, wives, daughters
and girl children are indeed spared from that vicious and most brutal of all
violence against women and children â ârape!â
In this province we must struggle to ensure that the social and family
fabric that makes up our society restored and enhanced.
Therefore, there is a huge and significant role for all such as the
religious fraternity which must take this challenge even much more vigorously.
Non-governmental bodies and structures must focus more sharply and acutely on
these matters especially in those remote and rural areas of our province where
the glare and focus of media and others are not there and where the most
vicious of crimes against women and children are committed.
The judiciary is indeed very critical and must continue to dispense of
justice in unwavering manner including focusing on farm workers and their
rights too. It must not be just a call and slogan we make about 'wathinta
bafazi wa thinti umbokodo', that slogan and rallying cry must begin to make an
impact!
Thank you.
Issued by: Office of the Premier, Northern Cape Provincial Government
21 March 2006
Source: Northern Cape Provincial Government (http://www.northern-cape.gov.za)
