Reconciliation Day - for who?

The LAND Party would like to remind the people of South Africa that the 16th December, the ‘Day of Reconciliation’, was originally commemorated by Apartheid nationalists as ‘The Day of the Vow’. This day celebrated their so-called victory at ‘Blood River’, where they made a pact with God and believe that He chose their side. They promised to always celebrate the day as a day of thanksgiving, like a Sabbath, and ensure that future generations commemorated it too.

The Day of the Vow, in fact, represents the wholesale dispossession of the black people of South Africa, even though it is now supposed to be a day of ‘reconciliation’. The ‘Day of Reconciliation’ is nothing but a poorly disguised attempt by the powers that be to re-write history and fool the masses that their lives have improved since 1994!

The sad reality is that the looting, mismanagement, and misappropriation of the resources of SA continues unabated, whilst the rich grow richer and the poor poorer. The only reconciliation that has occurred in the last 24 years has been between 0.1% of the black elite, Cyril and his cronies, and primarily, white capitalists, who have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo of gross inequality, widespread homelessness, and poverty.

The LAND Party believes that calling December 16th a day of "reconciliation " is a misnomer and that the public holiday should be scrapped. South Africa already has too many public holidays and, practically, having a public holiday just before Christmas is economically disruptive as well as utterly meaningless. How can we celebrate something that hasn’t happened?

One day, when there has been true reconciliation, we can reconsider. Until then, there is a lot of work to be done and we ask the people of South Africa to at least use the day to engage with one another about what this day represents, what reconciliation means, and what needs to be done to achieve it.

We call upon all justice-loving people to use the day to recommit to a South Africa free of poverty and corruption.

"You can fool some of the people some of the time but not ALL of the people all of the time!"

END