Cape Town – Voices to Save SA has been given the go-ahead by the Cape Town city council for 8 000 participants to march from Keizergracht to Parliament at noon on Friday.
The march is one of many planned around the country after President Jacob Zuma’s cabinet reshuffle last week during which Pravin Gordhan was fired as finance minister, prompting an investment status downgrade to “junk” by ratings agency Standard and Poor’s.
City spokesperson Priya Reddy said the march will proceed along Darling, Adderley, Spin and Plein Streets to Parliament and should return at 2:30pm via Roeland, Buitenkant and Darling Streets to Keizergracht.
Permission has also been given to smaller hour-long gatherings for 200 people to form a human chain along Durban Road, Durbanville at noon; 150 people to gather next to Gordon High School; 20 people on the pedestrian walkway on the Joostenberg Vlakte side of the bridge at Maroela Way at 6:30am; and the ACDP will lead a march of around 500 people along Wesfleur road in Atlantis at 11am.
The ACDP’s Reverend Kenneth Meshoe said the party was disappointed that a once proud liberation movement had descended to “supporting an unaccountable president” whose decisions had led to a downgraded economic status for the country.
The ACDP decried the lack of care for the country’s poor and they would support all legal organised mass actions until Zuma is removed.
More than 60% of businesses in Cape Town are heeding the call to bring the country to a standstill on Friday, according to a survey by the Cape Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
Some 99.21% of respondents indicated that they believed that there is a leadership crisis in the country and indicated that they supported a call for Zuma to resign.