An anti-apartheid Struggle veteran has encouraged pupils to speak out against racism at school and home.
Speaking at the Crawford School in Sandton as part of Anti-Racism Week, which was recently launched by the Ahmed Kathrada Foundation, Sophia Williams de Bruyn said racism must be challenged.
“We need to talk about racism. If we talk more openly about something, the easier it is to challenge it. Ask your teachers if you can have discussion about racism all the time.
"Racism must be challenged when you are at school or at a dinner table at home. And if someone makes a racist joke, we don’t have to laugh about it; we need to condemn it. We need to tell them that it is wrong and point out to them why it is wrong,” said De Bruyn.
De Bruyn, who was one of the women leaders who together with thousands of others marched to the Union Buildings in 1956 to protest over the pass laws, said the new generation should take the baton from her generation and take a stand against discrimination.
“Today in the democratic South Africa, do you young people have the bravery needed to stand up to racism? Today you may not necessarily have police officers knocking at your door in the middle of the night because you spoke out against racism, but it doesn’t mean that challenging racism doesn’t require courage. It requires a great deal of courage,” she said.
Thando Ngoasheng, 17, a Grade 12 learner, said one needed to change one's mindset.
“Try to get out of the mind the old-fashioned way of thinking. That would really help young people to be anti racist,” said Thando.
The ANC has declared 2018 as the Nelson Mandela centenary to honour the life and work he did in the country and abroad fighting racism.
Wuraoluwa Nihinlola, 18, a Grade 12 learner who moved from Nigeria to South Africa in 2010, described Mandela as a unifier.
“I realised that South Africa is such a diverse place, it is full of different cultures and Nelson Mandela has encouraged that,” he said.
De Bruyn also encouraged learners to download an app that they can use in reporting racist incidents. She said the Zimele Racism Reporting app would help reduce incidents of racism.
“It is very important for learners to download this app because they might meet up with racism. It might be in the mall or maybe out of school.”
The pilot phase of the app intends to aggregate data and provide a trend analysis of hotspot areas where racism may occur. The app can be downloaded on Android phones' Play Store.
@SthembisoMedia