African National Congress Makana Sub-Region public statement on name-change
African National Congress Makana Sub-Region public statement on name-change
The African National Congress has been quiet on the name-change debate and we want to share our political opinion on the matter, as we consider ourselves as leader of society. We have participated in the name change process and people have spoken let us also remind one another that:
The government policy on name changing is fully consistent with the history of the African National Congress as a liberation movement; colonised people around the world over have always resented that their own names for places were taken over by those who came later as conquerors; to wish to change names is consistent with people and movements world wide; the wishes of the people in this regard have been captured by the ANC in the creation of Geographical Names Committees at all levels of government; it is a process that is happening throughout the country; it is not bound by time frames
The legislation states clearly that where a current name is felt to be offensive by a significant portion of the population, it can be changed; residents of Grahamstown have stated in many times and ways that they find the name of ‘Graham’ offensive, because it is associated with the violent seizure of their land and destruction of their homes in 1812; the poverty that the people still experience today can be directly traced to their loss of land and homes; to insist on retaining the name of Graham is similar to insisting that people in Israel should have places named after Hitler; it is wrong to imply that the wish to change the name comes only from ‘outside agitators’ (such as Thabo Mbeki and Julie Wells!)
A change of name brings a promotion of human dignity; it acknowledges that no society in the world can justify wholesale theft and destruction of homes and livelihoods; the change of name offers proof that the human rights and dignity of the poor in South Africa are being affirmed today under democratic rule; it can be used as a rallying point for greater dedication to building the nation and social cohesion
Those who fight against changing the name of Grahamstown on the basis of costs, have not done their homework; the R250 000 budget by the municipality for this is exactly .058 % of the total municipal budget. This is a very tiny amount compared to all the other services that are provided; it is a once-off expense that will not be on-going; we should rather focus our attention on naming and shaming those who fail to pay what they owe to the municipality in rates, electricity and water charges; the business community alone owes R36 547 582 as of the end of August 2012; this is 146 times the amount that is to be spent on changing the name – it amounts to continuation of theft by the rich, at the expense of the poor; how can they convince the poor that they are acting out of compassion?
Most of the costs of name-changing are covered by normal budgeting and shared between numerous government departments. For example, new letterheads get replaced as old ones are used up; the national Post Office is responsible for sharing information in the legal sphere; map-making companies are continuously updating their products on a regular basis; the National and Provincial Departments of Public Works update signage on the roads under their control, etc.; the Municipality always does marketing and branding to promote tourism, which is accommodated in the budget every year; opponents of name-changing have never provided any lists of what they think the costs are.
The ANC sees the name-change debate as an opportunity for the wider community of Grahamstown to come to understand and know each other better; it appears those who object to changing the name are predominantly white and wealthy; they are invited to consider the impact of their conduct on the larger community; the recent experience of the controversy over The Spear painting taught the nation an important lesson – that no one has the right to seriously offend the majority of the population; the ANC invites all parties to sit together and agree not only on the name change but also about other ways that we can unite to build the city to be the best that it can be; our history can be described as an evolution ‘from bullets to books’ – let us work together to finish the task of spreading learning to all corners of our community, freeing ourselves from the legacy of the past.
We have to clarify and protect our comrade who is always consistently being attack as if name change debate is her agenda. She is our own comrade and we believe that she has been a loyal member of the African National Congress. We do not doubt her loyalty to the work of the movement she has been an active member of since 1980 and she received her first official letter of membership in the ANC in 1990 from Alfred Nzo, the Secretary General based in Lusaka at the time. Some of the people who attack Comrade Julie are practising crude xenophobia presuming that she has no right to handle the name change debate due to being American born.
To you, comrade Julie, you are our deployee in the Council and you are still doing good work in this regard.
