Cape Town - The Khoi and San leaders in the province have approached the Equality Court in a bid to hold the government accountable for what they regard as ongoing discrimination and inequality practices against the indigenous people.
The First Indigenous Nation of Southern Africa (Finsa) and a delegation of Aboriginal and Indigenous Khoikhoi and San Leaders lodged a case of discrimination against President Cyril Ramaphosa, Cogta Minister Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, Deputy Minister Obed Bapelo, CRL, and the Commission on Khoisan Matters on Thursday.
Finsa leader Gregg Fick said since 1994, the Khoi and the San had been excluded from the Constitution.
“For the past 27 years, our rights have been infringed; we have been classified with apartheid race classification as coloureds and on numerous occasions gave memorandums to various political leaders within the government, but to no avail.
“Sadly, these recommendations have been shelved and the suffering, marginalisation, discrimination, oppression, and genocidal killings of the first Aboriginal and Indigenous Khoikhoi and San (so-called coloureds) continues.”
Fick said a report was released by the SAHRC in 2019 on the human rights situation of the Khoisan people, where recommendations were made to the government and were supposed to be implemented within a year. However, he said the government failed to adhere to the recommendations.
Khoi San leader from the Koopman Indigenous House, Derek Ocdjohn, said indigenous people were forced to apply to a commission for recognition for their traditional leaders while Nguni and other black people had the liberty to appoint their leaders.
“From all spheres, the coloureds have been referred to as gangsters, drunkards and addicts. That is something that is installed on our people to diminish our dignity.
“How can we have dignified youth when they have been labelled before they are born? When their own original identity and been taken from them, and now they must stand in front of a commission to explain who they are,” he said.
National Freedom Party provincial chairperson Yousseff Kanouni said the party, as the voice of the Khoi San in Parliament, would support the fight for equality and justice for the first indigenous people of South Africa.