Stories

Coming home from a surreal experience of going to the shops, I realised what I knew clearly as a very young adult - nothing is more essential than the arts...

Inscribed on the roof of a passage to Number Four prison, a quote from Nelson Mandela's book-"Long Walk to Freedom" captures the essence of the tour: "No one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails." 

Seismic global events inevitably cause shifts in how people view both the world and their individual lives. In recent history, and in my own lived-experience, such stand out events would be the dawn of democracy in South Africa my motherland; the blowing up of the Twin Towers in New York and now the global Covid-19 pandemic. 

“We, the people of South Africa, Recognise the injustices of our past; Honour those who suffered for justice and freedom in our land; Respect those who have worked to build and develop our country; and Believe that South Africa belongs to all who live in it, united in our diversity.”(excerpt from the preamble of the South African Constitution)

The Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa has again highlighted the value of workers in society. It has also underlined how millions of people – both workers and unemployed – live with hunger, insufficient food, poor sanitation, lack of proper housing and inadequate access to health services.

At midnight, 26 April 1994, my son Willem, our friends Eddie Meiring and Renier Terblanche and I stood in Johannesburg amongst thousands of people. There was a festive mood.