A stickler for traditionIN A community hall at the edge of the Kalahari desert, hundreds of Khoisan (also known as Bushmen) have gathered for a hearing on a new bill that could decide who rules them. Several are dressed in animal skins, with quivers of arrows slung across their backs. But despite their obvious interest, they are struggling to learn the details of the Traditional and Khoisan Leadership Bill. Few have seen a copy. It is available only online, and in English.
Even expressing their views is a problem: the parliamentary committee that travelled to the remote Northern Cape province for public hearings late last year arranged no translators for Khoi or San languages, or even for Afrikaans, the local lingua franca. Constance Mogale, the national co-ordinator for the Alliance for Rural Democracy, an activist group, watched the public hearing in Upington and shook her head in dismay. “They’re already trampling on our right to information,” she said.
Critics say the bill re-entrenches the tribal boundaries and leadership structures created by the apartheid regime, which dumped many black people in...Continue reading
Source: Middle East and Africa http://ift.tt/2lxK86F
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