SOUTH AFRICA: President Thabo Mbeki condems the continueing xenophobic attacks on immigrants

Record ID: 455959

  • Title: SOUTH AFRICA: President Thabo Mbeki condems the continueing xenophobic attacks on immigrants
  • Date: 25th May 2008
  • Summary: (BN12) FORT BEAUFORT, EASTERN CAPE, SOUTH AFRICA (MAY 24, 2008) (SABC - NO ACCESS SOUTH AFRICA) VARIOUS OF AUDIENCE LISTENING SOUTH AFRICAN PRESIDENT THABO MBEKI WALKING TO PODIUM AUDIENCE LISTENING (SOUNDBITE) (English) SOUTH AFRICAN PRESIDENT THABO MBEKI, SAYING: "Today we are faced with a disgrace, a humiliating disgrace for our nation where you have a handful of people, a minority in our communities that decide, that decide to commit crimes against fellow Africans. That is something that we have to act against very firmly and stop. But it is something, I am saying Archbishop, from this school we must communicate the message that this kind of behaviour against people from other countries is foreign to us. It's not something we know, these schools are important to be rebuilt, to be relaunched, to get them to occupy the place that they used to occupy, among other things to communicate the message that indeed we are not only South African but we also are African." AUDIENCE APPLAUDING WOMEN IN TRADITIONAL DRESS SINGING AND DANCING
  • Embargoed: 9th June 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: South Africa
  • Country: South Africa
  • Topics: Crime / Law Enforcement
  • Reuters ID: LVA58375GWL3KB8C2X0T4U71W55K
  • Story Text: President Thabo Mbeki says South Africans should not turn on other Africans and pledged that his government was committed to ending the xenophobic violence that has plagued the country for 13 days.
    South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki on Saturday (May 24) condemned the ongoing xenophobic attacks against African migrants and and said South Africans should not turn on other Africans.
    Mbeki was speaking in Healdtown in Fort Beaufort in the Eastern Cape, where he delivered the key note address at the Historic Schools Restoration Project event.

    "Today we are faced with a disgrace, a humiliating disgrace for our nation where you have a handful of people, a minority in our communities that decide, that decide to commit crimes against fellow Africans. That is something that we have to act against very firmly and stop," Mbeki said.
    The South African government has been criticised for its slow reaction to the violence, the worst since apartheid ended 14 years ago, and for not addressing the poverty that is widely blamed for the bloodshed.

    "It's not something we know, these schools are important to be rebuilt, to be relaunched, to get them to occupy the place that they used to occupy, among other things to communicate the message that indeed we are not only South African but we also are African," Mbeki said.
    Police said at least 50 people have been killed in areas around Johannesburg.
    More than 25,000 were driven from their homes since the attacks began 13 days ago in which mobs stabbed, clubbed and burnt migrants from other parts of Africa who they accuse of taking jobs and fuelling crime.
    Police said townships around Johannesburg were quiet on Saturday and in South Africa's premier tourism destination of Cape Town, security forces were monitoring several flashpoints after anti-foreigner violence continued overnight.
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