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S. Africa to Launch Anti-racism Campaign
The South African government would launch a campaign next week to commit people in the country to the fight against racism, Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad said on Monday.
The campaign would call on South Africans to express their opposition to racism by lighting candles, torches or lanterns and switching on their car headlights at noon on Tuesday next week, Pahad told reporters in Pretoria.
This was aimed at showing the country's commitment to tolerance ahead of the World Conference Against Racism to be held in the eastern coastal city of Durban from August 31 to September 7, Pahad explained.
"If every South African participates in this event, once again we would have demonstrated to the world that we are committed to the fight for a better world for all," he said.
All municipalities across the country would be expected to organize "torches of tolerance" events next Tuesday to mobilize people behind the conference and the symbolic torches would be lit and left to burn until the official closing of the conference, the deputy minister said.
He said the conference should serve as an opportunity for South Africans to appreciate the extent to which racism, xenophobia and related intolerance was still experienced around the world.
South Africans brought apartheid to an end through peaceful means, but this did not mean that all problems had been solved, Pahad said, stressing that a new kind of prejudice taking root in the country, xenophobia, had to be nipped in the bud.
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