Comrade Gwede Mantashe,

ANC National Chairperson,

Comrade Paul Mashatile,

Deputy President,

National Officials and Members of the ANC National Executive Committee,

Comrade Solly Mapaila, General Secretary of the SACP,

Comrade Zingiswa Losi, President of COSATU,

Comrade Richard Hlope, President of SANCO,

Representatives of the ANC Veteran’s League, Women’s League and Youth League,

Representatives of the Umkhonto weSizwe Liberation War Veterans,

Veterans and Stalwarts of our Movement,

Members of the Diplomatic Corps,

Leaders from the Religious Sector,

Traditional Leaders,

Comrades and Friends,

People of South Africa,

This year marks the 113th anniversary of the formation of the African National Congress, the people’s movement for freedom that continues to unite our country in a national effort to transform South Africa into a united, non-racial, non-sexist, democratic and prosperous society.

Today we gather in Khayelitsha in the City of Cape Town in the Western Cape, on the southern tip of our country and continent. It is the point of convergence between east and west, wealth and poverty, justice and injustice, despair and hope. A Cape of Storms and a Cape of Good Hope.

It was on these southern shores that our painful history of colonial conquest, dispossession, oppression and exploitation started, driven by forces that sought to exploit our resources, both human and material. The rapacious expansion of this quest led to the genocide of the Khoi and the San and prolonged wars with African communities in the interior.

The colonialists imported Malay slaves and indentured labourers from India, China and countries along the east coast of our continent. The subjugation of all these people resulted in complex relationships of domination and subordination. It defined some people as more than human and others as less than human.

It is also here that the proud and unbroken tradition of resistance and struggle for liberation had its genesis. From the Battle of Salt River in 1510, where the ǃUriǁʼaekua Khoikhoi abaThwa/Khwe defeated the Portuguese, through successive wars of resistance led by great heroes of our people.

We remember heroes such as Autshumato, Maqoma, Hintsa, Sekhukhune, Cetshwayo, Makhado, Mantsopa, Modjadji, Moshoeshoe and Ngungunyane.

Full speech attached.