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POLITICS | SOUTH AFRICA
South Africa's apartheid-era victims demand reparations
Annonymous
05/01/2024May 1, 2024
Dozens of South Africans have set up a protest camp outside the Constitutional Court. They are demanding reparations for human rights abuses suffered under white minority rule.
The protesters say they are being ignored even though the government has a $100-million reparations fundImage: Thuso Khumalo
The voices of some 50 elderly protesters are heard echoing in song across the grounds of South Africa's Constitutional Court in Johannesburg, the commercial heart of South Africa. They are demanding justice and reparations for abuses suffered under apartheid — 30 years after the country became a democracy.
They are all members of the Khulumani Support Group and the Galela Campaign — two groups fighting for financial redress for the victims of white minority rule under apartheid.
The protesters say that since they weren't identified as victims of human rights abuses during apartheid by South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), led by the late Archbishop Desmond Tutu 28 years ago, they haven't benefited from any reparations paid out by the government to date.
While the group has protested in front of the court intermittently for years, their permanent camp outside the Constitutional Court only started in November 2023.
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