The Mercury

Machel wants new TRC to aid healing

- Michelle Jones

EIGHTEEN years after democracy, SA has not started to understand its deep societal crises, says Graça Machel, internatio­nal women and children’s rights activist and humanitari­an.

She called for a new version of the Truth and Reconcilia­tion Commission so that perpetrato­rs and victims of violence could look each other in the eye and forgive one another.

Machel was delivering the second Desmond Tutu Internatio­nal Peace Lecture at the University of the Western Cape last night.

About 400 people gathered in the university’s main hall to hear her speak.

She said that both men and women in SA had not been healed from the emotional and psychologi­cal damage that had been inflicted on them. Families, which should be the building blocks of society, had been torn apart for at least three generation­s.

“It may sound presumptuo­us but I have observed, as a South African and a Mozambican, that we have huge difficulty in communicat­ing in a serene, peaceful, accommodat­ing manner. We have a lot of anger in our communicat­ion.”

Machel described South Africans as “ill, hurting, bleeding”.

“We are harming one another because we can’t control our pain.”

She said that anyone who would rape a woman, child or elderly person was “so damaged that they feel the need to inflict pain and hurt on others”.

“They are trying to destroy humanity in their victims. I think we need a vision of how to build a healthy society. How to heal the character of the sons and daughters of our beloved nation.”

Machel said it was important to be free of anger and frustratio­n that would enable us to touch each other in a loving manner, rather than brutalisin­g one another.

She said gender violence was not something to be discussed for just 16 days a year.

“The issue is why we are having hundreds of thousands of cases where we try to hurt, dehumanise one another.”

Machel said recent studies had shown that 61 percent of fathers in Joburg had never paid maintenanc­e and that 40 percent of households in SA were headed by women, not because the fathers were dead, but because they were absent.

“The SA family structure has changed dramatical­ly in recent decades.”

She attributed this to HIV/Aids, migration to urban areas and migrant workers.

The recent unrest in Marikana had highlighte­d the way in which mineworker­s were living, she said, adding that universiti­es should use their research facilities to come up with a deeper picture of what society had become.

Addressing Tutu, she said: “Arch, you led us to confront our demons with the TRC. It sounded like it would be an impossible job. But perpetrato­rs and victims were able to look into the eyes of one another.”

She said such national dialogue, a social movement with a similar sentiment, would be beneficial to confront the past.

In a lighter moment, at the beginning of the lecture, Machel thanked Tutu for forcing her and Nelson Mandela to marry. She said that at the beginning of their relationsh­ip, they were being “a bit naughty” and living together, when Tutu called and said they should get married.

“I just want to say thank you,” she said.

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