Helen’s post is out of order
DEAR Helen, I have been an enthusiastic supporter of your party, the DA, from the beginning of our democracy.
I admired you for your outspokenness against a vile system which came into being when the Nats took over the running of our country in 1948, namely separate development.
You were probably on their “hit list”, like many others who died for their stance.
I also believe you have done an excellent job in the Western Cape as premier but, most of all, I admire you for your honesty and integrity.
However, I think your involvement in the cartoon recently displayed in the news is completely out of place in our new democracy.
The cartoon is wrong on both counts. First, men who rape women come in all shades of colour and, furthermore, rape does not always have to be violent, it can be perpetrated in more than one way where the perpetrator claims “innocence” after the act.
Second, did the first colonists in the Cape barter with the indigenous inhabitants, those being the San and Khoi, for any land they acquired?
Similar to the patriarch Abraham who purchased land in Shechem, did any early colonist enter into any financial transaction with any earlier occupant when acquiring land they then claimed as their own?
Therein lies the dilemma of land restitution in our country.
The argument that land ownership becomes legal due to the claimant’s hard and enterprising work does not hold water.
Prior to 1652, the previous land dwellers, the San and Khoi, also can claim similar sentiments for their ownership as well.
Add courage to the San and Khoi as well – these hardy people had to ward off wild animals, not with muskets or guns, but with bows, arrows and spears.
Since the colonists first landed on southern African shores, and throughout the intervening years, atrocities have taken place on both sides, but are we not now aspiring to follow in the footsteps of our icon, Nelson Mandela, whose vision was crystal clear – a place for everyone under the African sun?
PATRICK DACEY | Northwold