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The Freedom of Expression Network (FXN) will be hosting its first National Day of Action with events across four provinces on Thursday, 30 August 2007 to raise awareness and build solidarity against repression and how the Regulation of Gatherings Act has been manipulated in an attempt to silence poor and other marginalized groups. Scores of organizations will join hands in solidarity on the 30th of August against attempts to intimidate, harass, victimize, unlawfully arrest and torture protesters. These actions by the state are unacceptable violations of our human rights, enshrined in our nation's constitution.
The Network, facilitated by the Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI), is a nationwide collective of social movements, residents associations, NGOs, and other civil society organisations that seeks to unite social movements and other organisations around issues of state repression and criminalization of dissent. The 30th of August was chosen as Anti-Repression Day in commemoration of the late Teboho Mkhonza who was shot dead at age 17 during police violence at a protest in Harrismith, Ntabazwe in 2004. Yet whether it is in Sebokeng or Soweto, Mamelodi or Middleburg, Kennedy Rd (Durban) or Khayelitsha, people of South Africa are facing greater and greater threats as they attempt to exercise their basic right to speak out. The events in the four provinces are as follows: Gauteng: Participants from communities all over Johannesburg will be marching from the FXI Offices in Braamfontein to the Gauteng Legislature building in the city centre to deliver a memorandum to MEC for Community Safety Firoz Cachalia to express their concerns over increasing police repression in the face of service-delivery protests and other civil society action. Marchers will convene at 11am at the corner of Station and De Korte Streets, Braamfontein before proceeding to the Legislature for delivery of the memorandum at 1pm. Western Cape: Participants from various Cape Town communities will stage a march to Parliament to hand a memorandum to Minister of Safety and Security Charles Nqakula expressing their concerns over similar acts of police repression there. Marchers will convene at 11am at Keizergracht before proceeding to the Parliament for delivery of the memorandum at 1pm. KwaZulu-Natal: Participants from the Durban area will be convening to hold a press conference on police repression before delivering a memorandum to a local police station outlining grievances concerning recent police brutality, particularly against shack-dwellers. - Free State: Participants from various parts of the Free State will convene in Harrismith to commemorate the death of Teboho Mkhonza and stand together against continuing harassment and intimidation of civil society in that region.
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