WITH regard to your two excellent articles (M&G May 12 to18), “Abortion — A Test for Women’s Rights” and “Miscarriage of Justice”.
It is estimated that over 200,000 illegal abortions are performed in South Africa each year — many of which are unsafe and even result in death. Three black women die every day due to incomplete abortions. How many more women must die before these archaic laws are
Strict laws that prevent abortion do not prevent it at all! They merely worsen the consequences. Legal or not, abortions will continue.
The “anti-choice” group is well organised, noisy and aggressive and apparently well funded. With their marches and placards they “appear” to be a majority. But there is that vast crowd of women — the voiceless, the poor, the illiterate — who don’t know what to ask, who to ask or where to ask. Desperate and poor women will abort — no matter what. It is the voiceless, the poor and the illiterate who are the ultimate sufferers.
I feel that the “anti-choice” (so called “pro-life”) supporters should accept responsibility for the thousands of deaths of babies (not foetuses but real, living babies) aborted after six months through backstreet and unhygienic conditions. They have forced those desperate women into waiting till the last moment. This “pro-life” group is guilty of murder!
Women must have the right to choose. They must be entitled to have this operation done legally, professionally and hygienically under clean and sterile
The RDP booklet states specifically: “Every woman must have the right to choose whether or not to have an early termination of pregnancy according to her own individual beliefs.” This was one of the vital issues on which many women voted the ANC into power.– Noreen Auerbach, Berea, Johannesburg
# RECENTLY a Mail & Guardian editorial stressed the fundamental human rights aspects of the abortion debate. Perhaps your newspaper should also be questioning the credentials of the fundamentalists quoted in “The Abortion Debate Rages On” (M&G June 2 to
Fundamentalists are not committed to all the human rights in our Bill of Rights and, being rigidly autocratic, they exclude women from positions of power. Some — including the Catholic Church — still practice apartheid in their religions. Today in some countries where there are fundamentalist religions, women still do not even have the vote.
At the public hearing of the Constitutional Assembly National Sector: Women, at the World Trade Centre on June 4 1995, only one oral submission was made that could be seen as anti-choice. Clearly, the credibility of the fundamentalists on the basic human right to equality must continue to be questioned. — Fran Cleaton-Jones, Babette Kabak, Doris Ravenhill, Members of the Executive, The Women’s Lobby
# Briefly
ANC MP Jenny Schreiner feels the Iscor development at Saldanha Bay should go ahead because it would create jobs for the local community.
It is true that the project will create a few thousand short-term jobs during construction. But when the plant is up and running, it will employ only about 600 people. Most of those will come from the more than 4 000 people in Vanderbijlpark who will lose their jobs as a result of the scaling-down of that plant.
Schreiner’s objections are not valid. The result of what she regards as an RDP-friendly project at Saldanha will be 600 jobs gained — and few of those for the locals — at the expense of 4 000 jobs elsewhere.
The only concern which will benefit is Iscor, which will get a R1-billion tax break and be able to make more money out of fewer workers. — Robert Brand,
I WELCOME the decision taken by the Constitutional Court to abolish the death penalty because it was meaningless, cruel and inhuman.
During the National Party regime, many killings took place. Scores of Africans were killed with no explanation at all, no arrests.
Vuyisile Mini, Payi, Xundu, Mahlangu etc were hanged, but notorious killer Barend Strydom killed eight people in Pretoria. The NP released him. There are many others like him whose hands are full of blood.
The Conservative Party recently tried to form a campaign alliance against the death penalty, with other parties, to secure the release of Clive Derby-Lewis and others. Yet, when the death penalty is abolished, they are against the decision. They are hypocrites, not honest at all. — Mike Mambukwe, Former Death Row Prisoner, Pretoria
* I WISH to congratulate you on your 10th anniversary. I have been reading your paper ever since I was a first year Engineering student at the age of 17 (1987) in
I have read virtually all available editions since then. However, I battled at times when I had to work during vacation, when, in the former Transkei, I couldn’t get my copy in some remote areas. My heart was sore when I went to work in Volksrust in the Eastern Transvaal in 1993, and had to drive to Newcastle every Saturday morning to get my weekly bread.
I’m now back in Durban and there is nothing more satisfying than knowing that I will read my Mail on Friday before 9am. Congratulations, keep up the good work and don’t let the temptations of consumerism and commercialisation affect your quality coverage. — Khwezi Vincent Tiya, Westville
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