A group of students who protested against the country’s ”harsh realities” at OR Tambo International airport on Wednesday are racist, the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) said.
”These hooligans disguising [sic] to be concerned about South Africa are not only racists to the core, but are an example of the past that is refusing to acknowledge the birth of the new South Africa,” said the ANCYL’s Zizi Kodwa in a statement on Thursday.
Last month one of the protesters, Quentin Campbell, a Pretoria student, was one of 11 white students who painted their faces black at Pretoria’s Union Buildings in a bid to be classified as Africans.
Kodwa said the youth league was ”appalled” at the students’ ”desperate measures”. He said while the right to protest had to be acknowledged, racism could not be tolerated.
At Wednesday’s protest airport officials stopped three students from handing out garlic, beetroot and pamphlets to foreign tourists. Wearing bandages, neck supports and carrying crutches, they wanted foreigners to note ”the harsh realities of South Africa”, said campaign initiator Campbell in an e-mailed statement on Wednesday.
”The pamphlet was designed to point out to tourists the perils of discrimination, crime and HIV in South Africa, with reference to everything that is being blamed on the ‘wrongs of the past’.”
It also referred to former deputy president Jacob Zuma’s remark that a shower could prevent Aids and Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang’s view of garlic and beetroot as Aids remedies, Campbell said.
Ten students had taken part but only three were spotted by the police, it was reported. — Sapa