The week of August 10th to 16th in 2012 was a horrendous experience that showed the callousness of men.
These are the sentiments shared by the founder of the humanitarian foundation, Gift of the Givers, Dr Imtiaz Sooliman, in his address at the 4th Annual Marikana Commemoration Lecture.
The lecture was hosted virtually by Sibanye Stillwater.
The Humanitarian Foundation was among the first respondents to assist the striking mineworkers 11 years ago.
Dr Sooliman says, “Gift of the Givers was involved in assisting those miners at Marikana and their families who were extremely hungry. Disappointingly, on one of the days, we received two calls. One was somebody purporting to be from Luthuli House. The message to me was please stop giving food parcels to the miners. This is an instruction from the president in that once they are hungry, they will stop the strike soon. All they wanted was to feed their children. That is the aspiration of 60 million South Africans. All they want is dignity.”
For surviving family members, like Amina Fundi, who was just a little girl when her father Hassan Fundi was killed while on duty as a security guard at the mine, the pain still runs deep.
“My father played a very huge role in the mine and my siblings as characters and value systems, our religious faith and our intellectual and like our intellectual interests and stimulations, you know. So, his passing kind of affected that in like now when I look back at it, I think subconsciously it could have just been rooted in some sort of distrust in God. Because it felt like, you know, why would you take somebody so dear to my heart away from me, I just couldn’t understand it.”
