Environmental Affairs minister, Nomvula Mokonyane has expressed outrage over what happened at Clifton Fourth Beach. Mokonyane has described the alleged removal of beachgoers as discriminatory.
It’s alleged that a private security company removed Black beachgoers from the beach on Sunday evening.
There are reports that the private security guards were hired by the Clifton residents and briefed to not allow black people who appear to look like they are from the townships or criminals onto the beach.
Mokonyane says it is not acceptable for any security company to remove people from a public space.
“The three thousand kilometres coastline is not owned by any single individual or any community. It belongs to the public and everybody – black and white – has access to that. We also have an obligation as South Africans to make sure that when we use these public facilities we maintain the mental standards and we do not also impose what is a preference of a minority or a certain group because of their own proximity. It’s unacceptable. South Africa belongs to all who live it.”
Picnic at Clifton’s Fourth Beach
Meanwhile, the lobby group, Black People’s National Crisis Committee, is expected to host a picnic at Clifton’s Fourth Beach late Saturday afternoon.
The latest initiative comes after the group slaughtered a sheep on the beach yesterday as part of their Reclaim Clifton Campaign.
The beach came under the spotlight when a group of people were allegedly chased away from the beach by the Security Company, Professional Protection Alternatives last Sunday.
The ANC in the Western Cape has come out in support of the picnic. ANC provincial spokesperson, Dennis Cruywagen, elaborates:
“We are in support of today’s picnic at Clifton’s fourth beach. The picnic is not being organised by the ANC bus as I said we fully support it. We throwing our weight behind them and we would want to ask Western Cape residents or Capetonians to join us and want to see all of God’s beaches open to all God’s people and make a point peacefully that we stand for non-racialism.”
