 By Kgotsofalang Mashilo
President Cyril Ramaphosa spent time with the Hellenic, Italian and Portuguese communities in South Africa, also known as the HIP Alliance, during a community dialogue held at the St John’s Hellenic Hall on Tuesday night last week.
Chairperson of the HIP Alliance Dr Stravos Nicolauo chaired the meeting and started proceedings by identifying several community members who had tabled various questions for the president under topics such as entrepreneurship, social cohesion, service delivery, women empowerment, land reform, loadshedding, the economy, national health care and coalition governments.
Environmentalist Catherine Constantinides urged all residents to be active citizens and questioned Ramaphosa on the role of women in building the country and his views on women empowerment.
“We have one of the best constitutions in the world because we strive for a non-sexist, non-racist, democratic and prosperous society,” said Ramaphosa.
He acknowledged that though South Africa still has many battle scars from a difficult past it was everyone’s responsibility to change the ideologies behind racism and patriarchy.
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“Women empowerment should include economic empowerment. It should include the best training for women in the workplace and equal pay for equal work,” he said.
Ramaphosa addressed the alarming statistics surrounding gender-based violence and said he was scheduled to sign a new declaration against gender-based violence and femicide.
The president also touched on the problems at Eskom.
“Eskom is broken, and it is a very complex problem,” he said.
“There is not a single company that I know of in South Africa that has worked up a debt of R430-billion.
“Eskom is by far the most important company in SA and holds our livelihoods in its hands.”
He said a number of design faults had been identified at Eskom’s power plants, Medupi and Kusile, during a recent visit.
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“Cyclone Idai, which recently hit Mozambique, is also affecting Eskom’s power supply, which is not helping the situation faced by the power utility,” said Ramaphosa.
Jose Nascimento, head of the Portuguese section of the HIP Alliance, said the Portuguese community needs to be represented more prominently in the rainbow nation.
“We do not have a Portuguese South African Ambassador,” Nascimento said.
“We’d like to see a South African Portuguese minister as part of the cabinet, South African Portuguese generals in the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) and a South African Portuguese High Court Judge.
“We’d like to occupy those spheres because we have those skills and we are committed and we are part of the rainbow nation.”
