I can then ask you a bit about some of the constitution
so the preamble of the constitution says we the people of South Africa
recognize the injustice of our past honor those who suffered for justice and freedom of our land
respect those who have worked to build and develop our country believe that South Africa
belongs to all who live in it united in our diversity to accept that absolutely now
during evidence in chief Mr Roets testified about some of the speeches that you've given
in which you describe white people as visitors in South Africa is that correct
absolutely now how do you reconcile this constitutional notion
that South Africa belongs to all who live in it and that white people are visitors in South Africa
you arrived here as settlers in 1652 it's a historical fact and you were using a
South Africa as a refreshment station you are not here to settle you were a passing because of
our Africanness and the spirit of ubuntu we have embraced you and we've shared our land with you
and we've accepted that you have naturalized in this country but it doesn't change the fact
that you came yet as a so let me ask you that let's clarify that yes do you accept that there
are many people in South Africa black and white indian colored chinese who came south Africa
from another country at some point and not placed not blacks we came from one country called Africa
ah i understand in other words the claim is anyone who is on the continent of Africa
belongs in south Africa is that correct was not a visitor no no south Africa is Africa
we are one country called Africa this south Africa you are talking about was imposed on us
so we didn't come from anywhere speak for yourself we didn't come from anywhere there's no African
who came from anywhere we came from here i mean my lord i cannot come from
the second bedroom in this house and then i find you in another bedroom in the same house
and then you say i came from somewhere in the same house i didn't come from somewhere i was sleeping
on the other side well yeah so we are not visitors we didn't come from anywhere this is our continent
so in other words someone who is born in Egypt Nigeria Malawi Botswana Zimbabwe none of those
people have visited in South Africa they belong here it's their own yes where Nigerians Ghanaians
Mozambians Zimbabweans when they are here they are at home they should not even for a second doubt
themselves this is our let me ask you this thing your party has recently engaged in a campaign
where you've gone to restaurant owners and you've asked them to produce lists of who works for them
and to say you have a certain number of people who are not South Africans and i said there are
people who are South Africans and we want you to change those numbers now how do you reconcile
what you've just told us which is that all people who are born in Africa are part of one house
but you want to say these people are different and they should be fired
from the restaurants they're working and they should be replaced with real South Africans
how do you reconcile we've never set fire so when you are in a court before my lord don't
miss the prison facts no way have we ever said fire anyone so we we shouldn't lie please my lord
lest before we go to the continent here in south Africa if you get a a job or a tender
to go and do a road in Soweto you are required to hire thirty percent or so of locals of Soweto
yet you are a South African of Soweto you are required to subcontract a certain percentage of
people from Soweto so because the locals at that space should not feel excluded they should embrace
the project they should feel they must welcome the project and they must protect it as their own
now what the white ownership does to our people my lord is that they hire our brothers and African
brothers and sisters who are not locals to the exclusion of locals so that they can ignite
the xenophobic war amongst our people they want to thrive which is what made you
survive divide and rule you are dividing us by hiring some of us i'm a South African if i were
to go and open a restaurant in kwaZulu-Natal and i come with everybody from Limpopo the people of
kwaZulu-Natal one they will not feel like this restaurant belongs to them they will not feel a
need to defend it because i just impose people from the other side to them they need to be a
involved for them to know that this belongs to them but it doesn't make the Limpopo people less
South African or less home because i said you must be mixed with the people from kzn and since
our project is in it ends it doesn't make it less at home because i said so no i'm saying the unity
of Africa must start from the shop flow Zimbabwe Mozambique Nigerian South African come let's
work together on the same floor Mozambican and Zimbabwean let's go to school together let's
grow up together and know each other so that by the time we defeat these colonial borders
we already have embraced each other and we don't start from scratch so that's what we're doing
is it's in line with what was saying we're saying Africa is one and let one Africa be seen
at cream restaurant we're not going to allow the bosses to divide our people by excluding others
now so if there is a shop my lord that says here we don't hire Zimbabweans i will go there
and fight with them and say why would you say that why do you classify our people and want
to isolate them it will be a wrong practice so we are starting and which is what is offensive
you want to exclude south Africans with African brothers and sisters so they can fight amongst
themselves and they remain divided we are saying no come together work together so that the unity
starts at the shop floor you are not happy with that let me put you what you actually did
yeah so in other words your party goes to cream restaurant and says we've looked at your books
and you employ let's say it's 25 people who are not South African and uh five people
who are South African we think you should reverse those numbers the next time when we come back in
two weeks now what would it entail you said i'm putting words in your mouth about firing what
would it entail to reverse those numbers but i didn't do that i didn't go to crime and say
these are the numbers and then when i come back in two weeks i want these numbers no
i said to cream i want to look at the the the ratio of cream and see if you guys are compliant
and you know my lord in all the restaurants i went i found them compliant i found both outside
brothers and sisters from other countries and South Africans together on the shop floor
i never said that you see you rely on non-existing sources because
i can ask my lord here that you lead the evidence of me saying that read something
because you utter such ways to mislead the public but i know for a fact my lord he can't
produce anything to back up what he said and he deliberately says it so that it can spread wrongly
that your party did this and there is a video that your party is producing them going to a restaurant
i might be mistaken that it's not cream i know you had a different engagement with someone from cream
they went now you saved my party not me yes but i started saying i went
to cream myself yes yes i went to cream i went to three more other restaurants
and they were white owned and they hired Africans to work there and they hired South Africans
to work there i went there and when i arrived my lord a day before we sent a delegation to go and
make appointments we were given an appointment a setup was made in that restaurant of where we're
going travel meeting when i arrived there then there is sudden change of heart and then doors
are closed and there is a problem people are going up and down saying we can't access the place i
just said one or two ways which opened the door i said to them this country was won through dialogue
we spoke that's why we are where we are now you are refusing to speak in a country where
we delivered this democracy through speaking and you want to say you are a democratic person
abandon your white supremacist attitude and apply the spirit of those who came before us
and came together and spoke and resolved our problems
they went inside they spoke they came back they opened and they apologized sincerely
for their conduct because they were misled by their lawyers there was no confrontation
my lord business was not on it we made sure we make appointment in the our way uh
they've not opened because they don't do breakfast so we we met them in the morning so that by the
time they open we're done we've spoken and then the shop can open and run smoothly let
me ask you some follow-up questions so you said you checked that they were compliant
what would compliant mean the ratio was balanced we had a both South Africans Zimbabweans Zambians
all of them were there working together in one restaurant out of 12 workers there were
actually three Zimbabweans the rest of the South Africans if there's a Zimbabwean person who only
hires Zimbabweans in their restaurant would that be compliant no and i will not have said to him
in two weeks time i want you to change this no i would have educated him that the importance
of making our people work together in the same work environment helps to unite
the Africans because if we don't do that we are giving the facts a weapon to engage in xenophobic
attacks so whatever we do no nation should feel sidelined or replaced by another nation
they should feel that we are all Africans who are all home and we are all protected in that way it
goes even beyond the issue of work it goes to the security of the mall itself of the shop itself
because if the people who come from here work there and there is a looting that is going to
happen tomorrow there there will be the ones who are going to stand up and say guys you can't do it
that's our job we worked there if your nation is that we're all African brothers and sisters
why this obsession with an idea of a ratio and why your view that a Zimbabwean person running
a Zimbabwean restaurant ought not to be allowed to employ only Zimbabweans it seems that you are
the ones stoking the division you are saying there must be some kind of ideal ratio that if you had a
shopping center for example where there were 10 restaurants and one was a Mozambican restaurant
employing onions and beacons and one in South African restaurant deploying only South Africans
you'd say this is a this is unacceptable there needs to be some kind of ratio internally why
you have just given a division a new meaning why would a ratio be a division because racial means
come together this one's like this how how are you together here how can that be a division ratio
cannot be a division ratio is making sure that everybody is included and our people understand
that and patriotic white South Africans who owned restaurants appreciate and understand that
only racists who claim to be speaking on their behalf will say the things that you are saying
my lord i had three meetings three owners not a single one of them so that is an attack