Latest news with #selfdetermination
Mail & Guardian
a day ago
- Health
- Mail & Guardian
From Jan Smuts to Gareth Prince: The struggle for the liberation of cannabis continues
The South African Human Rights Commission's discussions with the Rastafari and cannabis communities raised its concerns about stories of systematic and personal violations. Photo: Delwyn Verasamy As Africa Month ends, the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) wishes to draw attention to a key struggle for African self-determination, remembering and 're-membering'. That struggle is the struggle for the full liberation of cannabis. Cannabis is a plant which has been used by indigenous South African people in medicinal and spiritual practices for centuries. The struggle for the right to grow, trade and use cannabis can thus be seen as a decolonial one — to reclaim and re-legitimise indigenous knowledge systems, African religion, spirituality and self-determination. The struggle has continued throughout South Africa's democratic dispensation. On 7 March 2025, the minister of health gazetted a new regulation banning cannabis and hemp foodstuffs under the Foodstuffs, Cosmetics and Disinfectants Act 54 of 1972. After widespread contestation and backlash over the constitutionality of the regulations, the minister withdrew them three weeks later. These regulations came unexpectedly, while the Rastafari and cannabis communities were waiting for the draft regulations, which would bring into effect the Cannabis for Private Purposes Act 7 of 2024, from the justice department. The regulation by the minister came exactly a 100 years after cannabis was classified as a controlled drug in 1925 at the Geneva Opium Convention. The classification resulted from a proposal by colonial regimes, including South Africa. Prime minister Jan Smuts was a leading sponsor at the League of Nations, placing cannabis in the same category as cocaine. Cannabis communities thus considered the withdrawn regulations as continued disenfranchisement and suppression of cannabis communities. Less than two weeks prior to the gazetting of the regulation, on 26 February 2025, the SAHRC convened a meeting with other chapter 9 institutions, government departments, civil society and members of the Rastafari community from all nine provinces — the Rights of the Rastafari Roundtable. The Rastafari National Council was also represented. This provided a space for the Rastafari and other cannabis communities to engage in dialogue, to be heard, to affirm their dignity and to find solutions to the structural challenges they experience. The roundtable was precipitated by the SAHRC's discussions with the Rastafari community throughout 2024 where it was troubled by the stories of the systematic and personal violations experienced by this community. Through these sessions emerged accounts of discrimination, criminalisation and persecution — not only because of their cultivation and use of cannabis but because of the general lack of recognition for Rastafari as a community deserving of respect, protection and equal standing in society. The experience of advocate Gareth Prince is one of the better-known examples of the Rastafari struggle. In 1998, the Cape Law Society refused Prince's application to be admitted as an attorney because of his criminal record for possessing cannabis, thereby stripping him of his right to work and earn a livelihood from his profession. Prince is still unemployed and believes members of the Rastafari community are treated as 'third-class citizens' in South Africa. Prince's experience is a reality for almost all Rastafari. At community discussions and the roundtable, Rastafari parents informed the SAHRC of the humiliation at being searched by police officers in front of their children. They believe that their visible Rastafari appearance renders them easy targets for police officials, which amounts to racial and cultural profiling. They endure marital discord when they disagree with their partners on the decision to cut their children's dreadlocks, so that they can be accepted in certain schools, and due to the overt and subtle discrimination against and bullying of Rastafari children. They shared stories of living under precarious employment conditions as they endure regular drug testing by employers because of their visible Rastafari identity and appearance. They suffer unlawful searches of their homes, expulsion from schools, medical neglect at health facilities and social stigmatisation. One Rastafari delegate at the roundtable asked the government stakeholders represented: '… To what extent have your institutions decolonised and transformed? Because, from where I'm sitting, and from your presentations, you are part and parcel of the colonial legacy … because the laws that you are implementing are not the laws that represent us.' They wondered why other religious communities' marriage ceremonies were recognised by the state, but theirs were not. They wondered why their religion, with its African origins, was frowned upon by fellow Africans in an African state. They conveyed their sense of voicelessness in South Africa's democratic culture because they choose not to engage in protest action. They felt 'unseen' and 'unhuman' and carried a heavy sense of non-belonging — pariahs, even under the new dispensation. The unfair discrimination against the Rastafari community and their social position as a marginalised group has largely been left out of the popular discourse about equality and transformation in South Africa's body politic. And yet, the Rastafari community continues to experience some of the worst violations of constitutional rights, including their rights to equality, religion, culture, dignity, health and education. The gazetting of the foodstuffs regulations is an example of the exclusion of the Rastafari from the democratic processes of decision-making in matters that affect them, and is a continuation of paternalistic colonial and apartheid attitudes to this community, and the cannabis plant. Despite a 2018 constitutional court judgment which decriminalised private cannabis use by adults, as well as and the signing into law of the Cannabis for Private Purposes Act 7 of 2024, the Rastafari continue to be arrested for cannabis-related crimes. Police officials conduct these arrests in violation of an August 2023 South African Police Service directive pausing cannabis-related arrests, issued by the national commissioner of police. The Cannabis Act only allows for arrests for dealing in cannabis, where there are reasonable grounds to suspect dealing. Yet, the complaints received by the SAHRC from the Rastafari community suggest that most arrests are still for private possession and use. Because of a lack of regulations from the justice department, which would specify quantities, the definition of 'dealing' has been left to the discretion of individual police officials. Because of the continuing structural and systemic human rights violations which have left the Rastafari community unrecognised, vulnerable, marginalised and criminalised, the office of commissioner Tshepo Madlingozi, at the SAHRC's head office, has designated the Rastafari as one of its two priority communities. The office aims to continue being a partner to the Rastafari and other cannabis communities, to help them regain their human rights. To bring the Rastafari, and other cannabis communities, into the fold of South African society, the state should be more proactive in recognising them as a legitimate community that requires similar protections and measures of redress to other previously disadvantaged and marginalised communities. This includes ceasing all cannabis-related arrests, prohibiting discrimination against children with dreadlocks in private and public schools and expunging all criminal records for persons who have been convicted of cannabis-related crimes. It is imperative that the justice department urgently develops clear and precise regulations on the use and possession of cannabis, including quantities, to guide both cannabis users and the criminal justice cluster. While having been at the forefront of the fight for the decriminalisation of cannabis, members of the Rastafari community feel excluded from the recent rapid commercialisation of the plant. They report that the licensing process is too bureaucratic and expensive, creating artificial barriers to their participation in the formal cannabis economy. In the meantime, 'cannabis shops' are mushrooming in many urban centres, despite their existence in a legal grey area. These and other concerns will be taken forward by the SAHRC in partnership with the Rastafari community and other stakeholders. One such initiative was held on 13 March where SAHRC commissioners Sandra Selokela Makoasha and Philile Ntuli hosted a roundtable specifically for Rastafari women, to provide a safe space for expression and discussion of their specific experiences as a result of their multi-fold identity and intersecting social position as Rastafari, women, wives, mothers, caregivers, workers and cannabis producers and traders. But all interventions such as these, by state and non-state actors, will be rendered ineffective as long as the broader South African society continues to stigmatise and discriminate against the Rastafari. From Jan Smuts to Gareth Prince, the struggle against state overreach and for the valorisation of indigenous cultures and practices continues. Tshepo Madlingozi is a commissioner responsible for anti-racism, education and equality at the South African Human Rights Commission and Naleli Morojele is a research adviser at the commission.
Arab News
4 days ago
- General
- Arab News
Algeria ‘regrets' Britain backing Morocco autonomy plan for W.Sahara
ALGIERS: Algeria's foreign ministry said it 'regrets' Britain's decision on Sunday to support Morocco's automony plan for the disputed territory of Western Sahara, overturning a decades-long policy in favor of self-determination. 'Algeria regrets the choice made by the United Kingdom to support to the Moroccan autonomy plan. In 18 years of existence, this plan has never been submitted to the Sahrawis as a basis for negotiation, nor has it ever been taken seriously by the successive UN envoys,' the ministry said in a statement.
The Guardian
27-05-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Traditional owner group seeks to negotiate local treaty with Victorian government in state first
The Dja Dja Wurrung Clans Aboriginal Corporation (DJAARA) has become the first traditional owner group to seek to negotiate a local treaty with the Victorian government. The corporation, which represents the Dja Dja Wurrung people, has become the first traditional owner group to be formally entered into a register run by the Treaty Authority – the independent umpire that will oversee negotiations. It is the first step to prepare for a traditional owner treaty negotiation. The authority will work with the traditional owner group before the state is invited to negotiate, and the corporation will form a delegation to represent the group during treaty talks. DJAARA's move comes as Victoria continues to work towards establishing what would be Australia's first statewide treaty with First Nations people. DJAARA chief executive, Rodney Carter, said the group wanted more independence and authority to manage land on its country in central Victoria, which takes in Bendigo. 'It's really exciting,' he said of the group's progress towards a local treaty with the state. Carter, a Dja Dja Wurrung and Yorta Yorta man, said traditional owner groups often faced planning regime barriers regarding land management. 'If we're self-regulated and we've got these exceptional standards and we adhere to those, that would be really empowering and about self-determination that we make decisions for ourselves. 'We can be held to account in what we do.' Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email Carter said the traditional owner group could also bring 'constructive solutions' to other areas. He said other priorities for treaty negotiations included discussing how 'ongoing integration of western science and traditional knowledge' could be used in an education setting. Jidah Clark, a Djab Wurrung man and Treaty Authority chair, said a 'diversity of views, lessons and experiences' from communities across the state had laid strong foundations for treaty-making. 'Treaties will recast the relationship between First Peoples and the state, bringing us closer together. This is an important marker on the path towards unity,' he said. Victoria's minister for treaty and First Peoples, Natalie Hutchins, said traditional owner groups were 'experts in their communities, languages, cultures and caring for Country.' 'Treaty is about making a better and fairer state for every Victorian,' she said. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion The First Peoples' Assembly – Victoria's democratically elected Indigenous body – last November began nation-first treaty talks with the Allan government. A statewide treaty – the first of its kind in Australia – will tackle problems affecting First Nations Victorians. In January the assembly and government announced the assembly's role evolving to become an ongoing First Peoples' representative body, was being considered as part of statewide treaty negotiations. When the statewide treaty negotiations began last year, the Victorian premier, Jacinta Allan, said outcomes would need to be passed in the state parliament. Traditional owner treaties allow Indigenous groups to enter into separate agreements about issues and priorities for their communities and region. Rueben Berg, a Gunditjmara man and assembly co-chair, said local treaties would enable traditional owner groups to use their local expertise to deliver solutions for their community. Victoria's opposition withdrew support for the treaty process in January 2024, citing concerns about culture heritage laws, after the defeat of the federal voice to parliament.
CNN
21-05-2025
- Politics
- CNN
Trump is resettling South Africa's White Afrikaners in the US. Instead, a White separatist town wants his backing for self-rule
A group of 59 White South Africans arrived in the United States last week after being granted refugee status by the White House, which has fast-tracked the processing of Afrikaner refugees but paused refugee applications for other nationalities. On Wednesday, South Africa's President Cyril Ramaphosa is set to meet his US counterpart Donald Trump in Washington, seeking a reset in relations with the United States. Ties between both nations have been fraught since Trump froze aid to South Africa in February over claims it was mistreating its minority White population. But as thousands more Afrikaners hope for admission to the US, others insist they have no need of refugee status but want America's help instead to tackle a wave of violent crime in South Africa, or even to establish an autonomous state within a state. Joost Strydom leads the group of White South Africans who have dismissed the US' offer of asylum, and heads Orania, a separatist 'Afrikaner-only' settlement in the country's Northern Cape. 'Help us here,' he said his message was to Trump, whom he hopes will recognize Orania's quest for self-determination. 'We don't want to leave here,' he told CNN. 'We don't want to be refugees in the US.' Home to some 3,000 Afrikaners, the 8,000-hectare (19,800-acre) Orania town is partially self-governing. The exclusively White enclave produces half of its own electricity needs, takes local taxes, and prints its own currency that's pegged to the South African rand. But the settlement's residents want more: its recognition as an independent state. Strydom was part of Orania's delegation to the US in late March to push for this goal. 'We met with government officials,' he said. 'The conversation is ongoing, and it is something that we've decided to keep a low profile on.' Orania is backed by a 1994 post-apartheid accord that allowed for Afrikaner self-determination, including the concept of an Afrikaner state, referred to as Volkstaat. Strydom anticipates that the settlement could develop into a 'national home for the Afrikaner people.' Afrikaners are the descendants of predominantly Dutch settlers in South Africa, with White South Africans making up roughly 7% of the country's population as of 2022 – a share that had declined from 11% in 1996, census data shows. A discriminatory apartheid government led by Afrikaners lost power in the mid-1990s, replaced by a multi-party democracy dominated by the African National Congress. At least 67,000 South Africans have shown interest in seeking refugee status in the US, according to the South African Chamber of Commerce in the USA (SACCUSA). In comments justifying his decision to resettle Afrikaners in the US, Trump cited claims that 'a genocide is taking place' in South Africa, adding that 'White farmers are being brutally killed and their land confiscated.' South African authorities have strongly denied such claims. In a statement in February, the South African Police Service said 'only one farmer, who happens to be white,' had been killed between October 1 and December 31, and urged the public 'to desist from assumptions that belong to the past, where farm murders are the same as murders of white farmers.' Police minister Senzo Mchunu stressed in a recent statement that there was no evidence of a 'White genocide' in the country. The police crime figure for the last quarter of 2024 had been disputed by an Afrikaner advocacy group, AfriForum, which argued that five farm owners were murdered during those months and that police had underreported the actual figures. AfriForum has been documenting farm murders in South Africa for years. In its report for 2023, it said there were at least 77 farm attacks and nine murders in the first quarter of that year, almost equaling the 80 attacks and 11 murders it recorded within the same period in 2022. CNN could not independently verify those figures. Most of the attacks happened in Gauteng province, the group stated. Gauteng is home to the largest concentration of South Africa's White population, according to the country's last census in 2022, with about 1.5 million Whites living there. Afrikaner farmer Adriaan Vos is a recent victim of Gauteng's farm attacks. The 55-year-old said he was left fighting for his life just two months ago after being shot on his farm in Glenharvie, a township in Westonaria, West of Gauteng. 'I was shot twice in the knee and once at my back,' Vos said about the attack on his farm in the early hours of March 16. 'Luckily, that bullet stuck next to my lung,' he said, adding that his farmhouse was pillaged and set on fire the same night. Vos could not identify his attackers and is unsure whether the attack was racially motivated. But the raid appears to be part of a pattern of farm attacks that has persisted for years in South Africa, a country grappling with one of the world's highest murder rates. South African authorities rarely publish crime figures by race but local media report that most murder victims are Black. Westonaria police told CNN there are 'no known suspects' in the attack on Vos' farm and 'no clues of who the attackers were.' South African leader Ramaphosa does not believe that Afrikaners are being persecuted – as claimed by Trump and his ally Elon Musk, who was born and raised in the country – and has described those fleeing to the US as 'cowards' who are opposed to his government's efforts to undo the legacy of apartheid, especially inequality. One of those efforts was the controversial enactment in January of an Expropriation Act, which empowers South Africa's government to take land and redistribute it – with no obligation to pay compensation in some instances – if the seizure is found to be 'just and equitable and in the public interest.' Under apartheid, Black South Africans were forcibly dispossessed of their lands for the benefit of Whites. Today, some three decades after racial segregation officially ended in the country, Blacks, who comprise over 80% of the country's population of 63 million, own around 4% of private land while 72% is held by Whites. For some Afrikaners in Orania, there is more to lose than gain if they choose to be refugees in the US. Built from scratch on arid land described by Strydom as 'an abandoned ghost town' with extreme weather, Orania has witnessed infrastructural growth and is the most realistic place to preserve Afrikaner culture and heritage, according to Cara Tomlinson who coordinates an Afrikaner cultural association. 'If I were to go to America, I would have to give up my language and culture for the American language and culture. I would be abandoning my God-given identity as an Afrikaner for something foreign,' Tomlinson, 24, told CNN. Leaving Orania for the US is not on the cards either for 70-year-old retired church minister Sarel Roets, who moved to the town in 2019. Orania provides him 'a quiet, solitary life,' he told CNN. 'When we travel outside Orania in South Africa, it is very common to be looked at with hate,' he added. Both Roets and Tomlinson desire Trump's recognition for Orania, but the legitimacy of the separatist town has been questioned by other South Africans, including members of the radical left-wing party, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) who say that its 'Afrikaner-only' policy 'institutionalizes exclusion.' South Africa's foreign ministry said Orania had no status as a nation within a nation and remained bound by South African laws. Beyond Orania, other Afrikaners, such as Vos, who's still nursing his injuries, do not plan to leave despite the pressures felt by farmers. 'I'm lucky to be alive,' he said, adding: 'I must look after this place (his farmland), whatever is left. We were born and bred here. South Africa is all we know.' But help must come fast, Vos warned, as he outlined what he hoped Ramaphosa will tell his US opposite number during his visit to the White House. 'We need help in South Africa because you don't know if you're going to wake up tomorrow. It's a mess here,' he said. 'Hopefully, he (Ramaphosa) can be open about everything (with Trump) … and say, 'I'm going to fix it, and I'm going to look after the farmers and the people that are putting food in my mouth.' He must come and do it, implement it, and let's start over again.'
ABC News
21-05-2025
- Politics
- ABC News
Guam legislature set to debate pursuit of US statehood
There's debate in Guam over whether it should persuade the US Government to grant it statehood. The territory's decolonization committee says any move must be determined by the people. Guam's legislature is set to debate a non-binding resolution to pursue statehood, following a proposal put forward by Senator Parker Williamson earlier this year. The territory is listed by the UN for decolonization and last year became an associate member at the Pacific Islands Forum. "I wasn't surprised a call for statement," said Melvin Won Pat Borja, the Executive Director of Guam's Commission on Decolonization. "The current status of Guam as an unincorporated territory is an inequitable status to like statehood," he added. "My primary focus is that the Chamorro people's right to self determination doesn't take a back seat to a particular preference."
