Machel calls for SA to face its demons by setting up new TRC
GRAÇA MACHEL has called for a new version of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission so that perpetrators and victims of violence may look each other in the eyes and forgive one another.
Eighteen years after democracy, SA had not started to understand its deep societal crises, the international women and children’s rights activist and humanitarian said.
Machel was delivering the second Desmond Tutu International Peace Lecture at the University of the Western Cape last night. About 400 people gathered to hear her speak.
She said that men and women in SA had not been healed of the emotional and psychological damage inflicted on them.
Families, which should be the building blocks of society, had been torn apart for at least three generations.
“It may sound presumptuous, but I have observed, as a South African and a Mozambican, that we have huge difficulty in communicating in a serene, peaceful, accommodating manner. We have a lot of anger in our communication.”
Machel described South Africans as “ill, hurting, bleeding. We are harming one another because we can’t control our pain.”
She said anyone who would rape a woman, child or elderly person was “so damaged that they feel the need to inflict pain and hurt on others”.
“They are trying to destroy humanity in their victims. I think we need a vision on how to build a healthy society. How to heal the character of the sons and daughters of our beloved nation.”
Machel said gender violence was not something to be discussed just 16 days a year.
She said recent studies had
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