Pro-Palestine demonstrators outside Athlone Stadium, Cape Town, where ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa delivered a May Day address on Wednesday, 01 May 2024. He reiterated the party’s stance of solidarity with Palestine. [Picture: Wardah Wilkinson]
Palestinians in Gaza and the Occupied West Bank were not forgotten when President Cyril Ramaphosa addressed a May Day rally in Cape Town on Wednesday. He also attempted to rally support for the upcoming elections.
Thousands of supporters of the African National Congress (ANC), Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) and South African Communist Party (SACP) gathered to hear his Workers’ Day address at the Athlone Stadium, Cape Town.
Leaning on the memory of Nelson Mandela, the ANC president told the crowd that the alliance – comprising the ANC, COSATU and SACP – had so far “stood firm in our support for the people of Palestine”.
The issue of Palestine is one he has repeatedly rallied around since October, allowing him to capitalise on discontentment with the Democratic Alliance’s (DA) stance on the war on Gaza. At least 34 596 Palestinians have been killed so far.
“We want the people of Palestine to do what Madiba said should be done; that they too must enjoy the freedom that we are enjoying,” he said.
Palestine has become a major rallying point in the run up to this year’s national and provincial elections. Amidst a global swell of support for Palestine, local political parties have come under scrutiny for their stance on what many deem a genocide in Gaza.
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As a party, the ANC has historically backed the Palestinian cause. Party officials sporting a keffiyeh is not an uncommon sight. Most recently, it even supported a motion in Parliament to shut the Israeli embassy in Pretoria.
This stance did not go unnoticed by the second deputy president of the Muslim Judicial Council (MJC), Shaykh Riad Fataar, who told the president: “History will write you and the government down as a president that stood with humanity and justice”.
The party’s declarations in the legislature and on the campaign trail notwithstanding, the SA-Israel relationship on a bilateral level is slightly warmer than it seems. The post-1994 government, under the ANC, still maintains economic and diplomatic ties with Israel.
