Red October Rally in Kwamashu, Durban

07 November 2002

The KwaZulu Natal Province of the South African Communist Party (SACP) will hold a Red October Rally as detailed below:

DATE : Sunday, 10 November 2002
TIME : 10h00 – 13h00
VENUE : KwaMashu Indoor Sports Centre (next to Princess Magogo Stadium and KwaMashu train station, between Sections P and J), KwaMashu township (Durban)

The SACP General Secretary, Blade Nzimande, will be the main speaker. The rally is part of the SACP’s ongoing Red October Campaign focusing on food security, social security and mobilisation of communities to register for state welfare grants.

The KwaMashu rally will include a session whereby KwaMashu residents will talk about problems they face in the social security system. Already, the KZN SACP Province and the KwaMashu branch are working on problems identified in local pension pay-points and local offices of the Department of Home Affairs. Throughout October, SACP Brigades in every province have visited communities, offices of the Department of Home Affairs and the Department of Welfare in an attempt to investigate and solve problems in the social security system

Some of the problems include:

Many poor families are simply not aware of their social security rights;
There are often huge problems for poor people when trying to apply for social security – they do not have IDs, there are massive delays in many Home Affairs Departments, the process is cumbersome, they are treated rudely by officials.
There are still problems in many pension pay-out points – elderly people are expected to queue for long hours, or to come back the next day. Pensioners are also the target of all kinds of dubious salespersons at poorly supervised pay-out centres. Only last Friday, Mr. Zacharia Ntuli passed away waiting in a long pension queue in central Pietermaritzburg.
Many of these problems are associated with privatised pension pay-out systems
Medical certificates for disability grants sometimes appear to be refused on an arbitrary basis.

The KwaMashu rally will also be used to deliver the runner-up certificate to the KwaMashu branch of the SACP in the Florence Matomela Award as decided by the 11th Congress of the SACP held in July 2002.

CONTACT
Smiso Nkwanyana
SACP KwaZulu Natal Provincial Secretary
Cell - 082 468 7184
Email - sacpkzn@icon.co.za