ANC CONDEMNS ATTACKS ON FOREIGNERS

BY SAPA
Jul 23, 2009
JHANNESBURG

The ANC strongly condemns all criminal acts in the form of violence against foreign nationals, destruction of state and private property, and looting of shops

The ANC has a "deep understanding" of the impact poor service delivery has on South Africans, spokeswoman Jessie Duarte said today.

"The ANC, however, strongly condemns all criminal acts in the form of violence against foreign nationals, destruction of state and private property, and looting of shops in some parts of the country under the guise of ’service delivery protests’," she said.

The government, at all levels, had put plans in place to address the issues raised.
The party was commenting after a wave of service delivery protests, some of which turned violent and resulted in a resurgence of xenophobia.

Dismissing the protests as unfounded would not help the situation, said the ANC Youth League, which said that in most cases, the concerns over service delivery were genuine."Dismissing the concerns as products of a third force will never assist the people’s challenges and will not help expose the [ulterior] motives if there are any," it said in a statement.

Duarte said the ANC was "not impervious to genuine community concerns" and called on its branches to work with civil society to ensure party policies were "well articulated" to the people.
"We have engaged to find solutions to all problems and concerns raised with us by communities during door-to-door campaigns and public gatherings in the run-up to the 2009 elections."

Direct communication was important, Duarte said, hence the party appreciated the commitment by Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Sicelo Shiceka to visit affected areas, where he would listen and find solutions to the concerns raised by communities.

The ANCYL said leaders of the ANC in government should visit communities to address the challenges they faced. It also called on communities refrain from destroying infrastructure while raising their concerns.