The Khoisan Youth community, who celebrated Youth Day at Retreat Civic on Thursday 16 June, was reminded to live their lives with purpose.
Western Cape Khoisan Council leader Chief John Jansen said it was hard to live a life with purpose when surrounded by crime.
“As a person who embraces the Khoisan heritage, you must have a purpose in life, especially bearing in mind where the youth of colour find themselves and what they face every day where crime is concerned.
“It is just so difficult for youth to live their life with purpose with all the crime taking place.”
Jansen added that humanity of indigenous people and people of colour were destroyed during the apartheid system.
“The apartheid system was about land and livestock and we lost everything. That happened to be the beginning of a disease called transgenerational trauma and that disease was never treated because as we know apartheid ended in 1994 but the legacy of apartheid is still with us.”
Explaining about how transgenerational trauma affects communities, Jansen says it is trauma that manifests itself in destructive behaviour.
“We must ask ourselves what is transgenerational trauma; it is psychological and physiological, that is transgenerational trauma. We were never treated for that ‘disease’ and the fundamental cause of the trauma manifests itself in destructive behaviour.”
He added that 99% of prisoners in South Africa are people of colour.
“Why is it that crime is largely committed by our people? Our Khoisan tribe’s vision is to restore the dignity of our people and to restore the humanity of our people.
“In SA in 2021 there were 36 000 rapes recorded, 6 900 murders in last three months of 2021 and 350 of those were children. There are 57 murders in SA every day.
“There is no light at the end of the tunnel if we don’t deal with the real causes of the issue of crime.”
Meanwhile, Ward 72 councillor Kevin Southgate said while commemorating Youth Day one needs to reflect on the past to understand the future.
“While we celebrate, reflect and commemorate on the sacrifices made and the achievements of the youth of 1976 we need to look to building a better future for ourselves and our community.
“We need to say to ourselves never again will we subject our communities to the atrocities that led to the 1976 uprisings.
“We need to reflect on our past in order to understand our future.”
Quoting Dr Myles Munroe, Southgate added: “Where purpose is not known abuse is inevitable.”
“We dare not linger in the past because if we do others will make decisions on our behalf and we will be left behind.
“We need to seize the opportunities with which we are presented to promote sustainable livelihoods and to show resilience in the face of adversity.”
Southgate urged youth to focus their attention on job creation.
He added where there is no vision people long to go back to the past.
“We need to focus our attention on job creation, skills development and upskilling our youth in an attempt to address and eradicate the ever-increasing crime in our communities.”
