KNYSNA NEWS - Hornlee resident Barend Fredericks is one of 14 graduates of the Green Connection's Legacy Champions Programme, a campaign that aims to equip participants with the necessary advocacy skills to make positive changes in their communities.
A key aspect of the programme is to ensure that activists feel empowered, equipped, and supported as they raise their voices and work to solve their own local environmental justice issues, advocating for the outcomes they want for their communities.
The project objective is to create a network of passionate and skilled Green Connectors who know how to develop evidence to support their demands and effectively mobilise their communities to join their eco-justice campaigns.
Fredericks has been hard at work mobilising local fishermen and indigenous communities to fight for the respect, protection, and promotion of environmental rights in the area. "With the help of the Green Connection we are better equipped to oppose oil and gas exploration, as well as the laws and regulations that act as barriers to indigenous people's right to access natural resources and erase an entire history," he says.
The Green Connection's strategic lead Liziwe McDaid says, "the Legacy Champions Programme is a dream come true for me. South Africa needs her people to feel that they matter.
Over the years, it has become evident that neither Parliament nor local councils - who are critical to our democracy - are optimally used to ensure that the executive is held to account and ensure government actions are in the interests of the people."
The Green Connection's community outreach coordinator, Graaff Reinet resident Neville van Rooy, served as a mentor for the Green Connectors, driving environmental and social justice awareness among programme participants, while playing a critical support role.
He says, "When I first started working with these communities, more than a year ago, I found that people felt defeated by a system there to protect them. Many did not know where to start fighting for their rights, even as the ocean was being stolen right from under their noses, through the different restrictions and limitations imposed by those in power. Yet, these are people who have a strong heritage connection to the ocean who now unfortunately must face punitive measures, including jail, for trying to fish from oceans that have been taken over by multinational companies."
The Green Connectors hail from all around the country - Port Nolloth and surrounding areas in the Northern Cape; Saldanha Bay and Langebaan (West Coast) and Hornlee (Knysna) in the Western Cape; the Karoo; Soweto township and Sokhulumi community in Gauteng; and Gqeberha and Port St John's in the Eastern Cape.
Fredericks says they urge government to respect customary law and to protect indigenous people's right to enter fishing areas to fish.
"[This is] in order to sustain ourselves and create livelihoods. People want to return to their ancestral land so that we can also benefit from its natural resources."
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