Esther Lewis
5 February 2009
Pressure groups will use the traditional grand opening of Parliament as a platform to highlight issues from the arms deal to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
On Friday Cosatu, with the Young Communist League and several other organisations will picket to promote boycotts and sanctions on Israel, says national spokesperson Patrick Craven.
"Parliament is an important and appropriate political venue. This is part of an ongoing campaign around the country," he says.
Protests will also be held in Johannesburg and Benoni.
The Social Justice Coalition (SJC), born out of the xenophobic attacks last year, is to demand an independent judicial commission of inquiry into the arms deal.
The group decided to highlight the arms deal because they believe democratic systems, including Parliament, were undermined in the process. "The arms deal is a parasite which took our money. We would need less than a quarter of that money to improve life in Khayelitsha," said the SJC's Angy Peter, who lives in Khayelitsha. She is responsible for running education programmes for SJC.
She said that while the government spent billions on arms that were not needed, the people in her community still used the bucket system, had no electricity and too few communal taps.
The group said they had been restricted when applying for permission to march.
They were allowed to lead only 1 000 people in the march from Keizergracht Street and had been instructed to go no further than Roeland Street between Canterbury Street and Buitenkant Street.
Roeland Street has four lanes, but protesters are only allowed in one lane leading to Parliament.
Police spokesman Superintendent Andre Traut said: "We have looked at all threats and made recommendations. We will not allow any disruptions by protesters and we will ensure an incident-free event."
Several businesses as well as residents in the area will be affected. Street vendors will not be allowed to trade during the road closures, scheduled for 6am to about 1pm.
Traut said neither people nor objects were allowed to protrude through windows, doors or openings in buildings on the routes of closed streets.
Rubbish would not be collected that day, so residents had been instructed not to put their rubbish bins outside.
Traut said people ignoring any of these requests would be regarded as a security threat and would be dealt with accordingly.
The following roads will be closed on Friday from 6am to 1pm:
Roeland Street between Buitenkant and Plein streets; Gallery Lane, Plein Street between Roeland and Spin streets; St John's Street be-tween Roeland and Orange streets; Bureau and Spin streets; Adderley between Wale Street and Fountain Circle; Heerengracht Street between Fountain and Media 24 circles; Hertzog Boulevard between Heerengracht and Oswald Pirow; Wale Street between Burg and Adderley streets; and Strand Street between Long and Russell streets.
Princess Ann will be closed at the M3 and Eastern Boulevard incoming will be closed at Main Road from about 9am to 1pm. Several streets around the presidential residence in the Newlands area will be closed.
No parking will be allowed in Church Square; St Mary's Cathedral parking area; Adderley Street between Wale Street and Hertzog Boulevard; Hertzog Boulevard between Heerengracht and Oswald Pirow; and Gallery Lane.
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