Pretoria - Rivonia trialists, Advocate George Bizos and Andrew Mlangeni, have been honoured with the Freedom of the City Award, by the City of Joburg.
City of Joburg Mayor Parks Tau bestowed the City’s highest honour to the two for the role they played in the country's liberation struggle on Wednesday.
“We also honour the service they gave - and continue to give - to the very democracy that they helped lead the struggle to create.
“And, through them, we honour the values enshrined in our constitutional order, the great refutation of the system our honourees gave their freedom – and risked their lives – to bring down,” Mayor Tau said.
Stalwart Mlangeni, one of the accused in the Rivonia Treason Trial, spent 26 years on Robben Island in the cell next to Nelson Mandela before serving in Parliament in the first democratic government.
Bizos’ has dedicated his working life fighting for basic human rights under apartheid, and since the collapse of apartheid, he has fought to ensure that those rights, guaranteed under the Constitution, are accorded to all South Africans.
Mayor Tau said in honour of the two, his administration will redouble the fight against the consequences of the system they helped bring down.
“We recommit ourselves to emulating you, confronting the challenges of our own day in the spirit of the towering example that you have set for us.”
Mayor Tau said efforts will be intensified under the corridors of freedom programme to lead the private and public sector alike to cast transformation in glass and concrete; to invest in mixed-use, mixed income realities along transit corridors and in new transit nodes.
They will also drive the powerful response initiated through the Vulindlel’eJozi programme – a partnership with Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator to break down barriers to opportunity for 200 000 young people – both through placement into opportunities and through state-of-the-art, market-defined skills development channels. – SAnews.gov.za
