Mashatile’s Vision for an African Renaissance in Heritage Day Address

Deputy President, Paul Mashatile has stressed the urgent need to decolonise and Africanise museums and monuments through people-centred knowledge production, urging citizens to “reimagine heritage institutions for a new era”.

Addressing the Heritage Day event at Bridgeton Sports Grounds in the Western Cape on Wednesday, he called on South Africans to anchor the country’s cultural legacy in a future marked by inclusion, innovation and African identity.

Mashatile set the tone for a transformative vision of South Africa’s past, present, and future.

“Our heritage institutions must be more than museums of memory. They must be engines of development, laboratories of creativity, and spaces for cultural diplomacy,” he declared.

He called for a strategic shift aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals and South Africa’s Vision 2030, where heritage becomes a tool to combat unemployment, social fragmentation, crime, and inequality.

“Our heritage institutions must reflect our lived experiences. They must preserve erased histories and empower future generations,” Mashatile said.

Referencing the Eastern Cape Frontier Wars, the Battle of Ncome, and the Sekhukhune wars, the Deputy President paid homage to forgotten warriors and traditional leaders who resisted colonialism and safeguarded African identity.

Mashatile decried the colonial-era beheadings and export of Khoisan and African skeletal remains to European museums, vowing government action through the National Policy for the Repatriation and Restitution of Human Remains.

He also called on communities to fight modern-day social ills—drug abuse, GBV, racism, and youth marginalisation—urging all South Africans to protect and promote heritage as a unifying force.

“Our heritage embodies the resilience of a people united in their diversity. It is the soul of our nation and the key to unlocking our collective future.”

kamogelo.moichela@iol.co.za

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