Phillip Dexter's article concludes that the Bruin Bemagtigingsbeweging (BBB - Brown Empowerment Movement) is a direct challenge to the letter and spirit of our Constitution. He also refers to "very real issues of social inclusion, marginalisation and alienation that people who were classified as Coloured face in the democratic South Africa,"

Despite the title of his article "Race, identity and history in the Western Cape," he does not take these points any further. Instead he argues that the BBB, a civil society movement established for the upliftment of Coloured people, is a "narrow, reactionary, opportunistic attempt to secure a political platform for people who are intent on getting votes for themselves at the expense of the interest of the people they claim to represent." He also makes some unfortunate remarks about the person of veteran politician Peter Marais. Dexter states that "those like Marais who try to make us go backwards in time to define ourselves as Coloured, White, Black, Indian or anything else first, are robbing us of being part of a process of liberation."

Truth is that the BBB was established in November 2011 at a meeting in Paarl. The meeting was called by members of the Department of Correctional Services in the Western Cape. I was asked to facilitate the meeting with an extensive group of community members, leaders in education and members of the Correctional Services Department.

My request was that we focus on the matter of the Correctional Services members who felt discriminated against as their being coloured was now the barrier in promotions and appointments. This was very simply that the Department was applying national demographics instead of provincial ones in their employment practices. It was following closely the discredited approach of Jimmy Manyi who argued that there were too many coloured people in the Western Cape. Coloured people in the Western Cape will have to be moved to other provinces to balance the racial employment equity scorecards. The 52% of Coloured people in the Western Cape must now be shrunk by these policies to 9% that Coloured people constitutes nationally.

The meeting felt that this was broader than just one department as it affects whole communities. It resolved that the BBB be established as a civil society initiative to address the marginalisation of coloured people. Mr. Marais was also invited to the meeting and was subsequently elected to the management committee of the BBB.

This is the issue at hand.

Coloured people are in oversupply in the Western Cape and need to be moved to other provinces. A Group Areas removal in democratic South Africa. The much discredited Jimmy Manyi statements amongst others by Minister Trevor Manuel are alive and well in the affirmative action policies of the Department of Correctional Services.

In the Labour Court case in Cape Town today ten officials of the Correctional Services Department are taking the Department to court. In cross-examination adv. Marumo Moerane SC (along with adv. Dumisa Ntsebeza SC and two others) states the following to witness André Jonkers: "I sympathize with you. (But) to address the legacy of the past...there will be people who will be unhappy." People like the Coloured people in the Western Cape. Jonkers responded almost with desperation: "When will there be a future for me and my family? To date you have 10 posts, but not one is reserved for a coloured person. And you call that ‘equity'?"

This, Mr. Dexter, is what it is about in the Western Cape when it comes to coloured people. Nowhere else in the country is this policy as blatant as it is in the Western Cape. This is why the BBB was established, in November 2011 already.

Discussions on the Manyi statements followed with the ANC Western Cape in your Cape Town office where the ANC Western Cape executive members present expressed their concerns with this approach. They also undertook to take up the matter with Correctional Services. You were then probably still in the arms of COPE where you found the ANC policies detestable.

Already on 9 March 2011 Cosatu through Messrs. Vavi and Ehrenreich expressed themselves against this legislation. Gwede Mantashe too. See Rapport 9 March 2011.

Today you speak of a movement to address the upliftment of coloured people as a "direct challenge to the letter and spirit of the Consititution".

The notion of race, says Mr. Dexter, "has been debunked so many times over that is actually a disgrace that people use this category other than in the sense that our Constitution and laws do, which is to seek to identify people...for the purposes of redress for the consequences of this classification." Redress for coloured people, sir? What about the ANC's reference to blacks in general and Africans in particular? Is that debunking your myth? Do you consider withdrawing the racial brief of the DCS?

"Being South African in the democratic South Africa," you say, "start with recognising that being Black, Coloured, White, or Indian is secondary to being African and South African." Is this what your interpretation of "African in particular" is? No, because your include all the categories. And yet, your party speaks about "blacks in general, African in particular."

You also say, "there is no Black, Coloured, White or Indian ‘race'". Waa' val djy uit, meneer? Is this in line with your party?

Listen to Minister Trevor Manuel in his biography when he looked at the first election in the Western Cape:

"But the contradiction in the Western Cape was this: most ANC members in the Cape were indeed African, and it was logical that they should wish to see those demographics reflected in the leadership. Yet the majority of people in the Western Cape, the majority of the working class, was coloured. This contradiction, and the ANC's inability to manage it, played out in the first democratic election in 1994 in a way that shocked ANC leaders." (Choice not Fate - the life and times of Trevor Manuel, 2008 at p. 322.).

A friend shared with my recently how her company applied to the Lotto for funding. She had to hear that her company had too many coloured people and that it was a Western Cape company. Mr. Christo February testified in the Labour Court how he was detained and tortured for three months for his UDF activities in the struggle against apartheid. Today that means nothing because he is coloured in the Department of Correctional Services.

No, Mr. Dexter, the BBB is not a political party and it is not a "challenge to the letter and spirit of our Constitution." It is a civil society movement, very much in its baby shoes, finding solace in our Constitution. Coloured people have family and more particularly, blood ties with African, White and Indian and cannot be exclusive. However, we acknowledge the diversity of our African, White, Indian and Coloured family.

! Ke e: /xarra //ke (people who are different coming together). This relates to our First Nation status and our physical contribution to uniting in our diversity. But this is a topic for another day. You have an election to prepare for and we have to decide whom to vote for.

Dr. Danny Titus is conference chairperson of the BBB.

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