Pretoria - Despite putting on a brave face when standing up for the Khoisan clan, loneliness creeps in on King Khoisan, who has led a four-year camp at the Union Buildings.
In 2017, he and his people arrived from the Eastern Cape and settled in at the Union Buildings, with the purpose of getting their people recognised.
Their requests include that their language to be one of the official languages in South Africa and that they be recognised as the first citizens of the country.
“When we arrived here in 2017, we never thought that our journey would be this long,” said King Khoisan.
He said leaving his family behind was not an easy thing to do.
“When I came this side from Port Elizabeth, I had to sacrifice my whole life … I have stopped my life for more than three years.
“For me to be away from my children and grandchildren is hard,” he said at the weekend.
“I have been deprived of the comfort of watching television while relaxing on a couch, and of creature comforts like taking a shower.
“Those are some of the sacrifices that we had to make.”
King Khoisan said not a lot of people know about the sacrifices he and the others who live with him have made to become “settlers” at the Union Buildings.
“For them, when they come to the Union Buildings it’s nice, as they come to see the Khoisan people in real life.”
One of the challenges of camping outside in their makeshift home at the national site is the rainy season and the cold of winter.
“It is the rainy season right now, and we are often running around trying to protect ourselves and our belongings from getting wet.
“Even when it’s windy we suffer.
“There was an incident when it rained for a whole week, and it is sad for us, as no one is assisting us, not even the government."
During the first Covid-19 lockdown restrictions, he said they learnt to adapt to a “new habit of gardening”.
“Under the lockdown we had to change our way of staying here. We were forced to start growing our own vegetables and herbs, for survival and good health.”
Where they arrived and set up camp, all they had was grass and flowers around them, and they had no access to electricity, but all that changed when a good Samaritan reached out.
“Someone from the community sponsored us with a solar system, so now we are able to charge our electronic gadgets.”
The camp site is now home to six people, with fresh vegetable gardens and shelters they can sleep in.
There were visitors camped next to them in solidarity.
“There was a group of about 40 people from Kuruman who stayed here for two weeks. They left but later returned and stayed for another week.
“Those are the people that have supported us, and others do come to show support us” said the man, who, when he came in 2017, had been there the previous year, and returned after promises made by President Cyril Ramaphosa to address their issues, were not met.
Last Wednesday, King Khoisan and three others were arrested by the police and dragged away from the site for planting dagga on the lawns, not too far from the statue of Nelson Mandela.
They were released the following day on warning ahead of their trial in March, and according to reports, immediately after their case was postponed some of their supporters smoked dagga right outside the court house.
Despite the challenges they are faced with, they say they are not discouraged in continuing to fight for the Khoisan clan.
They are encouraging the public to come to the Union Buildings to see how they live, and to hear their reasons for being there.
Pretoria News