UDF 40th Anniversary: Former member says there’s still work to be done

CAPE TOWN - While the celebrations for the 40th anniversary of the United Democratic Front (UDF) draw to a close, one former member said there’s a lot of work left to complete.

Shepi Mati headed up Congress of South African Students (COSAS) in the early 1980s and was a UDF member.

He said the social inequality which they fought for all those years ago is still a problem today and must be addressed.

“We have deepened the inequality between rich and poor and I think for me that is the biggest challenge that face us, and we cannot postpone it and put it on the shoulders of our children.”

He said there’s a challenge of creating a new nation which he adds still illudes us.

“We sang songs about a new nation, and yet at this current moment we seemed to have lost our way around forging non-racialism in practice on the ground.”