Imtiaz Sooliman – Keynote address from , Gift of the Givers Foundation
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The speakers discuss the recent COVID-19 crisis and the importance of everyone's actions in addressing issues such as lack of income, education, and lack of clarity in government policies. They emphasize the need for unity and clarity in government, community relations, and media coverage, and encourage leaders to act with love and compassion. The speakers also stress the importance of realigning values and creating change, and urge leaders to act with love and compassion.
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Thank you very much for that introduction, a special thank you
to stepania Stillwater for this invite and opportunity to address
people in various sectors of our society,
getting straight to the matter at hand, August 10 to 16 was a
horrendous experience in our history.
It showed the callousness of men, and let me explain that to you in
a more tactical manner. Gift for the givers was involved in
assisting those miners at Marica, those and their families who were
extremely hungry. Disappointingly, on one of the days, we received
two calls. One was somebody purporting to be from lutori
house. The message to me was, please stop giving food puzzles to
the miners. This is an instruction from the president in that once
they're hungry, they will stop the strike soon. I told the person the
President has my number, I don't understand him to be a person like
that. Tell him he must call me directly to say those words
himself to me. But let me tell you directly to take the message home
to those you received from truly house that I will now double the
number of food parcels to give to those poor people.
At some point in the day, I got a call from somebody who says
they're part of the investors in London mining. The same message,
stop feeding this, this miners and their families and with hunger,
soon the strike will stop. This is the most this great, huge
disregard for human rights, for human emotions and human feelings.
It was terribly disappointing to see that kind of sentiment coming
from people who are well healed, who have nothing to lose, whose
wives and children do not go to the hardship and difficulties that
those poor people in Marikana went
it's time not to love in the past, but reflect from the past an over
a period of time into the current. We especially in the current year,
when we are trying to build the country and bring social cohesion
and put people together. We've been getting a lot of negative
people saying, fail, steady state, collapse, grit, Blackout, social
unrest, economic collapse, all those kind of negative things. You
can't build a country on negative sentiment. And a lot of the
negativity came because of covid, not because of covid, but because
of the effect of covid. Mental Health took a huge knock during
covid. People died in isolation. A child couldn't hold his mother or
her mother that was passing on in an ICU husband watched in
distress, why wife passing away, and could not touch the hand of
the body in the last few minutes, it was a very lonely deaths
healthcare workers. We lost 1500 doctors. We lost 2000 teachers.
Kids lost their parents. Parents lost brothers and sisters and
family members, sometimes more than five in a family. It was a
real tough time emotionally. The country hadn't healed from that,
and because of lack of healing. In that process, any minor challenge
becomes a major issue. So we learn from Marikana. We learn from
covid. We learn from the civil unrest in in KZN in 2021 we learn
from the funds of 2022
and we don't fear the challenge of escort in 2023
Why do I say that
positivity makes a body that's not physically strong work much
better?
A negative mindset will destroy a body totally. We speak about
social unrest and and a lack of cohesion and how the country will
fall apart because of hunger and because in 2021 there was unrest
because of hunger. There is no unrest because of hunger. There is
no lack of social cohesion. The masses of this country are very,
very peaceful people. This is a message of positivity to the
government, to the corporates, to the mining company, companies,
everyone. We need to respect the dignity of people, because we
ourselves would want our dignity respected. You see, 27th April,
1994
was not the defining moment in this country, because the black
government took over white government. That was not the
defining moment. Governments come and go all the time, that's
nothing new. What was significant was the attitude of the masses of
this country, the world. Media came with the war rooms and coming
to film the crisis, the chaos, the violence, the eruption, the fire,
the.
Burning that's going to take place. People have finally been
liberated and given the opportunity to take revenge for
all the hardship and difficulty they went through. Your toll, keep
your passports ready, buy food, stock your homes up. You're not
going to go or any able to go anywhere.
It was the most boring event in world history, nothing happened.
But in nothing happened, that happened. Everything happened.
What do I mean?
You see Mandela always said, The people have spoken on 27th April,
94
the people spoke without saying the words their body language said
everything they stood in those lines, in discipline, respect,
hope
and in obedience for something to bring change in their lives, like
those miners that stood at A copy were waiting for a change in their
lives. They didn't say. On 27th April, we were detained without
trial. We were shot at. We were shot in sharpwell. We had to
follow the DOM pass. Our children disappeared. Our family members
disappeared. We were tortured. We were oppressed. Now is the time.
Let's take our revenge. No, the body language said, We will hold
hands. We will not burn the country. Are we looking for hope?
We want to build and want to do things together. That was the body
language.
A year later, Nelson Mandela wears rugby shirt of Francois Pinar at
great political risk to himself, because the rugby shirt and rugby
is regarded as a spot of the oppressor, and yet he wore it, and
people said it was a sell out, and he sold the people out a true
leader balances between the war and the battle.
Better to to lose the battle than to lose the war, because when
communities turn against each other, hundreds of years of
healing and talking and serving and supporting will never change
and fix that. I'm not a normal tourist. I'm a disaster tourist. I
specialize in going to chaos, disorder, confrontation, war,
damages, natural and unnatural. And I see how communities tear
themselves apart in civil war and fiction between themselves, people
from the same same street, same religion, same color, same
community. Once you tear yourself apart, there is no coming back. It
takes hundreds of years, but our people, on 27th April, 1994 said
in without the words that we are a people of faith. We believe in
rebuilding, in renewal. All we want is dignity. Those miners in
Marikana were asking for the same thing. We delivered 1000s of food
parcels to their families. What was incredible.
White miners were scared to come with the black miners were and we
said, we treat everybody equally. The White miners then got brave,
and their families got into the busses. We took them to the site
of distribution. They were welcomed by the black miners. The
black miners gave space and said, You can go first. No racism, no
friction, no anger. They were hungry together while corporate
members and investors were planning how to destroy miners and
bring them to their knees. Miners were showing through humanity. All
they wanted was to feed their children. That is the aspiration
of 60 million South Africans. All they want are not expensive German
cars or a high rise building to stay in or expensive luxury homes.
All they want is dignity, how to feed their children, send them to
school, have good health services, good social cohesion, good
neighborliness, no crime. They can't do it on their own. The
government can't do it on their own. Everyone says government's
corrupt. Government is not corrupt. They are corrupt people
within government, like there are monsters within certain mining
companies, like there are corrupt people in corporates, in the
religious sector, in the NGO sector, in the private sector, you
have monsters and people who are corrupt all over. It doesn't make
the entire country bad. People said saps is corrupt. They bad
people a part of the gang settlement. Everybody in the CPS
is not corrupt, not against element. We'll destroy the moral
fiber of people when we have such negative thoughts and negative
sentiments and paint everyone.
And what the same brush. We stand together, we hold together, we fix
things together. You see, if you offer our country to Germany,
Canada, Australia, America, Britain, anybody in Europe and
say, Please take over this country,
they will look at you like there's something wrong with you. How can
7.4 million people's taxes look after 65 million people? It's
totally impossible, and especially since pre 94 we were responsible
for that. Lack of education, lack of opportunity, no income, no
jobs, no development. Can't look after your families. We've
inherited that. We have a duty to reverse that, and the only way we
can do that is what government, corporates, NGOs, religious sector
and the country joining hands together, what simania is doing
following the takeover and the renewal, the housing, the care,
fulfilling the promises, is an example that all corporates and
all mining companies in South Africa are going to follow. But
while saying that, I need to very became very clear that there has
been a huge change in the thinking of corporate South Africa during
covid itself, we never got calls from the CSI heads. And let's be
honest, CSI departments were created to fulfill a government
regulation. There was no sincerity, no commitment, no
compassion. It was about ticking boxes. The first question they
will ask is not about the quality of the project. How many be points
will you get? Will we get a tax certificate? Can you arrange for
us to get some media interviews or a write up that was the focus of
your CSI? Not communities are leading. They need help. They need
assistance. What should we do? How should we do it? No such thing
across the proper sector,
but in covid, a new realization dawned when the CEOs and the MDS
of companies called not the CSI, the CEOs and MDs and said, forget
all those issues of be tax certificate and media coverage.
Please tell us how to save our country and how to save our people
when you bring commercial compassion into commercialization,
we have an Islamic teaching. It's called barakah. Barakah means
blessings beyond measure, tenfold. When you give blessings, when you
do something good, it comes back 10 fold to 700 fold. Whatever you
get give comes back to you. Simania and other companies are
starting to set an example in a big way
to make a country grow.
You don't drop people down. You hold them and you pull them up
with you. In that way, everybody prospers. If you leave them, they
will pull you down, and certainly everything will collapse. So we
have this possibility to them. And I thank those corporates who've
come out and said, How do we save the country in 2021
the corporates show the same kind of non malice, no vengeance, after
the sole unrest, in case of death, it wasn't riots. We don't have
time to discuss that. It wasn't rights, it wasn't insurrection. It
was outright looting. And the orchestrators of the looting out
we call traitors and anti patriots. The blame went on the
poor people. They were used as pawns. Yes, they did the wrong
thing, but they were used as pawns, and they had immense
remorse after that event to say, what did we do? Terrible thing
that we did. This is not part of our culture and part of our way.
But at that point, the guys who responded first, or the corporates
whose warehouses diluted and burned, whose trucks, forklifts
and equipment and supplies were stolen and damaged and destroyed.
They responded first, no anger. How do we help our people? They're
hungry. How do we build our how do we rebuild our country again, an
example of what corpus can do, blending in with the people. 11
April, 2022
when the flood seat case and end,
we expecting calls from everywhere. Send a boat, send
helicopter, send a diver, send earth moving open. No such calls.
The only calls we got was from corporate South Africa up till 1am
into the 12th of April. And the only question, how can we help?
And what do you need? The corporate mindset change has been
consistent. There's been an increasing amount of intervention,
and the CSI spend we want to increase. Not only that, the
corporate heads are.
Trying to get the staff involved to see what's happening on the
ground. I don't have too much time. I just want to make two more
points. So what is that? During lockdown in July, 2020 in Makanda,
known as to those who don't know, it's grandstown, a child comes in
the queue, barefoot, coal, shivering, thin, torn shirt, no
jersey, no jacket, no hat, no hat. Comes to what our soup kitchens
and says, I'm very hungry, but I won't eat much. Do you mind giving
the food for my mother, my father, my brother and my sister, they
haven't eaten for days. Can you please give that food? I will eat
too much. The child has become the sacrificial lamb,
an indication of everything that's wrong in our society that we need
to fix. How would you react if your child was in that situation
when a child falls down a particular lacrim a two year old
and drowns in feces, how do we explain to parents that your child
died in feces? How would we in our ivory towers, expensive cars,
wonderful homes, business class, travel ticket your grandchild or
child died in that thesis? We need a realignment of our thinking, and
we need total commitment to social values and holy hands of people
and detaining their dignity. My final message is my instruction
that I got from the spiritual teacher. Gift of the US is not my
organization. I don't get up one morning to say, form an
organization and give it a name. I got a spiritual instruction from a
spiritual master on the sixth of August, 1992 on a Thursday night
at 10pm
they said, My son, I'm not asking you, I'm instructing you to form
an organization. The name in Arabic will be translated gift of
the givers, you will serve all people of all races, all
religions, all colors, all classes, all cultures, of every
geographical location and of any political affiliation, but you
will serve them unconditionally. You will expect nothing in return,
not even a thank you. This is an instruction for the rest of your
life. Serve people with love, kindness, compassion and mercy,
and remember the dignity of men is foremost. Sivanya, other mining
companies, government guys sitting in offices, they don't know what's
going on in the ground. You need to get out and see what's
happening in the field. You could have been on the other side.
Fortunately, you're on the right side, the happy side, the lucky
side, the prosperous side. 60 million people need our hands.
They need our support. And this initiative by sivanya should carry
on with all other corporates and even ordinary people, is not the
jobs of corporates. Only individual people can make a
difference. Thank you for an opportunity to share a few minutes
with you. Let's restore the dignity of our people, and
together hold hands to build a great South Africa. This is the
greatest country on Earth, but all the problems and all the
challenges we have there is no better, and it will get far better
than what it is right now, if we hold hands together, thank you for
your time and all the best for the rest of your conference. You.