King Khoisan SA vows not to leave Union Buildings after court evicts him

He says officials will not engage with him on issues he deems important

King Khoisan SA remained adamant on Wednesday he will not move from the makeshift palace outside the Union Buildings after the government was granted an eviction order.

The government was granted an eviction order on December 11 and King Khoisan SA was given 30 days from the date of the order to vacate the premises.

TimesLIVE reported that in November 2017, Khoisan SA and his family walked from the Eastern Cape to Pretoria to demand that the president recognise the Khoisan people as the country’s first nation, add the language as one of the official languages, return their ancestral land and scrap the term “coloured” as the apartheid government imposed it to categorise the Khoisan people.

True to his word, Khoisan SA has established a miniature village right next to the 9m-tall Nelson Mandela statue, with a population of 20 people and signs of “Original Embassy” and “Aboriginal Embassy” at its entrance.

King Khoisan SA told TimesLIVE on Wednesday that he was served with court papers about the government’s application to evict him and the 20 people he lived with.

“I was served with papers to go to court. I did not go to court. Because I was not in court, the court granted government an eviction order,” he said.

“My stance is still the same. I will not remove myself from these premises. Even if they want to forcefully remove me. They either shoot me or arrest me until we start engaging on issues that brought us here.”

He said since he had been at the Union Buildings government officials were reluctant to meet him and discuss the issues that brought him to Pretoria.

“The only department we were engaging with was Pansalb [the Pan South African Language Board] on the issue of recognising the language.

“It could have been advisable for government to talk to the first nation people to discuss issues that had been brought to them. Why has government not engaged with us? It is not about getting what we want, but getting together and see how far we can come to the resolution of the issues.”