Mary Robinson reads to SA children

2012-08-06 15:08

Mary Robinson reads to learners from Vuyani Primary school. (Breadline Africa)

Cape Town - For former presidents, it’s about more than just politics. Sometimes they care about education and reading as well.

Ex-UN Human Rights Commissioner and former president of Ireland, Mary Robinson, visited Gugulethu on Monday to attend a handover of a container library at Vuyani Primary School.

She was joined by Western Cape MEC for education Donald Grant.

The container was donated to the school as part of a countrywide initiative by the Mandela Day Libraries Project.

Basic rights

"Literacy and the right to education is a human right,” Tim Smith, director of Breadline Africa, a Cape Town-based NGO said.

"Every school should have access to a library and every child should be able to read, write and be given the means to learn."

The initiative aims to place 20 container libraries in schools across the country this year.

Robinson ended the event by reading to a group of learners from the school.

Robinson spoke at the 10th Mandela Annual Lecture on Sunday where she warned that the ANC was tainted by corruption and had shifted from its roots.

Robinson said the achievements by the 100-year-old African National Congress were "remarkable".

"Sadly, though, in recent years my South African friends tell me the ANC's moral authority has been eroded, tainted by allegations of corruption; a temporary betrayal of its history," she said.
 

- News24