South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has decided to deliver this year’s State of the Nation Address (SONA) in the Cape Town City Hall on 10 February following the fire that damaged part of the parliament building, APA learnt on Monday.
National Assembly Speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula and National Council of Provinces Chairperson Amos Masondo announced that Cape Town city officials offered their city hall as the best alternative place for the annual event and the president had accepted the offer.
“After a great deal of consideration and following thorough onsite inspections of alternative places, we are pleased to announce that the 2022 SONA will be held at the Cape Town City Hall,” Mapisa-Nqakula and Masondo said.
According to Mapisa-Nqakula and Masondo, the city had offered three places for hosting the SONA – and these included the Cape Town International Convention Centre and the City Council Chambers.
But they chose the city hall as a suitable venue in terms of its infrastructure and capacity, the presiding officers said.
It is also a befitting place considering its historical significance, they added, noting that the city hall was the first place where South Africa’s first post-independence president Nelson Mandela made his first speech to the nation after his release from prison on 11 February 1990.
“Again, on 9 May 1994, the late Archbishop Desmond Tutu introduced Tata Mandela to thousands of jubilant South Africans in the same balcony after his election in the National Assembly as the first democratic President,” they added.
Sections of South Africa’s parliament building were extensively destroyed in a fire on the morning of 2 January. A suspect has been arrested and has appeared before the courts charged with arson.
NM/jn/APA