Former South African Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Naledi Pandor told an audience in Leicester on Friday evening that the UN must be reformed, “Especially the Security Council.” Dr Pandor made her comment during her speech at a dinner in her honour organised by Leicester-based Friends of Al-Aqsa.

She pointed out that the Global South must be connected to the Global North in order for the UN to be truly representative. “Moreover, the UN has peace monitoring, but it lacks the means for peace enforcement.” The veto power sees to that. “Nevertheless, change is always gradual, has to be managed and has to be thought through.”
In the meantime, said Dr Pandor, we must all commit to a global campaign to ensure that the people of Palestine have freedom and justice. “Individuals united can make a difference. With this in mind, petition the UN to re-establish the special committee against apartheid with a focus on apartheid Israel.”
In a wide-ranging speech, she touched upon the issue of an academic, cultural and sporting boycott of the occupation state, drawing on South Africa’s experience in the struggle against apartheid.
“Academics around the world should boycott all academics and academic institutions which support apartheid Israel, who draft the laws and mechanisms that sustain apartheid and who do not condemn apartheid.” Israel, she added, should not be playing sport anywhere in the world.
“Malignant forces” are at play, said Dr Pandor. “Why does Israel have such impunity? The people of Palestine did not carry out the Holocaust, but they are paying the price for it.” She stressed that there is a great need to put the facts into the public domain — “And keep doing so; don’t stop protesting; don’t stop writing” — to educate the general public about the justice of the Palestinian cause.
Addressing the issue of post-genocide Gaza, the former minister, who was instrumental in getting South Africa’s charge of genocide made against Israel at the International Court of Justice last December, was adamant that only the Palestinians should decide who governs them.
“No one must say that the government of Palestine must exclude Hamas,” she said. “The choice must be the choice of the Palestinian people. Nobody else.”
In conclusion, she told the large audience that it is essential for us all to fight to ensure that the right to freedom of speech remains. “We know that if we stand up for Palestinians we will be threatened and called ‘anti-Semitic’ but that shouldn’t deter us. We shouldn’t leave it to chance to have a just framework for freedom. If we fail to act, then we’re saying that freedom and justice are just for some, and not for all.”
Other speakers at the dinner included Dr Ismail Patel, chair of Friends of Al-Aqsa, as well independent MPs Ayoub Khan from Birmingham Perry Barr, and Dewsbury and Batley’s Iqbal Mohamed.