Ramaphosa honours ‘ignored’ WWI service of black S. Africans at France memorial

South Africa‘s President Cyril Ramaphosa on Sunday called for recognition of black South Africans’ service on the Allied side in World War I during a visit to a memorial in France.

Ramaphosa laid a wreath at the South African National Memorial in Longueval in northern France and commemorated the 110 years since the Battle of Delville Wood — one of the most significant battles involving South African soldiers in the war.

But he emphasised the need to also honour the contributions of non-white South Africans to the war, which drew fighters from countries from across the then-British Empire.

“We remember all those whose contribution was diminished, ignored or deliberately excluded from the official history of our country. We gather to affirm that the memory of a nation cannot be divided according to race,” Ramaphosa said according to remarks shared by the presidency.

“For too long, South Africa remembered only part of this history. Today, we remember it in full.”

He paid tribute to South African soldiers who fought at the Battle of Delville Wood — one of the battles of the Somme — in July 1916, during which hundreds were killed and thousands wounded, captured and reported missing.

“Their sacrifice deserves the eternal gratitude of our country,” he said.

He also hounoured the more than 600 members of the South African Native Labour Contingent — a unit of workers sent to Europe to support the Allied war effort — who died in the sinking of the SS Mendi in 1917 in the English Channel.

He denounced the treatment of the tens of thousands of black South Africans who were willing to serve but were “denied the status, recognition and dignity afforded to white combatants”.

“Their service was obscured by a political system that could accept their labour and their sacrifice, but refused to recognise their equality,” he said.

“This was not merely an omission. It was an injustice,” added the president, who was on a three-day official visit to France.

He called for building a “common memory” and “to tell the full story” of both Delville Wood and the Mendi in teaching future generations.

“Above all, we must teach them that a nation is strengthened when it has the courage to confront all of its history,” he said.

The Delville Wood memorial, long associated mainly with the sacrifice of white South African soldiers, since the end of apartheid has evolved into a place of commemoration for all South Africans who served during the First World War.

“This transformation is an important act of historical justice,” Ramaphosa said.