"Let's defeat imperialism" Youth Festival opens in SA, costing R69 million!

The 17th international Festival of Youth and Students opened on Monday, 13th of December near Pretoria (South Africa).
It is called a "democratic" youth festival, although the countries and themes seem more socialist and totalitarian.

There have been media outcries against the festival's funding.
Out of the R 69 million, R 40 million is paid by the national lottery.
This comes at a time where many charities and organizations have struggled for lottery funding.

Speakers include the ANC's corrupt former Police boss Jackie Selebi.
Representatives from Cuba and Zimbabwe received loud applause from the crowd at the opening parade.
SA just scrapped a huge Cuban debt.
The Zimbabweans carried signs saying: "End illegal sanctions now!".

www.news24.com...

reply to post by halfoldman

It appears the festival is indeed organized by "left-wing" student unions (they don't seem to pick up much of the bill however).
This festival was originally supposed to be in Belarus:
en.wikipedia.org...

reply to post by halfoldman

This really makes me think: popular and mass religion is so often accused of deceptive funding (maybe rightly so).

Now here we have socialist youth spending so much money.

I really hope people follow this.
It's a shocking hypocrisy.

reply to post by halfoldman

What is described as a meeting of "progressive youth" costs charities and taxpayers dearly.
But rest assured, the National Youth Development fund will not be compromised:
www.news24.com...
Where are the mass protests against capital wastage?

Where is this money really going?

Yesterday President Jacob Zuma spoke about education at the opening.
One of the biggest ANC policy failures in SA is education.

Zuma also aligned himself with the Rhema church, arguing that the ANC will rule until Jesus returns.
It makes me wonder. They have fingers in all these ideologically divergent pies.
Perhaps it's all one big pie?

Key speakers fail to arrive at multi-million dollar Youth Festival.
Delegates sit on lawn waiting for speeches:
www.mg.co.za...

reply to post by halfoldman

Some good footage of the opening parades in this link:
www.sowetanlive.co.za...
Also: highlights from controversial ANC Youth League's Julius Malema.
Including on the cancellation of 1.3 billion debt against Cuba, the nationalization of SA's mines and an anti-British rant.

reply to post by halfoldman

More shockingly Malema called Morocco an "apartheid state", and called on US President Obama to remove US troops from Korea.

Just listening to the radio, and I've rarely seen South Africans so unanimously upset and scathing about something as the millions wasted on this farce.
It's not the ideology itself, but hardly anybody showed up.

Hooray, the $10 million youth festival marches forth!

Within two days:
- Delegates spend time on "kissing games".
- Over zealous and drunk "anti-imperialists" storm and vandalize the media center.
- Protests and concerns over food and transport
- Seemingly fraudulent outsourcing to none-existing companies, and calls from opposition parties and Cosatu (Congress of South African Trade Unions) to investigate the now blown money.

www.timeslive.co.za...

reply to post by halfoldman

Oh my hat!!!

Delegates from Morocco and Western Sahara separated after clashes at Youth Festival:
allafrica.com...
Say what?
Does anybody even know why?

Just wondering: why do socialist countries, often with totalitarian one-party states always insist on the label of being: democratic?