Khoisan Chief SA with the activists outside the Union Buildings. Picture: Leon Sadiki/City Press

With the nine-metre high Nelson Mandela bronze statue towering over them, four men clad only in animal skin covering mainly their private parts, sit on the Union Buildings lawn around a long eland horn from which herbal essence is burning.

Once the essence starts releasing some white smoke, they all go into prayer mode. Their prayer is only one: to meet President Jacob Zuma and table their grievances on behalf of all the Khoisan communities of South Africa.

Until Zuma meets and hears them out, Chief Khoisan SA, Christian Martin, Brendon Billings and Shane Plaatjies intend to stay, even if it means spending the whole festive season camping at the Union Buildings in Pretoria.

Sunday marks 10 days since they arrived in Pretoria, ending their gruelling 18 days of walking barefooted from their home in Port Elizabeth, Eastern Cape.

“We have walked barefooted in the rain, cold, hail and hot weather and were really hoping it will be an in and out thing on arrival in Pretoria but we were wrong because we’re still here, waiting to meet the president. We’re not intending to give up … a president is a leader, a servant of the people and we’re hoping at some point he will make time to meet us,” Chief Khoisan SA said.

He said they felt unwelcomed on the first day they arrived on November 30.

“Security officials said we’re dressed in animals skin and barefooted, and so we are inappropriately dressed to be allowed into the Union Buildings. I am still asking myself if they would have done the same to any other group dressed in their own traditional attire,” Chief Khoisan SA said.

Martin said after they were denied entry into the government offices housing Zuma’s office in Pretoria, they decided to set up a camp nearby. Their small colourful camping tents are set about 100m from former president Nelson Mandela’s statue.

With people walking on the Union Buildings lawns daily and many taking pictures around Mandela’s statue, the Khoisan group appear to have become another tourist attraction on site.

They comply happily when asked by people to pose for pictures with them and they take time to explain their cause to those who ask.

“We’ve acknowledged everything that government has done for Khoisan communities just like any other South Africans in that we have houses, water and electricity where we stay but there are just some civil right issues that we want addressed. We’re not demanding but requesting actually,” Martin said.

Chief Khoisan SA says he has already walked three times from Port Elizabeth to Parliament in Cape Town and had petitions signed by ministers and other senior officials, but no actions followed.

“We then decided to walk all the way for a face-to-face interaction with the president so we can be sure that he is aware of our issues,” he said.

One of their demands was that they want Khoisan people to be recognised as the first nation of South Africa and not be classified as coloureds. They also want their language to be one of the country’s official languages.

“Why use our language on the South African coat of arms yet it is not an official language? We want to be taken seriously and our stories to be told not only as the hunters but as the first nation of this country,” he said.

Since their arrival, Martin says they have been living on hand-outs from the public.

“I have decided to fast as part of our daily prayer for President Zuma to agree to meet and listen to us. Fifteen to 20 minutes is all that we need with the president, then we can go back home to our families; is that too much to ask?” he said.

“We’re up daily at 2am, walk up to the perimeter fence to pray and walk along the same perimeter of about 500m long 14 times as part of our prayers.

“Unless President Zuma agrees to meet us, you will still find us here next year, waiting. We have also made contact with Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa’s office requesting the same as we continue praying for the best outcome.”