May 18, 2005
By Lucille Davie
VISITOR numbers at the Hector Pieterson Museum and memorial in Soweto have shown a steady rise over the past six months, from 7 300 to 10 400.
Chief curator Ali Hlongwane attributes this to "project-driven activities". By this he means running special events to attract people.
This Friday, 20 May, with the Centre for the Study of Violence and the Khulumani Support Group, families of children who went missing in the unrest of the 70s and 80s will assemble at the museum.
"It is very important to keep alive this consciousness," Hlongwane says.
The number of visitors to the museum and the memorial alongside it for November 2004 was 7 365, with a drop over the following three months to about 6 400 each month and a climb again to 8 436 in March, to peak at 10 420 in April.
Hlongwane expects visitor numbers to rise considerably in June, to mark the anniversary of the 16 June 1976 uprising, in which Hector Pieterson and dozens of other school children were shot and killed in Soweto.
He predicts that figures for that month will rise to 20 000, and stabilise at 15 000 a month for the rest of the year.
In June the museum will collaborate with the Robben Island Museum, the Gauteng Provincial Legislature and the 16th June Foundation to hold a multi-disciplinary education programme.
It will consist of a teleconference with young people on Robben Island. A poster collection belonging to the provincial legislature will be on display in the museum. Artworks from cellphone provider MTN will also go on display, in an exhibition entitled "Resistance, Reconciliation and Reconstruction".
"We will integrate this collection with our permanent exhibition, and see how that works," Hlongwane says.
In July an education officer is to be appointed with a priority to establish an education department. Hlongwane hopes its activities will help to maintain the higher figures.
The museum focuses primarily on children, with an emphasis on the local community visiting the museum, says Hlongwane. In March the number of children under nine visiting hit a record 2 935, falling to 2 159 in April.
Meanwhile, The Sunday Times reported last weekend that the family of Mbuyisa Makhubu, the boy who was carrying Pieterson in the famous Sam Nzima picture taken on 16 June 1976, filed a missing person's complaint with the police, 30 years after he went missing.
Although he is widely believed to be dead, Makhubu's family have never given up hope of seeing him again. They believe he is alive and could be suffering from memory loss.
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