WORLD BOOK DAY 23 APRIL 2003
AK-47s cheaper than books.
It is cheaper in South Africa of today to buy a second hand AK-47 assault
rifle than it is to buy a new JK Rowling Harry Potter book. That is the
message author, satirist and social campaigner Pieter-Dirk Uys will bring to
Cape Town today as part of the campaign to have VAT removed from books.
From police and other sources he has discovered that it is possible to buy
one of these weapons for as little as R150. Many paperback books, let alone
hard cover editions, are considerably more expensive.
Uys, along with other authors, will this morning [subs: Wednesday, April23]
collect signatures in central Cape Town for a submission to parliament to
have the 14 per cent value added tax on books removed. The action is part
of activities to celebrate World Book Day.
Campaign organizers had hoped originally to present their submission to
parliament on World Book Day, which this year falls in the middle of the
Easter parliamentary recess. None of the relevant ministers " arts and
culture, education, finance and trade and industry were available to
receive it. "So we will collect more signatures to take to parliament next
month when parliament reconvenes," said Bankole Omotoso, the Nigerian-born
academic, author and actor. The campaign, started more than a year ago and
supported by the national library, has already collected tens of thousands
of individual signatures and won the backing of all three trade union
federations, along with support from libraries, schools and tertiary
institutions around the country.
"We support this campaign wholeheartedly," said Nora Buchanan, acting
librarian at the University of Natal in Durban. She pointed out that the
amount paid on VAT each year by the university library would be "enough to
purchase several medical or science journals much needed for vital
research".
The submission, which has been circulated in six of the 11 official
languages, was launched by the Campaign Against Reader Exploitation (CARE).
It points out that the government supports an official drive to "build a
nation of readers". "But it is a contradiction because the government
encourages reading on the one hand and then makes it more expensive on the
other," said Omotoso, who is perhaps best known for his "Yebo Gogo"
television role. "Purchase price is a critical consideration for most
people, and particularly for those on lower incomes," noted CARE volunteer
Barbara Edmunds. "Books, in this context, become a luxury and this is
tragic, especially in a country with a 60% illiteracy rate," she said.
CARE has also claimed that VAT is used by some unscrupulous people in the
book trade "as a fig leaf" to increase the prices of books. "This is a tax
on knowledge," agreed Western Cape academic and author, Keith Gottschalk.
CARE supporters have also lobbied a number of parliamentarians and ministers
and, in December last year, the department of arts and culture officially
stated that it would be looking into ways to remove VAT from books. However,
this investigation was halted in January. "We were told to wait for the
budget," said CARE co-ordinator, Terry Bell. "But the budget came and went
without any mention of VAT on books." "Something has to be done because
books are just far too expensive and we are trying to encourage literacy,"
said Blanche la Guma, widow of one Cape Town¹s leading writers who died in
exile in Cuba. She will join the author group, which includes Dorothy Kowen,
Diane Case, Bryan Rostron and Indres Naidoo for a "mass sign-up". The group
will also call for all outstanding submission forms to be returned as
quickly as possible and for those individuals, groups and institutions that
have not yet indicated support and wish to, to do so by e-mail at:
[log in to unmask]
"It is a campaign very close to my heart," said Pieter-Dirk Uys. "There is
something very wrong when an AK (47) costs less than a JK (Rowling)."
Tel: 0027 +21 +788 9699
Fax: 0027 +21 +788 9711
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