Parliament finds a new home for Sona speech

After the devastating fire four weeks ago that destroyed the Parliament building, the City of Cape Town handed over the keys to City Hall and declared it the Parliament Quarter.

The annual State of the Nation Address will be held there on February 10.

The Speaker of the National Assembly, Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, is confident that the country "will rise again from these ashes."

"Parliament as an institution remains intact, competent and able to fulfill its duties to the people," Mapisa-Nqakula said during the ceremonial handover of the building to Parliament.

“This building will undergo a transfiguration and it will become our nation's parliament,” said mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis.

Mapisa-Nqakula reflected on a key moment of former president Nelson Mandela’s long march to freedom, when he stood on the balcony of city hall and addressed the nation.

“We have thus come full circle. Thirty-two years since that historical occasion of February 11 1990 when he stood by the side of president Mandela, President Cyril Ramaphosa will address the nation from the same place on February 10 2022,” she said.

Hill-Lewis feels February 11 represents “hope and optimism for our country. It represented the defeat of something old and unjust and the ushering in of something new and hopefully united, peaceful, free and tolerant.” – TimesLIVE