HIGH All.

I think this year was a considerable success, the march started after much collaboration of some seriously dedicated people organizing things and viola were a foot, the day sunny and bright – at the first corner the wind and rain started this did not deter the Thinkers or Believers, in fact I think it made the people marching MORE determined. Throughout the rain and march, smiles radiated back at me, banners waving, I honestly didn’t think people would smoke with the size police presence and I had expressly asked people not too as I don’t think that our march is there yet… and I really didn’t want to go through the arrest mission.

I am PROUD TO SAY, despite this, I hear and see in the pictures that many people rolled and smoked openly, without police harassment. Besides it was a band of happy people walking down the road.

I would like to thank our police for their effort and participation, without them our country would not have made it this far, and I truly appreciate what they do.

I tried to connect with some international organizers and participants live while marching, I was going to talk to Boaz in Tel Aviv, Ferre in the Hague, Sokratis in Germany, Martin in Australia, and Clive in London unfortunately technology and the weather played against us here and this idea was quickly cut from the ‘live’ agenda. I would like to thank the international folk for standing by with their stories and for giving me the support for trying something like this. Next year!

I got the idea of filling balloons with seeds from the MMM website, this was all a go go go then the rain came, the balloons got wet and heavy with a down wind here and an up wind there the damn things left my hand bounced at the foot of parliaments gates and bounced over and lazily rolled around in front of parliament in the gardens waiting to pop and disperse seeds… some press say it was picked up, I didn’t see anyone pick it up I don’t know if any of the balloons popped.

Planting a cannabis seed, anywhere, is the most peaceful public protest and voicing of opinion available to anyone who can bend down and scratch the earth.

With the rain on the day I could not have planned a better chain of events.

I thank all those who participated and gave moral support, from strength to strength the movement will grow, I firmly believe that cannabis will be legal in my life time and yours.

Good movement, press and success on those still to voice their public opinions.

André.
One of many, who think clearly about cannabis.





From the press:
NEWS24.com
Balloons for dagga liberation
01/05/2004 22:49  - (SA)  
Cape Town - A group of about 150 Capetonians, waving posters proclaiming "Cannabis Can Make Petrol and Paper", "Go Green" and "Grow with the Flow" marched to the gates of Parliament on Saturday afternoon calling for the legalisation of dagga.
On their arrival, the marchers released a bunch of about a dozen green balloons with alien faces drawn on them; these flew over the wall and into the grounds of the parliamentary complex, where they were quickly gathered up by police.
According to the organisers, the march was intended to highlight "the many uses of the plant cannabis".
These included applications in the agricultural, building and health sectors.
In a statement earlier this week, organiser Andre du Plessis said cannabis, known locally as dagga, "is not only about smoking".
"There are more than a thousand other historically documented uses for this plant, going back thousands of years. More applications are found daily.
"These go across the board, and if we tackle this issue wisely, we can help solve a lot of South Africa's social and health problems.
"We cannot any longer ignore this plant, simply because of its historical association with the drug problem."
Du Plessis, an IT engineer, said it was clear from television and newspaper reports there was an existing and thriving rural agricultural cannabis market in South Africa.
"This market, although illegal, has been in existence for at least 15 years. I can vouch for that," he said.
Two of the participants in Saturday's march tried to hand a petition - titled "The Importance of Cannabis as an Industrial Resource" - to the police at Parliament, but they refused to accept the document, saying Parliament was closed at weekends.
"See, I told you we should have done this on Friday," one marcher said to the other.
The marchers, two of them waving green flags with the image of the characteristic "five-finger" dagga leaf, dispersed soon after.
Police were later seen trying to fit the green balloons into the back of a squad car, although it was not clear what they planned to do with them.
Despite the rain, May Day saw about a 150 people make their way to the closed gates of parliament.

This was South Africa’s attempt at joining a 160 other cities in the Global Marijuana March. The numbers were telling of the obscurity of the dagga debate but did not nearly represent South Africa’s estimated one million smokers. The turn-up was nevertheless colourful: barefooted youth with little hope in their eyes rolled joints while soft-skinned beauties with dirty hair waved legalise it Posters and Rasta brothers with bling-bling outfits zealously shared their views with a journalist from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Numerous self-styled gurus clutched research documents on dagga as an alternative energy resource, dagga as medicine, and dagga for building houses. Joints, bottled water and ganja muffins were passed around while the police kept their pose.

Organiser of the march Andre du Plessis explained to the crowd that, by using bricks made from cannabis and lime, one can build a house three times the size of a typical RDP house for the same price. Most marchers were also surprised to learn that the Eastern Cape government is planning to grow 2000ha of cannabis in the form of hemp in an effort to uplift the rural poor.

Hoping to create dialogue around cannabis, Du Plessis led a similar march last year and handed over a petition to public protector Gary Pienaar urging the government to rethink their fundamentalist approach to cannabis. He has yet not heard from the authorities. This year’s march he says is to remind government that the sharing of information with the people is an essential aspect of democracy.
Ten helium balloons filled with hundreds of cannabis seeds were released into the air. It was supposed to pop at altitude but with the help of the wind it ended up, in a very unspectacular manner, in parliament’s gardens. Du Plessis was not concerned. For him it was a sign that, one way or another, dagga will get governments attention.
 
by Ruan Kemp
windblowncloak@ananzi.co.za

I am going to try upload the contact sheets I've created, I have reduce the sizes considerably... if someone has a place I can post or ftp them too I would be greatful.


More news:
http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=65683

More Pics

More News and Pics:

http://iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=13&art_id=vn20040503013126159C494244

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/11C3F740-E23B-478F-A3F6-A623AF57AF67.htm


and the unspend millions on housing...

http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0,,2-7-1442_1520885,00.html

Thats great the seed would have probly began in africa.
FREEDOM to all,when all have freedom.
afica with aproxamitly 40 million aids victims,30 million adults,10 million children,one plant can feed and cloth and fuel and heal the nations of the whole world.
GOD gave us this gift.
blessing of health to you and your brothers and sisters.
please plant pot for peace
stay high happy and healthy
med-man

Awesome report Andre! It's great to hear from like minded and brave people like yourself and your marchers from the other side of the globe!! We have truth on our side, now that the global is movement is growing we must redouble our efforts!

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Great reporting. I reduced the image kilobytes in the photo (the one that includes a poster) to 41 kilobytes by lowering the jpg quality setting. I used the freeware Irfanview. Look it up in Google. It is a quick download. I attached the photo to my message. Clicking the attachment link above will show this photo below.

Here is another photo reduced a little more in kilobytes. Any more reduction is iffy for graininess and artifacts.