Statement by Cape Town Mayor, Geordin Hill-Lewis

Cape Town City Hall will be illuminated tonight in blue and yellow — the colours of the flag of Kyiv — as a symbol of our solidarity with the people of the city of Kyiv and Ukraine.

Today, I wrote to Mr Vitali Klitschko, the Mayor of Kyiv, to express the City of Cape Town’s solidarity with the struggle Ukraine’s capital city and indeed the whole of Ukraine is facing.

I informed Mr Klitschko that the City of Cape Town stands alongside other nations and cities around the free world in calling for peace in Ukraine and an end to Russian imperialist aggression.

The people of Kyiv are a proud, patriotic and resilient people who have endured a long history of conflict. They have built their city into a prosperous economic and cultural hub, one that faces destruction at this very moment.

The gesture of illuminating Cape Town’s City Hall in Kyiv’s colours will serve as a reminder of the torment the city and its residents are facing. Through this small gesture, we are also calling on our national government — and other governments around the world — to do more for peace to be restored and for the unprovoked and illegal aggression against the Ukrainian people to be halted.

As leaders and human beings, we must always take a firm stand against imperialism and the violence that brings, and I will not hesitate to continue to spread the message of peace and solidarity as far and as wide as possible.

Source: City Of Cape Town