“Readers make leaders. Those who read, lead,” said Mandela Day co-ordinator Frank Meintjies, yesterday at Soweto’s Meadowlands Primary School.

 Meintjies said the Mandela Day Container Library project was an important project that also created an opportunity for public participation.

Meadowlands Primary Schools principal, Florina Tshikane was grateful for the books her school received.

“We used to fetch books from the Meadowlands community library.

It was not easy and not possible for all the kids to go,” she said.
Tshikane added that the  literature would be of much help to the pupils.

“It will empower them to learn and read more and make reading a habit,”  she said.

Eleven disadvantaged primary schools across five provinces will be receiving books and a container library for its school.

“We encourage reading in all   local languages. The children should be able to read in their mother tongue,” said Breadline Africa’s programme manager, Puleng Phooko.

Pick n Pay and the Mandela Day Container Libraries Project recently came together to help answer Nelson Mandela’s call to “Take action and inspire change” on Mandela Day.

During the month of July, Pick n Pay stores encouraged members of the public to donate children’s books at all Pick n Pay outlets around SA. “Each day we would have to contact the  Foundation to collect books, that is how successful the book drive was,” said Pick n Pay’s Kim Birkby.

She said it was vital to remember what Madiba did for the country.

More than 10 000 reading books had been collected nationally.

According to the spokesman for the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory, Sello Hatang, the amount of books collected had been encouraging. “I hope this is the beginning of a greater initiative.

As a foundation, we hope everyone will follow in an attempt to build a better South Africa,” Hatang said.