March on the Durban City Hall to Demand Land, Housing and Dignity

13 September 2013
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press statement

March on the Durban City Hall to Demand Land, Housing and Dignity

Abahlali baseMjondolo Movement SA together with Abahlali baseSipingo Transit Camp (eMathinini) will be marching to the Durban City Hall on Monday, 16 September 2013. We will be joined by Abahlali from around the province of KwaZulu-Natal including Howick and the South Coast. For a very long time there has been serious neglect of people in smaller towns.

This march comes at a very tough time for our movement. It comes at a time when we are not only beaten and repressed for raising our voices but also threatened with death and killed. Our crime has been to organize in shack settlements and to organize unorganized communities. Our crime has been to organize outside state control. Our crime has been to organize outside party control. Our crime has been to create a platform for people who are supposed to be spoken for and about to speak for ourselves. Our crime has been to speak truth to power. Our crime has been to speak out against the corruption that implicates top politicians in Cato Crest. Our crime has been to insist that everyone counts. Our crime has been to insist on our right to the cities. Our crime has been to take action to put the social value of land before its commercial value. And yes, our crime has been to insist that the state does not treat the poor as if we were beneath the rule of law and outside of our constitutional democracy.

The Isipingo Transit Camp communities have have been living under life threatening conditions on flood plain and in a dump area. Many of the residents there are sick, really sick from asthma and other respiratory related sicknesses. This is not a place for human beings to live. In 1990 the ANC said 'Occupy the Cities'. We were promised housing in the Freedom Charter and election promises. Now we are being forced into transit camps where we are left to rot and this is called delivery. We cannot accept the conditions in this transit camp or in any transit camp. Transit camps are an attack on our humanity. They vandalize our dignity.

We have all been lied to from Kennedy Road to Cato Crest. One thing that Mayor James Nxumalo is known for and good for is lying. He says everything but does nothing. This is what he will be remembered for on his term. Lies and more lies. Lies and silence when his councilors threaten to kills us.

In Cato Crest our homes have been illegally demolished, we have been beaten by the police and threatened with death by the ANC. No one has been arrested for the assassinations of Thembinkosi Qumbelo and Nkululeko Gwala. Court orders against evictions are just being ignored. Today the residents whose shacks have been illegally demolished were supposed to be able to rebuild. This is what the court order demanded. The Cato Manor SAPS have been served with interdicts so today they used the Mayville SAPS to prevent the rebuilding. They are using all means possible to subvert the rule of law.

We are entering dangerous times. If we as the poor don't count to the rule of law and can be freely beaten, evicted, threatened and killed what hope can we really have in democracy? We have always warned and we continue to warn that the anger of the poor can go in many directions.

Each Abahlali branch in each community has prepared its own memorandum for this march after discussing it in their own community. We have asked the MEC for Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, the MEC for Human Settlements in the KZN Province and Mayor James Nxumalo to come and receive our memoranda.

However we make the following collective demands:

  • We demand well located land and decent housing in the cities.
  • We demand an end to transit camps.
  • We demand an end to repression and full and open investigation of all repression against our movement including the Kennedy Road attack in 2009, repression in KwaNdengezi and the assassination of Nkululeko Gwala etc.
  • We demand that the eThekwini Municipality cease its open violation of the Constitution and the law when it comes to the treatment of poor people in Durban
  • We demand an immediate end to the illegal and violent harassment of our members in Cato Crest including the demolition of their homes in violation of court orders.
  • Nigel Gumede must go.

    Our dignity is not negotiable. Our right to the cities is not negotiable. Our right to participate in this democracy is not negotiable.

    Our march will begin at King Dinizulu Park (Botha) and proceed to the Durban City Hall. It will start at 9 a.m. and finished at 13:00 p.m.

    Please contact:

    Thinabantu Khanyile Abahlali National Administrator 078 2891314
    Mnikelo Ndabankulu Abahlali baseMjondolo Media Officer 081 2633462
    Bandile Mdlalose Abahlali baseMjondolo Secreatary General on 084 5575090