GroundUp: Expropriate the suburbs, say activists

Daneel Knoetze, GroundUp

Tracts of private suburban land will have to be expropriated by the state at below market value if spatial apartheid in South African cities is to be reversed. The property clause in the Constitution can be interpreted in a revolutionary manner to allow for this. Expropriated land, subsidised by existing government property, should be used to provide housing for shackdwellers from the city fringe, so that informal settlements can be less dense and upgraded. These were the concluding opinions in a roundtable discussion on the Urban Land Question in the Cape Town CBD on 7 August.

“The clause should be read and interpreted with reference to the Bill of Rights as a whole, and in light of the Constitution's preamble, which (prioritises) values of social justice,” said Zackie Achmat, founder of Ndifuna Ukwazi, which hosted the discussion.

“The Bill of Rights places positive duties on the State to fulfil. These are geared to enhancing social change and transformation. The right to private property cannot be used as an insurmountable argument, when that right clashes directly with the rights to housing and dignity (for poor people).”

Yet, Achmat noted, the state was in fact doing the opposite. Instead of expropriating land, it was selling off property and entering into long term lease agreements with private investors. In June, news broke of a national government plan to sell off the sprawling Pollsmoor prison complex which lies among some of the country's most expensive real estate. A number of expensive properties owned by the Western Cape government may also be put up for grabs.

The City of Cape Town's ongoing inner-city regeneration programme, too, was an anti-poor public-private partnership — exclusionary and based on financial incentives, argued Jodi Allemeier, former Operations Programme Manager at Cape Town Partnership.

“It is designed to generate income for the council, because high property prices equate to higher rates. But what of the social and economic value [for the city’s inhabitants]?” asked Allemeier.

The general conclusion: spatial apartheid in Cape Town, and an institutional culture designed to “keep poor people out”, is more apparent now than it was before 1994.

Population density in informal settlements around Khayelitsha, Hout Bay, Strand and Nyanga, for instance, is between five and ten times that of the upmarket suburban band stretching roughly from Simonstown to Table View.

It is a spatial status quo violently reinforced by council and law enforcement agencies, argued Dustin Kramer, from the Social Justice Coalition (SJC), with reference to evictions by council's controversial Anti-Land Invasion Unit (ALIU).

He said the policy of evicting shackdwellers was often presented as isolated cases. “Yet, it is important to realise that they form part of a bigger process of policing urban land. Contrary to the City's justification, these evictions are not carried out to protect land for housing for the poor. They are designed to protect land from the poor.”

The ALIU often acte with impunity and disregard for the law, Kramer said. Indeed, a High Court judgment found the ALIU's eviction of families in Marikana informal settlement, Philippi, to have been unlawful, unconstitutional and reminiscent of apartheid.

South Africa lags behind many developing countries in Asia and Latin America where progressive and inclusive urban policies have been implemented. Stephen Berrisford, from the African Centre for Cities at the University of Cape Town, estimated that South Africa was lagging 40 years behind Brazil in this regard.

“That may sound somewhat discouraging,” he said. “But the campaign towards transformation in Brazil originated during discussions such as this one. It was lead by lobbyists, unions (and communities) engaged in decades of activism. The rural land question has been at the forefront of the debate in this country for a long time. Meaningful engagement around the urban land question is long overdue.”