Letter from the National Social and Economic Rights Institute to Zodwa Nsibande and Mnikelo Ndabankulu

July 19, 2012

Dear Zodwa Nsibande and Mnikelo Ndabankulu,

We write today with celebration in our hearts knowing that the impoverished people in South Africa have successfully organized and fought for justice for slum dwellers for many years. We know that the hardship and struggle involved in these years is born of decades of struggle of those who came before you. And the leaders who emerge from your work today will carry forward justice in South Africa for decades to come.

The Poverty Initiative, together with the National Economic and Social Rights Institute and Sleeping Giant Films, would like to invite two of your members to the United States for a monthlong speaking tour, combined with a Dear Mandela screening tour, at the end of September through the end of October 2012.

In building the movement to end poverty, we understand that poverty in the United States is inseparably linked to that of our brothers and sisters across the globe. We have been inspired by AbM’s call to build a “University of the Poor” in every city. We are committed to the same goal.

We see the U.S. Abahlali speaking and screening tour of Dear Mandela as part of this effort to develop and unite leaders committed to the unity of the poor and dispossessed. We hope to work with AbM to develop a curriculum around the film that highlights the concepts of living politics and bottom-up democracy. The US tour would be an excellent way to distribute this curriculum.

We also plan to have a weekend-long intensive study around AbM and Dear Mandela for advanced leaders within the Poverty Scholars Program network. We would be honored if you would join us for that study as well, over the weekend of the 21st September.

Willie Baptist, the Coordinator of the Poverty Initiative’s Poverty Scholars Program, helped introduce Chris and Dara of Sleeping Giant to AbM through an article written by Richard Pithouse, “Struggle is A School.” Then and even more today, we see lessons to be learned and exchanged between the poor of South Africa and the poor of the United States in our respective struggles to build a global movement that reflects the globalized character of the poor and dispossessed. Our organizations have been involved with Dear Mandela since its inception, and we believe that the story of AbM needs to be spread far and wide through the distribution of this film. The film itself is powerful, but its impact could be amplified greatly by Abahlali members being able speak directly with audiences about their struggle.

Throughout the production process of Dear Mandela, the Poverty Initiative has kept in close contact with AbM. It hosted two leaders, Mazwi Nzimade and Rev. Mavuso, at our Leadership School in West Virginia in 2009. We skyped leaders of AbM into a Strategic Dialogue with dozens of anti-poverty grassroots organizers, media makers and faith leaders from across the US to discuss the history of and lessons for the poor organizing the poor today. The Poverty Initiative and NESRI coordinated over 40 organizations to host the former President of AbM, S’bu Zikode, on his first national speaking tour of the US in the Fall of 2010. In addition to these specific events and collaborations, grassroots anti-poverty leaders across the US have written solidarity statements and held solidarity marches and protests with AbM as we have continued to build our respective struggles in the US and South Africa in recognition of the globalized nature
of the system we are fighting, and therefore the globalized struggles in which we are engaged.

Through these exchanges, as well as our tracking and use of AbM’s listserv, articles and other forms of communication, we have been able to share lessons and see ourselves connected to the struggles of the organized poor of South Africa. Grassroots community and religious leaders, as well as students, teachers and other people of conscience, continue to be inspired by the courage and tenacity of the leaders of AbM. We have learned about strategies to organize and empower the poor and used some of these strategies in communities across the US, as the US poor also seek to speak, organize and make change.

Dear Mandela needs to be shown at universities, churches and independent theatres throughout the U.S. The US tour would comprise screenings and speaking engagements in New York, Detroit, Chicago, Baltimore and Philadelphia, as well as a trip to Haiti facilitated by the Center for Constitutional Rights, to connect the struggles of AbM with the struggles of the poor dispossessed in the US and Haiti. These film screenings, together with the presence of AbM members, would provide an important opportunity to engage students, media makers and activists throughout the country in lively discussions to study the connections between the struggles in South Africa and the pressing issues facing their communities here in the US. The globalized character of the struggle—which goes beyond solidarity, but draws lessons from experiences across the world—reflects the reality that the struggle of AbM is our struggle and our struggle is their struggle.

We hope you will accept this invitation, and we hope that we can further deepen our relationship with you. We send our deepest appreciation for your work.

In solidarity,

Poverty Initiative
National Social and Economic Rights Institute
Center for Constitutional Rights