ANTI PRIVATISATION FORUM

18 July 2008

Xenophobic attitudes mar an APF march for housing in Alex

A documentary produced by Filmmakers Against Racism on Alexandra and the lead-up to the recent xenophobic attacks there, had its first of more screenings last week in Johannesburg and is scheduled for broadcast on SABC. The Anti Privatisation Forum was given a preview copy of Affectionately known as Alex by the filmmakers so that the APF would be made aware that the documentary follows the march for housing by Alexandra Vukuzenzele Crisis Committee (AVCC) on April 19 this year. This part of the documentary features some APF members making statements against the Mozambiquan and Zimbabwean occupants of houses in Extension 7. Little more than a month later, the pogrom against immigrants burst xenophobia into the open, which may create the impression that the two events are linked.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

**COHRE and CLC Joint Media Statement**

HUMAN RIGHTS ORGANISATIONS WELCOME JUDGMENT IN THE SOUTH AFRICAN CONSTITUTIONAL COURT

The Geneva-based Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions (COHRE) and the Cape Town-based Community Law Centre (CLC) at the University of the Western Cape welcomed the judgment that was handed down in the Constitutional Court today in the case of Various Occupiers v City of Johannesburg and others, in which COHRE and the CLC intervened as joint amici curiae.

The Constitutional Court overturned the Supreme Court of Appeal ruling, noting that the SCA "should not have granted the order of ejectment ... in the absence of meaningful engagement." As part of an Inner City Regeneration Strategy, the City of Johannesburg has attempted to evict residents of so-called "bad buildings" in terms of the National Building Regulations and Standards Act (NBRA). The City used this apartheid-era legislation to evict residents on grounds of health and safety concerns without consulting residents and without considering all relevant circumstances – such as the probability that residents would be made homeless.

Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign Press Release
18 Feb 2008
1pm

DELFT, CAPE TOWN - The appeal of hundreds of residents from Delft, who face eviction from the homes they occupied two months ago, is to be heard urgently at 2pm today (February 18th 2008). This decision was made at a meeting in chambers this morning.

Thubelisha Homes and the Provincial ANC government will oppose the peoples' appeal against the eviction order.

The Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign is against the court's earlier final eviction order. The court didn't even mention anything about alternative accommodation. They also refused to have an arbitration with the people of Delft to come up with a compromise.

Press release: Occupation of N2 Gateway houses by Delft backyarders

The Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign supports backyarders in Delft, who, in pain and frustration at being on housing waiting lists for years and in some cases for decades, have peacefully occupied more than 100 N2 Gateway houses in Delft. The WCAEC applauds the councillor who assisted these backyarders in this occupation and calls for no charges to be laid against him. Authorities have threatened these people with eviction at 5am on Friday 21st. The WCAEC opposes these threats and stands in solidarity with the backyarders resistance to eviction. The WCAEC particularly warns the police not to use violence against the backyarders. These houses were mostly intended by government and Thubelisha homes for residents of Joe Slovo informal settlement in Langa. But the residents of Joe Slovo do not want to move to Delft. They want government and Thubelisha to build houses for them in Joe Slovo. All this is the fiasco of the ill-thought out N2 Gateway 'pilot project' which was planned and is being implemented without adequate participation by the communities whom it is intended to benefit, and hence is failing at every turn.

South African Bureau of Standards
MEDIA STATEMENT

Ref: Regulatory (Electrotechnical)

Enquiries: Prince Moloi

Tel: +27 (012) 428-6242

Fax: +27 (012) 344-1568

Cell: 082 0656 719

Email: moloipt@sabs.co.za

29 October 2007

The South African Bureau of Standards (SABS) Regulatory Division warns consumers to refrain from buying non-pressure paraffin stoves named Panda, produced by Tao Ying Metal (Pty) Ltd, as they do not comply with the requirements of the Compulsory Specification.

In terms of the specification, non-pressure paraffin stoves must meet safety, health and environmental standards. However Tao Ying Metal stoves meet none of the above requirements and this leaves consumer’s safety and health at risk.

Friday 12 October 2007 1pm

Press Statement for Immediate Release

Protests at Home affairs Planned

There will be a 24 hour picket outside of home affairs (the refugee home affairs beneath the high way next to the International Conference centre) in Cape Town starting at 8:30pm on Sunday the 14th Oct, where in an attempt to get attention, foreign students from UCT along with some South Africans (black and white) will be sleeping on the street along side our illegal friends- the Zimbabweans.

There will be further demonstrations in front of home affairs (the refugee home affairs beneath the high way next to the International Conference centre) at 13:00 on Monday the 15th Oct where large numbers of our PASSOP members will be coming through from the townships.

Joe Slovo residents will be at Cape High Court in large numbers tomorrow and protesting there on Wednesday

Monday 24 September 2007
5pm

The 6000 residents of Joe Slovo informal settlement in Langa, Cape Town will be individually handing in their legal notice of their intention to oppose the state's application to forcibly remove them from their land.

The residents will be doing this all day tomorrow at the Cape High Court, ahead of Wednesday's hearing. The Ministry of Housing has applied for a court order which would allow them to forcibly remove 100 families per week for the next 45 weeks, and this will be heard by the court on Wednesday. Each and every resident vowed at community meetings this week that they would oppose this application in the High Court. The law allows for each and every resident to state why they feel they should not be forcibly removed and they intend to do just that.

NEWFIELDS VILLAGE RESIDENTS AEC
Press Release – Monday 20th August – 10am

9 Cape Town communities to march over City's Housing Company's broken promises

The march takes place tomorrow - Tuesday 21st August 2007 at 11am. From Kaisersgracht to the Civic Centre in Cape Town.

For further information please call Gary Hartzenberg ph 0723925859

Background

In the year 2000, the City of Cape Town as the senior partner, together with the Cape Town Community Housing Company (CTCHC) and funded by the National Housing Finance Corporation, built 2188 houses in nine communities all over the Metropole in areas such as Newfields Village, Hanover Park, Luyoloville, Philippi, Heideveld, Woodridge, Eastridge and Manenberg.

Newfields Village Abahlali base Mjondolo
Press Statement
5th June 2007
10am

HANOVER PARK, CAPE TOWN - The Newfields Village Abahlali baseMjondolo has slammed the National Home Builders Registration Council (NHBRC) audit findings into the defects of 415 low cost houses.

The movement is now seeking legal advice in order to have the audit findings declared null and void.

Residents moved into the 415 homes, built on swamp land, several years ago. The Cape Town Community Housing Company (CTCHC) offered residents low income rental housing from between R150 to R350 a month, that would be transferred into their names after five years. But within months of moving in, huge flaws appeared in the houses. Residents had to spend hundreds of rands each month to fix up their homes.

Tuesday, 20 June 2006
Press Release from the Motala Heights Development Committee (affiliated to Abahlali baseMjondolo)

CRISIS LOOMS AS HUNDREDS THREATENED WITH FORCED EVICTION AT MOTALA HEIGHTS (PINETOWN)

On Saturday 17 June ward Councillor Derek Dimba arrived at the Motala Heights settlement with municipal officials and 5 car loads of municipal security guards to mark out shacks that would then be destroyed by the highly militarised police Land Invasions Unit. They had probably chosen the Youth Day weekend thinking that many people would be away at their rural homes. They were wrong. The community was able to mobilise quickly and see off this first threat in what a number of people have described as a coming civil war.