Posted from The Mail and Guardian

A regular "street-cleaning" exercise by eThekwini metro police -- with one eye on the World Cup -- is drawing outrage from hard-hit street children in Durban and the organisations working with them.

Street children who spoke to the Mail & Guardian accused the police of using violence during the round-ups, which usually see them corralled into vans and dumped in "safe houses" far from Durban's central business district.

Said 13-year-old Kheto Ngcobo: "Sometimes they kick us with their boots and they beat us with their hands. Once, when a fight broke out [between two knife-wielding adults] in the police van, I got sprayed with pepper. My eyes burned and burned."

http://www.mg.co.za/article/2009-10-03-ethnic-tension-boils-over

Ethnic tension boils over
NIREN TOLSI | DURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA - Oct 03 2009 06:00

On Monday at 5am Lindela Figlan, huddling with his wife and three-year-old daughter near a bus shelter in Sydenham, Durban, was too terrified to flag down the passing taxis.

During the previous two nights the Kennedy Road informal settlement had been racked by mob violence that resulted in two confirmed deaths and several shacks destroyed. More than 1000 people are estimated to have fled the settlement, fearing for their lives.

Click here and here to see two short video clips of the bus trip to the Constitutional Court and here to see a short video clip of the proceedings in the court. All three videos are by Elkartasun Bideak.

http://www.mg.co.za/article/2009-05-24-shack-dwellers-victory-bus

http://www.mg.co.za/article/2009-05-16-poohslinging-slums-act-showdown-at-con-court

Pooh-slinging Slums Act showdown at Con Court
NIREN TOLSI | DURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA - May 16 2009 05:55

Winnie the Pooh references jostled with rigorous examination of the constitutionality of KwaZulu-Natal's Prevention and Elimination of Slums Act at the Constitutional Court on Thursday.

If it survives the challenge by shack-dwellers' organisation Abahlali baseMjondolo, the Act could serve as a model for similar measures in other provinces.

http://www.mg.co.za/article/2009-04-16-mzansi-voters-mnikelo-ndabankulu

Mzansi Voters: Mnikelo Ndabankulu
NIREN TOLSI | DURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA - Apr 16 2009 14:42

The one thing shack dwellers like Mnikelo Ndabankulu are guaranteed of after every election, is more building material for their mjondolos.

Once the ballots have been cast, election posters make their way into informal settlements like Foreman Road, a sprawl of rusted metal, wood and cardboard shacks arranged on a precipitous slope overlooking the middle-class suburb of Clare Estate in Durban.

Trading markets for malls
NIREN TOLSI | DURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA - Apr 07 2009 08:59

Among the shouts and smells of the early morning market in eThekwini's bustling Warwick Triangle are the ghosts of struggles between marginalised communities and power.

These appear to be echoing again as market and informal traders attempt to oppose the municipality's plans to replace the 99-year-old building with a shopping mall.

Vinesh Singh, spokesperson for the 700 market traders, said the municipality did not consult them before making an executive committee decision to develop a mall on the site. "The first we heard of this was at a meeting on January 16, which [eThekwini municipal manager Mike] Sutcliffe told us was an 'awareness' meeting about the development and that there would be workshops and things to follow. But we didn't see any plans and found out about the mall being built on the market site from the newspapers."

Purgatory for the poor
NIREN TOLSI | DURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA - Mar 31 2009 06:00

'The other day, my [nine-year-old] daughter and her friend were coming back from school through the bushes and a man tried to rape them,' says Neftal Ntuli (40)

"Luckily a car was going past and the driver brought them home. In broad daylight! It's not safe there."

Ntuli, his wife and three children form part of the first batch of families relocated by the eThekwini municipality from their informal shack settlement near Umlazi's King Goodwill Zwelithini Stadium to a transit camp in peri-urban T-section.