slovo

The Weekender: State turns against shack dwellers

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http://www.theweekender.co.za/Articles/Content.aspx?id=83638

State turns against shack dwellers

by Jeanne Hromnik

Published: 2009/10/10 09:03:17 AM

THE appellants in the Joe Slovo shack dwellers’ case against Thubelisha Homes might be forgiven for thinking the law is an idiot and an ass (and a bachelor, no doubt) after a recent ruling of the Constitutional Court.

Five Constitutional Court judges unanimously upheld last year’s high court ruling by Judge President John Hlophe that the 20000-strong community be evicted and relocated from the Joe Slovo informal settlement adjoining Langa, Cape Town’s oldest township, to Delft, 34km away.

COHRE Report on the N2 Gateway Project

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COHRE, the UN affiliated human rights NGO based in Switzerland, has just released a scathing report on the N2 Gateway project. Click here for an archive of entries on Joe Slovo and here and here for an archive of entries on the Symphony Way occupation.

For comment on how the N2 Gateway has effected the lives of poor people in Cape Town, contact:

Ashraf Cassiem at 076 186 1408 (Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign)
Kareemah Linneveldt 078 492 0943 (Symphony Way Anti-Eviction Campaign)

The deficiency of reality in the Joe Slovo judgment

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Click here to read this article in a word document, here to read a version published by Pambazuka and here to read previous entries on the Joe Slovo settlement.

The deficiency of reality in the Joe Slovo judgment

Kate Tissington
15 June 2009

The highest Court in South Africa has decided the fate of the 20 000 Joe Slovo informal settlement residents to be evicted to Delft to make way for the N2 Gateway housing project, in what is a disappointing and frustrating judgment that orders their eviction, albeit on the proviso that engagement occurs and that certain mitigating measures are undertaken.

Constitutional Court Demonstration Against Joe Slovo Eviction - 21 August

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Video footage from the Cape Town High Court demonstration earlier in the year - from SACSIS

Solidarity: Widely distributed & read in AbM branches. Just as Izwe Labampofu was read in Cape Town

Solidarity: Widely distributed & read in AbM branches. Just as Izwe Labampofu was read in Cape Town
Solidarity: Widely distributed & read in AbM branches. Just as Izwe Labampofu was read in Cape Town

PDF copies of the pages are attached below.

N2 Gateway and the Joe Slovo informal settlement: the new Crossroads?

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Updates are being added below - scroll down to see them or click here to see the Joe Slovo solidarity digital archive.

http://www.capeargus.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=3131

Since the launch in 2004 of N2 Gateway, Housing Minister Lindiwe Sisulu’s pet ‘flagship’ project has run into problem after problem: delayed delivery, cost over-runs, above all lack of consultation. In their 2004-5 report the Development Action Group, an NGO, wrote “The top-down approach in the N2 project undermines its overall sustainability… The casual, continued and increasing practice of excluding people from decision-making about development processes that directly affect their lives is an obstacle that communities are unlikely to tolerate for much longer.”

Sowetan: Evictions suspended - shack dwellers reprieved

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http://www.sowetan.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=1060093

Evictions suspended - shack dwellers reprieved
04 September 2009
Anna Majavu

THE Constitutional Court has suspended its order upholding the eviction of 10000 residents of the Joe Slovo informal settlement in Langa, Cape Town.

In March 2008 controversial Cape Judge President John Hlophe ruled that the Joe Slovo shack dwellers must be evicted to make way for the N2 Gateway Housing project.

But community leaders from the Joe Slovo task team took the matter on appeal to the Constitutional Court. In June the court upheld Hlophe’s ruling but ordered that the Joe Slovo residents be removed in phases and placed 20km away in Delft.

M&G: Gateway never had a chance

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http://www.mg.co.za/article/2009-08-20-gateway-never-had-a-chance

Gateway never had a chance
GLYNNIS UNDERHILL | CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA - Aug 20 2009 06:00

Cape Town's disastrous N2 Gateway project began without a funded budget and was starved of agreed funding by the National Housing Department, according to a confidential report by independent forensic auditors, which was leaked to the Mail & Guardian.

Envisaged as a model solution to South Africa's housing backlog, the Gateway project was to be delivered by the three spheres of government, which, in the Western Cape, were all run by the ANC at the time.

Cape Argus: Sexwale puts eviction to Delft on hold

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http://www.capeargus.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=5116368

Sexwale puts eviction to Delft on hold
Joe Slovo residents 'must be given time'

August 07, 2009 Edition 1

Andisiwe Makinana

HUMAN Settlements Minister Tokyo Sexwale has promised the residents of Joe Slovo informal settlement a reprieve, saying they will not be immediately removed from the area to Delft.

Sexwale, who visited a number of the city's informal settlements yesterday, told a meeting of about 500 people in Joe Slovo that despite the Constitutional Court ruling in favour of the housing department to remove the residents to Delft so that the next phase of the N2 Gateway project could start, he will have the implementation of that judgment postponed.

Business Day: Joe Slovo eviction - Vulnerable community feels the law from the top down

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http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=73812

Sandra Liebenberg
Published: 2009/06/22 06:49:37 AM

OVER a period of 10 months commencing on August 17, the largest judicially sanctioned eviction of a community in SA’s post-apartheid period will take place. The 20000-strong impoverished community of the Joe Slovo informal settlement on the outskirts of Cape Town will be required to relocate 15km away to a temporary relocation area in Delft.

According to provincial and local government, their relocation is required to enable the upgrading and building of formal housing as part of the N2 Gateway Project. Following resistance by the residents to the relocation, the housing authorities applied for and obtained an eviction order from the Western Cape High Court in terms of the Prevention of Illegal Eviction from and Unlawful Occupation of Land Act, 1998. The residents of Joe Slovo appealed to the Constitutional Court and a weighty judgment was handed down on June 10.

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