Category Archives: land occupations

Brutal Armed Attack on the eKhenana Land Occupation

08 November 2018
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement

Brutal Armed Attack on the eKhenana Land Occupation

The eKhanana Land Occupation was founded in Cato Crest in August this year. Since then it has been subject to repeated armed attacks. The local ward councillor Ward councillor Mzimuni Ngiba has personally accompanied by the police and the Anti-Land Invasion Unit during at least one attack. The ANC leadership in the ward have made it clear that they will not accept the occupation and they have made it clear that they intend to continue to mobilise violence to destroy it.

Today at around 11 am the Anti-Land Invasion Unit, armed security and metro police arrived at the occupation. There were more than 200 of them and they were prepared for war. They attacked the occupation with serious violence including rubber bullets and live ammunition. A number of people were injured in the attack. Mthobeli Sinaba, Bhekokuhle Shezi and Lando Tshazi are currently in King Edward Hospital as a result of injuries sustained in the attack. Lando Tshazi was shot in the leg with live ammunition and the bullet is still stuck in his leg. Continue reading

Illegal Attacks on the Phumula Mqashi Land Occupation in Tembisa

Phumula Mqashi Land Occupation

Friday, 6 July 201

Phumula Mqashi Land Occupation Press Statement

Illegal Attacks on the Phumula Mqashi Land Occupation in Tembisa

On 13 February 2018 a large tract of empty land was occupied in Tembisa, on the East Rand. During apartheid the land was used by the army. Since then it has remained unused. There were more than 700 occupiers and they were members of various organisations and came from a number of areas including Jiyane, Vusimuzi, Sivana, Welamulambo, Mgantsa and Thafani Section. Some had been renting shacks and others were living with their parents or grandparents in four room township houses. Sometimes there are ten or even fourteen people living in these four room houses. Young people need a place of their own to raise their children. Continue reading

Land Occupations are Urban Land Reform from Below but Sale of Land is Criminal

Tuesday, 13 March 2018
Abahlali baseMjondolo press statement

Land Occupations are Urban Land Reform from Below but Sale of Land is Criminal

Abahlali are pleased to announce that there has been remarkable progress in the eNkanini settlement in Cato Manor over the past two weeks. The MEC for Human Settlement and Public Works in KwaZulu-Natal Mr. Ravi Pillay has intervened in the brutal evictions and violation of a court interdict by eThekwini Land Invasion Unit. After several discussions with the Provincial government Abahlali has reached an agreement with the Province that violence cannot build our city, our province and our country. What has in fact been lacking is proper leadership on the side of the eThekwini Municipality. They believe in violence and disregard of the rule of law. As a result many activists have been injured, tortured, arrested and even killed despite the court interdict protecting 241 families that our movement has secured from the Durban High Court. Continue reading

Urban land question is also urgent

by Richard Pithouse,

The opening pages of Frantz Fanon’s The Damned of the Earth offer a searing account of the city under settler colonialism. It is “a world divided into compartments”, “a world cut in two”, a world “of barbed wire entanglements”, “a narrow world strewn with violence”.

Fanon provided a clear and spatial measure for decolonisation. He argued that the ordering of the colonial world, its violent coincidence of race and space, must be examined to “reveal the lines of force it implies” so that we can “mark out the lines on which a decolonised society will be reorganised”. Continue reading

Brutal Attack in Cato Manor – Comrades are Currently Being Assaulted in Police Custody

Friday, 27 October 2017
Emergency Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement

Brutal Attack in Cato Manor – Comrades are Currently Being Assaulted in Police Custody

This morning the Anti-Land Invasion Unit launched another brutal and illegal attack on the new land occupation in Cato Manor. Once again they destroyed and burnt people’s homes and possessions and engaged in serious assault.

Once again people resisted. Four comrades were arrested and taken to the Cato Manor police station where they are currently being subject to serious assault. Two other comrades have also been arrested and are currently in a police van.   Continue reading