Category Archives: Manqoba Nxumalo

M&G: The scouring of Jo’burg’s inner city

http://mg.co.za/article/2013-10-24-the-scouring-of-joburgs-inner-city

The scouring of Jo'burg's inner city

Standing on the corner of Kerk and Joubert streets in Johannesburg's inner city on Tuesday morning this week, Mandla Mabaso said he was ready to die.

"I'm going to toyi-toyi [against the evictions of inner-city informal traders] and I hope I die," said the street cobbler, tears forming in his eyes. "It is better that I die than see my children suffer."

Earlier that morning, Mabaso had kept R13 for the taxi fare he needed to get from his home in Soweto to Johannesburg's city centre where he fixes shoes from 7.30am until seven at night. Mabaso had given the rest of his money to his wife to take their two children, Sicelo (5) and Ntombizodwa (5), to the local crèche.

But when Mabaso (32) arrived at his usual spot he was told by members of the Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department that neither he nor the almost 100 traders who eke out a living at the Kerk Street linear market would be allowed to trade there, with no indication of when they might be be allowed back.

Mabaso, like many of the traders, had no money to return home. Nor could he imagine how he was going to find the R450 for next month's rent, or the R600 to keep his children in crèche during October. He was inconsolable.

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Mail & Guardian: Woman shot dead after protesters corner cops in Cato Crest

The police spokesperson, Jay Naicker, is telling straight forward lies here. There is a long history of proven lies by the police in Durban and elsewhere when it comes to them telling the media about their own violence. We urge all media to please do their own investigations before reporting police lies as credible accounts of police violence.

http://mg.co.za/article/2013-09-30-woman-shot-during-cato-crest-housing-protest

Woman shot dead after protesters corner cops in Cato Crest

by Manqoba Nxumalo

The housing allocation dispute in Cato Crest has claimed another victim, this time a 17-year-old girl who was shot and killed during a housing protest in Cato Manor, Durban on Monday morning.

The latest killing brings to three the number of people killed in the raging battle in Cato Crest, following the murders of housing rights activists, Nkululeko Gwala and Thembinkosi Qumelo, a few months back. Two weeks ago another housing rights activist, Nkosinathi Mngomezulu, was shot by the city's land invasion unit during a resisted demolition of shacks in the area.

Abahlali baseMjondolo's Mnikelo Ndabankulu, spokesperson for the shack dweller's movement, said Mngomezulu has been discharged from the King Edward Hospital Intensive Care Unit but not yet out of hospital.

Ndabo Mzimela, chairperson of the Cato Crest branch of the shackdweller's movement, said the deceased was identified as Nqobile Nzuza (17) from Maphumulo.

Meanwhile, Bandile Mdlalose, secretary general of the organisation, was reportedly arrested during Monday's violent protest in the area.

Early on Monday, branches of Abahlali baseMjondolo in Cato Crest informal settlement, Kenny Road and Siphungo decided to block the road, demanding an immediate response to their petition sent to the Durban Municipality on September 16.

Police called to disperse crowd

South African Police Service's spokesperson Colonel Jay Naicker told News24 that residents blocked Bellair Road in the morning and police were called to disperse the crowd.

"About 500 people surrounded the vehicle. They started stoning the vehicle and broke all the windows. The suspects then tried to pull the police out of the vehicle," said Naicker.

"They heard gunshots among the crowd. They fired shots into the crowd and the crowd dispersed … they used live rounds. They definitely would have been killed by the crowd [otherwise]."

The vehicle then left the area.

Police returned to the scene a while later and found a young woman had been shot. She died on the scene.

"Members of the Independent Police Investigative Directorate were called to the scene. They opened a docket of public violence and one of murder," said Naicker.

On September 1, the municipality demolished Cato Crest shacks in violation of an undertaking made to the high court in Durban on August 22, that it would halt evictions pending the finalisation of the application for a final order.

Manqoba Nxumalo is the Mail & Guardian's Eugene Saldanha Fellow for social justice reporting in 2013.

M&G: ANC:1 Shackdwellers:0

Please note that (1) the councillor's office was brunt down before the AbM branch was formed, (2) the eviction and not a protest became violent when Mngomezulu was shot, (3) the municipality are just lying when they claim that they have protected the shacks of the people that have been to court and that the occupiers are 'new', (4) witnesses deny that Mngomezulu stabbed anyone and no evidence has been brought to say that he did stab anyone and (5) the City's general court order against all land occupations in Durban cannot invalidate the constitution, the law or specific court orders and will not stand up in court.

http://mg.co.za/article/2013-09-27-00-anc-1-shack-dwellers-0

ANC 1: Shack dwellers 0

Manqoba Nxumalo

A housing rights activist is fighting for his life in a Durban hospital following a protest that turned violent when the Durban police's land invasion unit recently demolished shacks in the city's Cato Crest informal settlement.

At least 18 shacks were demolished on September 21 at Cato Crest, about 7km from Durban.

Activist Nkosinathi Mngomezulu, who is currently in the intensive care unit of the city's King Edward Hospital, was shot in the stomach by the land invasion unit during the protest.

For the past few months the informal settlement has been a site of battle between two warring groups; the ANC and the social movement Abahlali baseMjondolo.

The land occupation has resulted in considerable conflict, with local councillor Mzimuni Ngiba's offices and a community hall being burned down recently.

Several activists were arrested and later released.

Two housing rights activists, Nkululeko Gwala and Thembinkosi Qumelo, were assassinated and several shackdwellers were displaced.

The ongoing battle is over the delivery of houses to this small community of shack dwellers.

Since March, Cato Crest residents have occupied an unused piece of land owned by the municipality, in an operation dubbed "Marikana".

Mayor James Nxumalo blamed the occupation on migrants mainly from the Eastern Cape.

On September 1, the municipality demolished Cato Crest shacks in violation of an undertaking made to the Durban high court on August 22, that it would halt evictions pending the finalisation of the application for a final order.

The next day local residents, assisted by Abahlali baseCato Crest – a newly formed branch of Abahlali baseMjondolo – went to the Durban high court to stop the evictions.

An urgent interdict was granted and restrained the municipality from evicting the residents or demolishing their structures without a court order.

The court ordered the municipality to construct "temporary habitable dwellings that afford shelter, privacy and amenities at least equivalent to those destroyed".

The residents were represented by the Socioeconomic Rights Institute's Durban correspondent, Nichols Attorneys, and advocate David Saks.

The parties agreed to a court order that directed the legal representatives of the parties to meet at the settlement on September 17 to identify and mark the residents' shacks.

However, the illegal evictions at Cato Crest continued over the weekend of September 14 and 15, despite the interdict.

The General Council of the Bar has joined the fray, condemning the recent evictions as a violation of a court order.

However, the Durban municipality argued that the Cato Crest issue is more complicated because it already has a court order authorising it to demolish any new structures on illegal land and that it acted based on the strength of that order.

"In Cato Crest we agreed to go and mark the shacks that were already in place as per the court order but then we realised there are new structures that are being erected in total abuse of the court order and those are the structures that we are demolishing," the city's spokesperson, Thabo Mofokeng, said.

He added that they have a standing policy to remove all people who invade land and, based on that, they could act on any structure erected illegally within the municipality.

He also alleged that Mngomezulu stabbed one of their employees, whom he refused to name, during last weekend's stand-off and was shot in self-defence.

Academic and social commentator Richard Pithouse said the drama is "about protecting the interests of the ruling party".

"Party supporters have built shacks in the same area without consequence. These are political evictions. And politics is being openly mediated through ethnicity," Pithouse said.

"Mpondo people are being presented as having no right to this city and the Zulus among them as disloyal."

M&G: Durban officials face imprisonment for Cato Crest evictions

http://mg.co.za/article/2013-09-11-durban-officials-face-imprisonment-for-cato-crest-evictions

Durban officials face imprisonment for Cato Crest evictions

Manqoba Nxumalo

The eThekwini municipal manager Sibusiso Sithole and the head of the Land Invasions Unit have been ordered to appear before the Durban High Court on Thursday to explain why they should not be imprisoned for contempt of court for continuing with Cato Crest shack demolitions despite a court order prohibiting the destruction of shacks.

On Friday September 6 2013, Abahlali baseMjondolo and residents of Cato Crest informal settlement approached the KwaZulu-Natal High Court in Durban for the third time to prevent the eThekwini municipality from illegally destroying their homes.

???Read more: Cato Crest: Land hunger of ‘Marikana’ proportions
The judge granted an interim order compelling Sithole and the head of the Land Invasion Unit to appear in court on Thursday, September 12, to explain why they should not be imprisoned for 30 days.

Sbu Zikode, from the Abahlali baseMjondolo’s shack dweller’s movement, said they were shocked that the municipality could flagrantly disregard a court order and that they looked forward to Thursday’s hearing.

“We obtained yet another order because the municipality continues to go against the law and now they face arrest,” Zikode said on Tuesday.

The order further directed the municipality to construct “temporary habitable dwellings that afford shelter, privacy and amenities at least equivalent to those destroyed, and which are capable of being dismantled, at the site at which their previous informal housing structures were demolished” to the residents whose shacks were demolished on September 1 and 2.

This has not been done.

“When the state wilfully disobeys a court order, it makes a criminal of itself. It subverts the rule of law. It tears the fabric of our constitutional democracy,” said Stuart Wilson, executive director of the Socio-Economic Rights Institute (Seri).

“It is unacceptable that poor residents of an informal settlement must go to court three times in order to stop the illegal demolition of their homes … It is equally disturbing that the only way to hold a municipality accountable to enforce court orders is to bring individual office-bearers to court on pain of imprisonment for contempt.”

Appointed local government enforcers often face threats and violence when they attempt to disband informal communities taking advantage of loopholes in land use management legislation.