Category Archives: Nqobile Nzuza

Sacrifice After Mandela: Liberation and Liberalization Among South Africa’s First Post-Apartheid Generation

Kerry Chance, Anthropological Quarterly

This article examines sacrifice in a post-Mandela South Africa. Twenty years since the fall of apartheid, South Africa remains one of the world’s most unequal societies. From street protests to labor strikes to xenophobic pogroms, dissatisfaction with current socio-economic conditions is being expressed through urban unrest, particularly in townships and shack settlements. This article analyzes an emerging idiom of “sacrifice” among youth activists in response to deaths and injuries sustained during recent street protests. I argue that this idiom draws from understandings of liberation and liberalization, popular imaginaries of the anti-apartheid struggle, and processes associated with the country’s transition to democracy. Broadly, I suggest that sacrifice under liberalization reveals the blurring boundaries between “the gift” and “the market” in political life. [Keywords: Sacrifice, politics, violence, poverty, liberalization]

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Sacrifice After Mandela: Liberation and Liberalization Among South Africa’s First Post-Apartheid Generation

Mahala: Poor Man’s Burden

http://www.mahala.co.za/reality/poor-mans-burden/

by Samora Chapman and Caelin Roodt, Mahala

According to Abahlali baseMjondolo, the uprising in Cato Crest is being quelled by all means necessary: death threats, unlawful arrests and police brutality. Many unaligned shack dwellers have also fallen victim to violent suppression. Collateral damage, wrong place, wrong time, the poor man’s burden.

We headed to Cato Crest to find out more about the deaths. Our soft-spoken guide, Ndabo Mzimela does not come across as a political activist. But he became the Chairperson of the Cato Crest branch of AbM when his predecessor, Nkululeko Gwala, was assassinated on 26 June this year.

On 26 June a community meeting was held to discuss Nkhululeko the ‘troublemaker’. The meeting was attended by James Nxumalo (Mayor councilor of Durban) and Sibongiseni Dhlomo (MEC of Health).

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The Housing List versus the Death List

The Housing List versus the Death List

We are supposed to be living in a democratic country, a country of justice, a country where everyone should be treated as one. Yet there is a huge inequality. That inequality is economic, it is spatial and it is political. We remain divided into rich and poor. We continue to be allocated to different kinds of places that are meant for different kinds of people with different kinds of opportunities, different kinds of lives and different kinds of rights. We continue to be divided into those that have the freedom to express themselves and those that face all kinds of intimidation and repression if we commit the crime of telling the truths about our lives.

For the poor this country is a democratic prison. We are allowed to vote for our prison warders and managers but we must always remain in the prison. We must remain in silence when our shack settlements are illegally destroyed leaving us homeless. We must remain in silence when we are forcibly removed to transit camps that are only fit for animals but not for people. We must remain in silence when we are told to return to Lusikisiki or taken to human dumping grounds far outside the cities. We must remain in silence when we are threatened, beaten, shot and killed. The politicians think that when we refuse to be silent, and when we resist repression, they can silence us by throwing some meat at us. After all these years they think that we are dogs. We are not dogs. We are people. We will continue to rebel until we are treated as human beings.

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Today We Return to Court in Solidarity with Four of Our Comrades Arrested in Cato Crest

28 October 2013 Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement

Today We Return to Court in Solidarity with Four of our Comrades Arrested in Cato Crest

Today we return to the Durban Magistrate’s Court in solidarity with four of our comrades arrested in Cato Crest during the current wave of repression. The four comrades appearing in court today are Bandile Mdlalose and, in a separate case, Nokulanga Magobongo, Sibongile and Mr. Mzihle.

Bandile Mdlalose was arrested on the 30th of September 2013 during a spontaneous demonstration against the murder of Nqobile Nzuza, 17, who was shot in the back of the head by the police. Bandile’s only real ‘crime’ was to refuse to be intimidated and to be in silence in the face of police murder and intimidation. She was detained in Westville Prison for a week and then released on a very high bail (R 5000) and with onerous conditions including a ban on her entering Cato Crest. This is an outrageous violation of her basic political rights.

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