Category Archives: Quinton Mtyala

The Herald: State to get tough on violent protesters

http://www.peherald.com/news/article/12358

State to get tough on violent protesters

Quinton Mtyala
PRESIDENT Jacob Zuma has promised that the government will be getting tough on violent protesters

In his state of the nation address last night, Zuma said South Africans had to celebrate, promote, exercise and defend their constitution and that violence was unacceptable.

“It is unacceptable when people’s rights are violated by perpetrators of violent actions, such as actions that lead to injury and death of persons, damage to property and the destruction of valuable public infrastructure.”

His comments come almost a month after violent protests in Sasolburg’s Zamdela township in a dispute over new municipal boundaries.

Zuma said: “We are duty bound to uphold, defend and respect the constitution as the supreme law of the Republic. We will spare no effort in doing so.

“For this reason, I have instructed the Justice, Crime Prevention and Security Cluster (JCPSC) to put measures in place, with immediate effect, to ensure that any incidents of violent protest are acted upon, investigated and prosecuted.”

He said special courts would be set aside to deal with those suspected of public violence during protests, and these cases would be prioritised on the court rolls.

But Zuma said while some protested, the constitutional rights of all South Africans had to be defended. His government would not disappoint regarding that expectation.

“The JCPSC has therefore put measures in place at national, provincial and local level to deal with such incidents effectively,” Zuma said.

But before the anger of communities was expressed through violence, he called on all government departments to address concerns.

Grahamstown-based Unemployment People’s Movement spokesman Ayanda Kota said “Most protests are peaceful and people resort to the streets when they are not being heard by those in charge. The way he spoke was a demonstration of an authoritarian government.”

– Additional reporting by Rochelle de Kock

Cape Times: Shack movement won’t back ANC

Note: AbM, along with its sister organisations in the Poor People’s Alliance, has always boycotted all elections and refused any affiliation with any political party. However none of the movements in the alliance have ever interfered with the rights of any person to freely campaign for a party or to vote if that is their choice.

http://www.capetimes.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=5720466

POLL SUPPORT REFUSED
Shack movement won’t back ANC

November 08, 2010 Edition 1

Quinton Mtyala

THE ANC’s chances of retaking the City of Cape Town at next year’s local government elections have taken a knock after Abahlali baseMjondolo rebuffed ANC Youth League overtures.

The shack people’s movement has been behind service protests in Khayelitsha, but insists its members have not acted violently but disruptively.

The movement’s Western Cape leader, Mzonki Poni, said that after the eruption of protests in September he was approached by the league’s Loyiso Nkohla, who called for the City of Cape Town to be made “ungovernable” in the wake of the Makhaza open toilet scandal.

“We’ve been approached by the youth league, but we refused to work with them. They’re pushing a different agenda to ours,” Poni said.

For the ANC to retake Cape Town from the DA it would need majority support in Khayelitsha, the city’s largest township with close to 750 000 residents.

But the movement has vowed it would boycott and disrupt next year’s local government elections, saying political parties, particularly the ANC, viewed shack dwellers as voting cattle.

Nkohla denied wanting to co-opt Poni, saying the league had hoped to “reach out” to them since no ANC ward councillors would meet Abahlali.

“After the TAC, SJC and Cosatu accused them of working with elements of the youth league, I called him to clarify the situation and see if we could work together.”

This followed the stoning of buses and burning barricades being placed on thoroughfares passing informal settlements.

Nkohla denied the league was behind violence in TR-Section, from where residents had been promised they would be moved. Poni insists Abahlali baseMjondolo, which is active in 15 Cape Town communities, will not be used as a tool by political parties hoping to show up their opponents.

“We’re not going on to the streets to disrupt the DA-run city council, or saying that if the ANC takes over Cape Town things will change for us.”

He said Abahlali’s recent protests were intended to bring development closer to people.

“We’re challenging undemocratic government policies and a top-down approach from those in power,” Poni said.

Martin Legassick of the Anti-Eviction Campaign said ANC councillors showed no solidarity with poor constituents.

Legassick was kicked out of the exiled ANC in 1985 after being suspended in 1979 for being “factionalist”.

“Ward councillors in Cape Town earn R27 000 a month. That separates them from ordinary people. The ANC has a contempt for ordinary people,” he said.

Justin Sylvester, a political researcher at Idasa, said that, although Abahlali baseMjondolo claimed to have no political ambitions, it was an alternative to the ANC.

quinton.mtyala@inl.co.za

Cape Times: Abahlali’s housing protest ‘to continue’

The Cosatu meeting was disrupted by TR section residents with a help of ANC youth league not by ABM WC. Every protest in Khayelitsha is being ascribed to AbM WC at the moment but this is not the case.

http://www.capetimes.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=5694105

Abahlali’s housing protest ‘to continue’

October 20, 2010 Edition 1

Quinton Mtyala

SHACK dwellers’ movement Abahlali baseMjondolo (AbM) has vowed to continue its “strike” protest in Khayelitsha following an “unsuccessful” meeting with provincial head of Human Settlements Mbulelo Tshangana.

Yesterday, Tshangana spent over three hours explaining the provincial government’s plan for the upgrade of informal settlements and its new plan for housing delivery.

But Khayelitsha community activist and leading AbM member Mzonki Poni said Tshangana had failed to address the concerns of communities who, through barricades and attacks on buses, have protested against their living conditions in some of the city’s worst informal settlements.

“The meeting does not really speak to the memorandum we delivered two weeks ago. We’ll apply pressure. It’s not just about making noise (by toyi-toying),” Poni said.

He said AbM would “engage” with the provincial government and city officials until it was satisfied there was a concrete plan for people living in informal settlements.

Asked if this meant a continuation of the protests, the latest of which disrupted a meeting addressed by Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi on Monday night, Poni said: “Yes”.

quinton.mtyala@inl.co.za

Cape Times: No kick-off for blackout victims of QQ-section

http://www.capetimes.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=5509955

No kick-off for blackout victims of QQ-section

June 11, 2010 Edition 1

Quinton Mtyala

NO electricity for 700 families in QQ-section, Khayelitsha, means that, when the World Cup kicks off in Cape Town tonight, many of them won’t be able to watch.

The City of Cape Town’s failure to move them to one of several sites identified for flood relief victims had caused some residents to protest by blocking off a stretch of Lansdowne Road that passes by QQ-section.

Every winter, informal settlements like QQ section are flooded because they are either located below the water table or close to retention ponds.

Because of this, no utility services can be installed, and this has often been met with violent protest, as happened last year when the people of BT-section closed off a section of Lansdowne Road for more than a month in September.

Last week the city acknowledged that it had been forced to delay plans to move most of the 1 656 families living below the water table in Khayelitsha owing to objections by residents in the township’s relatively well-off Elitha Park.

At a meeting in Site B earlier this week, Premier Helen Zille said that if an agreement could not be reached with those objecting to the flood relief areas by the end of this month, R96 million allocated to the project would have to be returned to the provincial Treasury.

Mbongeni Mkhaliphi, a community activist and protest organiser in the area, said people there had on three occasions been promised that they would be moved to other areas, but nothing had come of it.

Three hundred families were supposed to have been moved this winter.

“They promised us land in Mfuleni, but nothing has come of it. Between June and September we were supposed to move… now they say it will only happen next year,” said Mkhaliphi.

quinton.mtyala@inl.co.za

IOL: Mayor Plato smacked

http://antieviction.org.za/2009/11/18/media-mayor-plato-smacked/

Mayor Plato smacked

On a surprise visit to the Blikkiesdorp transition camp in Delft, Mayor Dan Plato was smacked, cursed, sworn at and branded a liar by long-suffering, angry residents.

This after Plato angered them by dismissing their complaints of inhuman conditions by claiming it was “amongst the best” settlements.

He denounced some residents for “unfaithfulness and ungratefulness”.

Attempting to enter a row of corrugated steel huts, Plato was stopped by a group of women who barricaded the entrance.

In an angry confrontation Plato was smacked by an incensed woman as his bodyguards intervened to get her off him.

The tussel lasted for a short while. Plato looked shocked and hurt but did not retaliate.

# quinton.mtyala@inl.co.za

Earlier version:

On a surprise visit to Blikkiesdorp in Delft, Mayor Dan Plato had to walk through a gauntlet of angry residents swearing, cursing and in one instance even physically attacking him.

This comes a week after Premier Helen Zille was met with the same anger by the community over the living conditions at the temporary relocation area for backyard squatters who had illegally occupied N2 Gateway houses in Delft.

Currently Blikkiesdorp is home to more than 1452 families and can accommodate a total of 1667 families.

With a heavy police presence, along with his VIP bodyguards, Plato first met with his officials and afterwards went on a walkabout in the camp with surprised residents looking on.

Some greeted him, while others seemed oblivious – they had seen it all before.

With his bodyguards, housing officials and media on tow, Plato set forth as he had done many times before on his impromptu visits, he got talking to some residents, inspected toilets and spoke to those who seemed without malice.

He listened and gave short answers to some of the complaints but barely two metres behind him, prevented from coming closer by his bodyguards, was the loud voice of Patricia Ludidi, cursing and pointing fingers at him – questioning his real motives for visiting Blikkiesdorp.

Attempting to enter another row of corrugated steel huts, Plato was stopped by a group of women who barricaded the entrance.

An angry confrontation ensued which led to Plato being punched by an angry woman as his bodyguards intervened to get her off him.

On a surprise visit to the Blikkiesdorp transition camp in Delft, Mayor Dan Plato was smacked, cursed, sworn at and branded a liar by long-suffering, angry residents.

This after Plato angered them by dismissing their complaints of inhuman conditions by claiming it was “amongst the best” settlements.

He denounced some residents for “unfaithfulness and ungratefulness”.

Attempting to enter a row of corrugated steel huts, Plato was stopped by a group of women who barricaded the entrance.

In an angry confrontation Plato was smacked by an incensed woman as his bodyguards intervened to get her off him.

The tussel lasted for a short while. Plato looked shocked and hurt but did not retaliate.

# quinton.mtyala@inl.co.za