http://www.themercury.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=5093528

Police target ringleaders
Service protest anger boils over

July 22, 2009 Edition 1

SHAUN SMILLIE, POLOKO TAU & SAPA

SOUTH Africa has been gripped by a wave of violent service provision protests in three provinces, with fears that it might escalate and spill over into other provinces.

The protests in recent weeks depict a government still treading water in the race to keep democracy afloat, analysts say.

Anger against inadequate municipal services has boiled over after President Jacob Zuma’s administration was elected, under pressure to deliver on election promises.

Yesterday, protesters fought running battles with police through the streets of Siyathemba, which borders the town of Balfour in Mpumalanga.

Police fired rubber bullets and teargas, and cleared the barricades. They also called up reinforcements. Superintendent Meshack Mtsweni said police had changed tactics.

“We are focusing on the ringleaders. We have specific people who are identifying who the ringleaders are,” he said.

Police had arrested one ringleader.

Nomvula Mhlongo, who is 89, was on the streets of Siyathemba township taunting the police from behind a barricade of burning tyres.

She was there because she still lived in the same house that flooded in summer and got too cold in winter. “There is niks hier and I have been here all my life,” she shouted.

Yesterday, 99 protesters appeared in the Balfour Magistrate’s Court on a charge of public violence.

At least eight foreign-owned shops stood looted or gutted. The few locally-owned shops stood out, as they were boarded up, but untouched. At the Balfour police station, police were working in shifts and a braai had been organised to feed them. Also at the station were foreigners desperate to organise an escort to their shops.

One of them was Abrham Ayano, an Ethiopian. “This place is supposed to be life in heaven. But I have just risked my life for nothing,” he said.

Ayano’s shop in Greylingstad had been looted and he didn’t have a place to stay for the night.

Meanwhile, a stalemate, cushioned by promises of action from a councillor not directly responsible for the ward, led to protesters marching on the Thokoza police station, where they formed a human wall across the main entrance. Once again, the police readied for battle, but the tense stand-off ended without further violence.

The Ekurhuleni Municipality was quick to respond, asking the community to respect the law and promising to deal with the issues.

The worst-hit provinces were the Eastern Cape, Limpopo and Mpumalanga, where the number of households with access to water was 73 percent, 83 percent and 89 percent respectively. In the Eastern Cape, 66 percent of households used electricity for lighting, with 81 percent in Limpopo and 82 percent in Mpumalanga.

Nationally, housing provision by the government had dropped by 8.2 percent between April 2007 and March 2008, compared to the same period the previous year.