November 12, 2005 5:07 PM

the good news is that:

1. the metro has now made a crucial concession in that they are now prepared to negotiate with the abahlali base mjondolo movement. (previously they always insisted on only negotiating with the leadership of individual settlements) the abahlali base mjondolo now represent 16 settlements.

2. on Friday the metro made an offer. 6 409 houses in a new development (on moreland land) on the large stretch of prime but vacant land that runs from phoenix to the gated communities at mount edgecomb as well as 600 houses in clare estate. they also promised some houses on ukzn land (where the banana city settlement is)….this doesn’t appear to be a simple case of people who have been agitating being bumped up the housing ladder. as far as we can tell the plan has been to remove all the shack dwellers from clare estate and reservoir hills and to dump them in rural ghettos like parkgate (7 km’s outside of verulm and a r21 journey from durban). these promises, if kept, would be a major break with the neo-apartheid development model of the city as they would see poor people being housed in rich suburbs and on prime private land near to gated housing developments and office parks for the super rich. the offer has been made in writing with the proviso that it must be accepted at a council meeting in two weeks time. however it also includes a ‘suggestion’ that the march on mlaba be turned into a rally in asherville ‘where the leadership of Council will address the communities. the written offer includes clear time frames. they are different for different areas but are all in 2006.

of course if these promises are kept there will be ongoing struggle about the nature and quality of the developments, about who does the work on them and what workers get paid, and by people who won’t be able to be accommodated in these 7 000 or so houses. and, no doubt, once people are in the houses, there will be struggles around water, electricity, education, transport etc. but the good news is that the metro has, in principle at least, broken with the idea that poor people must be housed in rural ghettos. if this principle is put into practice then abahlali base mjondolo has a victory to celebrate.

richard