Sunday, 21 March 2021
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement

We Are Still Struggling for our Humanity to be Recognised

Today is Human Rights Day, a day during which we are always told that we should celebrate the human rights that were included in the 1996 Constitution.

As everyone knows the origin of Human Rights Day is the Sharpeville massacre in 1960. Under the leadership of Robert Sobukwe, the Pan Africanist Congress organised a non-violent protest against the pass laws that were used to exclude African people from the cities, and to keep them under white control in the cities. Sobukwe was clear that the protestors would “observe absolute non-violence” and that the protest would be the beginning of a campaign for “life abundant”. Around five thousand people joined the protest, and 69 were shot down like animals. Another three people were murdered by the police during protests against the massacre in Cape Town. Continue reading →

15 March 2021
Abahlali baseMjondolo press statement

The State Continues to Murder with Impunity

Abahlali baseMjondolo expresses deep solidarity with the family and friends of Mthokozisi Ntumba, who was murdered by the police in Johannesburg on Wednesday last week as he passed by a student protest. We join all progressive forces in refusing to accept that, more than twenty-five years after the end of apartheid, the state can continue to use murder as a routine form of social control.  Continue reading →

8 March 2021

THULI NDLOVU LECTURE FOR INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY

By Nomsa Sizani, General Secretary of Abahlali baseMjondolo

Thank you to Pan-Africanism Today for the invitation to speak today. We appreciate all organisations that work to build living solidarity between progressive forces. We also appreciate the opportunity to be part of this discussion on International Women’s Day, which is a day that comes out of women’s struggles and is used to celebrate women in struggle around the world.

Women’s determination and courage are the foundation of our movement, and we are committed to building women’s power in struggle. Thuli Ndlovu was one of the bravest women in our movement. She was born in February 1978, in a semi-rural area called KwaNdengezi.  Continue reading →

19 February 2021

Abahlali baseMjondolo Movement SA press statement

Collective Reading of the Communist Manifesto

On the 21 February 1848, Karl Marx and Frederick Engels published the first edition of the Communist Manifesto. Progressive movements and organisations around the world are holding workshops on the Manifesto, and as part of this global project our movement will hold a political education workshop at the Frantz Fanon school at the eKhenana occupation in Durban from 21 February to 1 March.  Continue reading →

17 February 2021

The Power of Abahlali and our Living Politic has been Built with Our Blood

Talk delivered by S’bu. Zikode as part of the virtual speaker series “Thinking Freedom from the Global South”.

May I first of all take this opportunity to thank the American University’s Anti-Racist Research & Policy Center, Department of Critical Race, Gender and Culture Studies and Women’s Initiative for giving Abahlali this important opportunity to speak here today. The most powerful forces of oppression operate at a global level, and for this reason the movements that organise resistance need to connect with each other. Our movement is open to the world, we insist that the world must be shared and we work to build solidarity with progressive forces everywhere. Continue reading →

28 January 2021

Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement

Impoverishment Continues to Threaten the Safety of the Poor During the Pandemic

Since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic in March 2020, we as the poor and marginalized in the townships, rural areas and urban shack settlements have been concerned that once the virus is spread in our areas, it will hit us worst.

When the president of the country first announced the lockdown, it became clear that he was acting as if everyone in the country is a rich or middle-class person. We do not all have access to water and proper sanitation, or the space to effectively social distance.  Continue reading →

Wednesday, 27 January 2021

The Politic of Home

Presentation by S’bu. Zikode in an online session called In Defence of Home organised by Africans the in the Diaspora Program – Thousand Currents

May I first of all thank Thousand Currents and all organisers of this session, and acknowledge my fellow panellists here.

Dignity is at the centre of the politic of our movement. We insist that the recognition of the full and equal dignity of every human being is non-negotiable. We work to build a movement in which the dignity of the oppressed is respected and communities in which the dignity of the oppressed is respected. We also struggle to force the rest of the society to respect the dignity of oppressed people. People often describe our movement as a home, a place where they belong and feel respected.  Continue reading →

Sunday, 17 January 2021
Abahlali baseMjondolo press statement

Abahlali baseMjondolo is opposed to the closure of borders

Since our movement was formed 15 years ago we have always opposed the systems that make people poor and keep them poor. We have always opposed all attacks on the poor. We are in solidarity with all oppressed people regardless of the country or province of their birth, the language that they speak, the religion that they follow or the colour of their skin. Any oppressed person who accepts the principles of abahlalism and the philosophy of ubuhlali is welcomed into our movement and can be elected into any position.  Continue reading →