Kaveel Singh
Durban – eThekwini Mayor Zandile Gumede attended the opening of a sports centre while police and Foreman Road informal settlement community members clashed over promises she apparently made.
Gumede was at the opening of a sports centre in Waterloo near Verulam, north of Durban, while police and the community clashed after building material that the municipality promised, weren’t delivered. Continue reading
Kaveel Singh
Mzimasi Nomvete was sound asleep when he smelt smoke and heard screams just metres from his home.
The 35-year-old resident of Foreman’s Road Settlement in Clare Estate, Durban, heard calls of “fire” early on Sunday morning, waking in a panic.
“People were screaming and saying ‘they are burning’. It was hard to realise what was happening. It happened so quickly.” Continue reading
November 16, 2017
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement
eThekwini Municipality Breaks Promises Once Again – Protest Currently Underway
Three lives have now been lost to the fire that devastated the Foreman Road settlement in the early hours of Sunday morning leaving more than a thousand people homeless. On Monday the Municipality promised to provide the people who had been left homeless after with fire with building materials. They promised that the building materials would be provided on Thursday, which is today. Continue reading
14 November 2017
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement
A Second Life has been Lost to the Foreman Road Shack Fire
On Monday we reported that Sisipho Xulu, a two year old boy, had died in hospital after sustaining terrible injuries in the shack fire that devastated the Foreman Road settlement in the early hours of Sunday morning. Yesterday, at around 2 in the afternoon, the community got the sad news that Eric Mpanza, Sisipho’s father, had also died in hospital. Continue reading
12 November 2017
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement
Foreman Road Settlement Devastated by Fire – a Child has Died
Today at around 1:30 am in the morning a fire broke out in the Foreman Road Settlement in Clare Estate, Durban. The fire started when a candle fell and ended up burning the Xulu family home. We have just heard that a two year old child in the Xulu family has died in hospital. Other members of the family are in a critical condition at King Dinizulu Hospital. Around eight hundred families have been affected by the fire. Continue reading
Patrick Sobutyu was shot through both legs during a protest against evictions in the Marikana informal settlement in Philippi East in August 2014. GroundUp reported the incident: Police use live ammunition on shack dwellers. Continue reading
Monday, 6 November 2017
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement
Repression & Intimidation in Lindelani
Yesterday in Lindelani, Ward 43, Sibusiso Cele and Xolani Msomi called a community assembly to prepare for the launch of a new AbM branch in the area.
There is a housing development in the area but people who are not members of the ANC and the IFP have not been given the numbers on their shacks that signify that they have been placed on the list to get houses. This is the usual corruption that happens all the time in Durban. Many of the people in the area that have joined our movement are among those who have been excluded from the housing project. Continue reading
STATEMENT BY THE LAWYERS FOR HUMAN RIGHTS (SWAZILAND) ON THE RIGHT TO LAND AND HOUSING IN AFRICA
Presented on the ocassion of the 61st Ordinary Session of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Right, in Banjul, The Gambia
1 – 15 November, 2017
Honourable Madam Chairperson, Honourable Commissioners;
LHR(S) recognises that article 14 of the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights (African Charter) guarantees the right to property. This right encompasses the right to land and by extension, the right to housing.
Madam Chairpesron, LHR(S) notes that almost fifty (50) years of independence African people are still landless in their countries of birth and the land question remains a critical issue and unresolved in many African countries; thus African people remain refugees in their own countries of origin. Continue reading
Friday, 27 October 2017
Emergency Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement
Brutal Attack in Cato Manor – Comrades are Currently Being Assaulted in Police Custody
This morning the Anti-Land Invasion Unit launched another brutal and illegal attack on the new land occupation in Cato Manor. Once again they destroyed and burnt people’s homes and possessions and engaged in serious assault.
Once again people resisted. Four comrades were arrested and taken to the Cato Manor police station where they are currently being subject to serious assault. Two other comrades have also been arrested and are currently in a police van. Continue reading
Friday, October 27, 2017
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement
Two Year Old Child Electrocuted in Silver City, uMlazi
On Wednesday, at 3 p.m., a two year old child was electrified Silver City, uMlazi, in ward 88. A young life lost so early in a society in which the lives of the poor are not counted as human lives. Continue reading