Category Archives: Election 2014

Lessons in democracy from the poor

http://www.thoughtleader.co.za/mikevangraan/2014/05/08/lessons-in-democracy-from-the-poor/

Mike van Graan

The decision by members of Abahlali baseMjondolo (AbM) in KwaZulu-Natal to endorse the Democratic Alliance in the 2014 election has not only raised many eyebrows, but has also unleashed stinging vitriol against this branch of the shack-dwellers’ movement. Started in 2005, AbM with its anti-evictions focus and its campaigns for decent public housing is recognised as one of the most effective social movements in the country. With its core struggle for land and housing, it has boycotted previous local and national government elections under the slogan of “No land! No Houses! No Vote!” Abahlali baseMjondolo has experienced severe repression from both ANC municipalities in KwaZulu-Natal and their DA counterparts in the Western Cape. It is against this background — and the strong anti-capitalist sentiment of the movement — that questions have been raised about the decision of AbM-KZN to call upon their members (estimated to exceed 25 000 nationally) to vote for the DA.

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The ANC Must be removed from Office

06 May 2014

Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement

 

The ANC Must be removed from Office

For nine years our movement has boycotted elections. We have been clear that no political party represents the interests of the poor and that it was necessary for us to build our own power in order to present our own needs and demands to society. In these nine years we have won many victories but most of us remain in shacks. Twenty years of shack life is a disgrace in a democracy.

Corruption is also a disgrace. In Durban you get nothing without a membership card for the ANC. All development goes through the councillors and their ward committees and ANC branch executive committees. Development is there to make ANC leaders rich and to control the rest of us by only making it available to ANC members. Development is not for the people. This kind of corruption is a disgrace in a democracy.

But an even bigger disgrace is the repression that we have faced from the ANC, its members, its leaders and its assassins. They have banned our marches; attacked our marches; arrested us on trumped up charges; assaulted us in detention; used armed men to drive us from our homes with police support; used death threats, attacks in our homes and torture in police stations to intimidate people to manufacture evidence against us; detained us for months and months while we wait for a trial that gets thrown out of court because there is no evidence against us; used their anti-land invasion unit to evict us for political reasons and beaten and shot us in our communities. Senior members of the ANC and the Municipality have made public death threats against us. Two activists were assassinated in Cato Crest last year and another, an unarmed teenage girl, was executed by the police.

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UPM: Election 2014: Our Position

Monday, 05 May 2014

Unemployed People’s Movement Press Statement

 

Election 2014: Our Position

The Unemployed People’s Movement (UPM) has endorsed the 'Sidikiwe! Vukani! Vote No!' campaign. We are calling on our members to refuse to vote for the ANC and vote for any of the small parties, but not the DA, or to spoil their votes if they cannot bring themselves to support any of the small parties.

We have received a number of calls from people wanting to know our stance on the decision by Abahlali baseMjondolo (AbM) in Durban to offer a tactical vote to the DA in response to the serious repression that they have experienced from the ANC.

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Why Abahlali endorsed the DA: S’bu Zikode speaks to GroundUp

http://groundup.org.za/content/why-abahlali-endorsed-da-sbu-zikode-speaks-groundup

On 2 May 2014 Abahlali baseMjondolo (ABM) –a social movement of shack dwellers– endorsed the Democratic Alliance (DA) for the 2014 general elections. Abahlali baseMjondolo are better known for their protests against unlawful evictions and their advocacy for public housing and urban land for the poor. Sibusiso Tshabalala of GroundUp spoke to S’bu Zikode, leader of Abahlali baseMjondolo, to find out why they took this decision.

GroundUp (GU): Abahlali’s politics are fundamentally different to that of the DA. Why did you decide to endorse the DA?

S’bu Zikode (SZ): We [ABM members] have suffered under the ANC’s rule. The ANC has consistently demonstrated that it lacks the political will to take the issues of the poor seriously. Being a shack dweller is similar to being imprisoned. The only difference is that a prison sentence can be short-lived, but when you’re poor and have no guarantee of upward mobility, living in a shack can be a life sentence. How long should we, the poor, be confined to this shack sentence?

Here in Durban, many of our comrades continue to be assaulted by the ANC. We fear for our lives and assassination attempts are the order of the day.

As a movement of the urban poor, we think our priority is to vote out the ANC. We do not agree with the DA fundamentally on many core issues. This decision is not one that is based on ideology. Poor people do not eat ideology, nor do they live in houses that are made out of ideology.

So for this decision, we have decided to suspend ideology for a clear goal: weaken the ANC, guarantee the security and protection of the shack dwellers.

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