Category Archives: Memorandum

AbM Western Cape – Demands Presented to Dan Plato on 21 July 2009

Click here for more pictures of the march by Sydelle Willow Smith, here for pictures from Independent Online, here for the report in the Cape Argus and here for the report in the Cape Times.

Update: Click here to read the Cape Town Municipality's response to the AbM Memorandum.

List of community demands
ABAHLALI BASEMJONDOLO OF THE WESTERN CAPE.

As people who are residing within the informal settlement we would like to bring the list of our demands to your attention for your immediate response. We are concerned with the conditions at which our people are living under off and with the city’s lack of proper intervention.We therefore demand that the city to look at conditions of each area and come up with relevant planning for each an every area. And to come up with a city wide housing planning for all people who are living at informal settlement and backyards. Further more we would like the city of cape town and its anti land invasion unit to adopt a different attitude than the one that they are carrying when it comes to the public land which is unused.

We demand response from your office within 14 days of receiving this memorandum and we want you to convey a meeting with all the relevant city officials and affected communities to further discuss these issue
ABM-WC contact details
abmwesterncape@abahlali.org
073 2562 036

QA
1. Residents of QA demand land.
2. Drains must be cleaned regularly
3. Street in between
4. Municipal waste collection
5. Clean Water
6. Adequate Toilets

VV,
VV informal settlement is more than 21 years old, and residents still does not have municipal essential services.
We therefore demands: Proper toilets, clean water, waste collection and we want to know what are cities future plans for VV informal settlement in terms of houses.
K. Mathiwane 072 512 4025

T.T.
We want the city to recognize the number of years that we have been staying here at Tt section, therefore we demand that this area be upgraded where it is, we don’t want to be housed elsewhere and we are saying to the city of Cate Town in the meant time people of tt must be provided by basic services.
Bulelani Cornelius Mfaco
078 350 3887-079 1104940

Demands for Q.Q SECTION

1. The city must stop fooling our people
2. We want to be relocated as the city promised us with relocation to Bardel Farm
3. We need time frames for relocation

MACASSAR VILLAGE evictees

As people of Macassar village we note with great concern that.
1. The city’s demolition of our structures that we have built to shelter our selves was illegal and the city acted in a manner in which was shocking to it’s residents.
2. The city’s stealing of our building material was out of the question, as a result of that, people at Macassar are homeless due to the city’s criminal act.
3. And we are saying Dan Plato must stop undermining people of Macassar village,
4. We therefore demand: our building material (that was stolen by the law enforcement) back as soon as possible
5. That the city must look for alternative accommodation nearby not to the dumping site, Delft TRA.
Andiswa Kolanisi 073 699 1839
Theliwe Macekiswana 083 248 1658
Nomsa Molongana 078 6872 292

MEMORANDUM FROM U.T SECTION EGADINI
1. There is a density of houses in such a way that when there is a fire, fire fighters has no access to do their job so we need streets in order to do that you must remove some residents and allocate them to a serviced land. Another reason we want street is that according to our culture when someone passed away we must take the coffin inside the house before we bury the corpse which is impossible in our area.
2. We need water taps that are strong enough to last long because the one that we have are common when they are broken we fix ourselves nobody is helping us, only four taps is serving four hundred households.
3. We need a tall lamp at the middle of the area so that the whole place can be brighter for our security from the criminals.
4. We also need a proper sanitation because when there are heavy rains the place is full of water.
5. We are the people of U.T Section Egadini we want to know that where do we go from here , Yes we do have light we want to know about the houses.

B. Gumata 072 6738486
M. Mpondo 082 5440 100
V. Ntontela 071 1136 764

W.A
WA informal settlement was established 1986 and the area is a home to 61 families, and does not have even a single toilet and we all depend at 1 water tap and the area is very dense
We therefore demand that if the city cant provide us with essential services because of the area in which we are situated at, then the city must provide us with alternative piece of land with all the basic services within Khayelitsha or nearby Khayelitsha
PHAMBILI NGABAHLALI BEMBACU, PHAMBILI. PHANTSI NGABANTU ABANGAFUNI KUSINIKA MHLABA, PHANTSI.
Ivy Mbotshelwa 083 8960 537
Luntu Mene 078064 7113

RR SECTION
ATTENTION
As RR we are saying people of this city must not only be recognized when it comes to the elections and neglected after them. Political parties must stop using the poor for their own benefits.
OUR DEMANDS:
1. Our houses are flooded because the area in which they are situated at is at flood prone area
2. We don’t have electricity
3. We are saying no to city’s chemical toilets, we demand proper toilet
4. We want to be relocated
Bobhala Thembelani
Secretary

AbM March on Mayor Dan Plato's office

View more presentations from antieviction.

Memorandum of Demands by the Siyanda Abahlali baseMjondolo Branch

Siyanda 9 November 2008, the day before the big march. For pictures of the march click here and here.

10 November 2008
Siyanda Abahlali Branch

Demands addressed to Mike Mabuyakulu, the MEC for Housing in KwaZulu-Natal, by the Siyanda Abahlali baseMjondolo Branch

1. We demand adequate land and decent housing in the city.

2. We demand one house per family and not one house per shack.

3. We demand that the city (eThekwini) comply with the laws of the country.

4. We demand an immediate and permanent end to forced evictions and demolitions.

5. We demand that there must be an independent commission of enquiry to investigate the rampant and blatantly corrupt sale of government houses by government officials. There must be action against all the corrupt government officials. This is not only a problem here in Siyanda. All Abahlali members are aware of the situation in the Joe Slovo settlement where one of the founders of that settlement, Busisiwe Gule, remains in a shack while with all the papers to her house while Nomaxabiso is still living in Mrs Gule’s house. All complaints about this corruption, right up to the national minister, have just been ignored.

6. We demand fair and transparent allocation of government houses.

7. We demand safe, quality houses built on proper foundations.

8. We demand that there must be inspectors to make sure that all houses are of a quality standard. A certificate must be issued for each house by an independent evaluator that guarantees its quality and safety.

9. We demand compensation to those who have been forcefully removed for the construction of the MR 577 freeway.

10. We reject the current situation where people are only given orders as if in a dictatorship and we demand proper consultation and full participation in the discussion and decision making with regard to all issues affecting the shack dwellers.

11. We demand the creation of job opportunities and that first preference for local jobs to be given to the poorest people in local communities.

12. We demand that the Slums Act be immediately scraped and its notorious transit camps be immediately shut down.

13. We demand that our shacks be upgraded where they already are through the use of Chapter 13 of the Housing Code and not demolished via the notorious Slums Act which is hated by the poor because it is an attack on the poor.

14. We demand that all people of 21 years and older be entitled to a house as they are all expected to vote.

15. We demand compensation as we were exploited to guide the development of the houses that were later corruptly sold to people who do not live in Siyanda.

16. We demand an end to abuse by government officials and we demand that government officials who abuse the people must be investigated and that appropriate action must be taken. For instance there is the case of Npuphuko who offered a family RDP house keys at midnight in exchange for their daughter. She is the daughter of all of us and therefore Npuphuko is the abuser of all of us.

17. We further demand that a meeting be scheduled with us within two weeks so that a way forward can be discussed on these demands.

Contact Mzo Dlamini the March Convener on 073 8701244 and Mxolisi Mtshali on 072 5550965, Mamu-Nxumalo 076 3339386 and Thembi Zungu on 074 3423607

Abahlali baseMjondolo March in Siyanda – Monday 10 November 2008

Abahlali baseMjondolo will march against evictions, corruption, dictatorship and abuse by the state in Siyanda (between Newlands East & KwaMashu) at 9:00 a.m. on Monday 10 November 2008.

The marchers will procede from the Siyanda settlement to the magistrates’ court where Mike Mabuyakulu has been asked to accept the memorandum.

An attempt by the police to unlawfully ban this march was overturned yesterday after intense counter pressure. Abahlali baseMjondolo was prepared to go the high court at 2:00 p.m. yesterday afternoon to interdict the police against the unlawful march ban if they did not back down.

This march will be supported by Abahlali baseMjondolo members from settlements across Durban and Pinetown.

For more information and comment contact Thembi on 0743423607 and on Mzo 0738701244.

http://www.abahlali.org/node/4154

Siyanda Residents March

Breaking News: Siyanda shack-dwellers, facing eviction from the MR577 Freeway site, are staging ongoing marches to halt building and allocations at the Kulula Housing Project. The contractors have just been stopped from proceeding with the patently unfair allocation of housing that has been undertaken without any form of meaningful consultation. There is a heavy police presence again today and the situation is tense. (There is an article in yesterday’s Isolezwe here.)

Forced Relocations in Siyanda to Make Way for New Freeway

Wednesday, September 17, 2008 13:01
Press Statement by the Siyanda Abahlali baseMjondolo Branch

DURBAN – Shack-dwellers in Siyanda, KwaMashu, have been threatened with forced relocation to make way for construction of the MR577 Freeway. The eThekwini Municipality has demolished at least 50 shacks in the area this year, without notice or a court order. These demolitions are illegal and criminal acts. Street marches by residents, peacefully protesting against relocation, have been met with violent police action and intimidation.

According the eThekwini Municipality, all those displaced by the new freeway would be moved to the adjacent Kulula Housing Project, concurrently under construction and facilitated by Linda Masinga & Associates (See: http://www.ethekwini.gov.za/durban/government/munadmin/media/press/506) (See also: http://www.ethekwini.gov.za/durban/government/munadmin/media/press/521).

Residents have since been informed that an unspecified number of families affected by the freeway construction will be relocated to eNtuzuma and placed in “transit camps” – government-built shacks or temporary structures, ordinarily used for emergency relief, which are increasing supplied by municipalities in lieu of formal housing.

As those in Siyanda undergo or await eviction – without knowing how, when and where they would be relocated – further controversy has erupted over the decision to move families from other parts of the Durban-metro, as far away as Umlazi and Lamontville, into the finished Kulula houses.

Siyanda shack-dwellers point out that those made homeless by the illegal Municipal demolitions earlier this year still have not been provided any alternative accommodation – in the Kulula houses, or elsewhere. Not only were these evictions carried out without notice or a court order, occupants were prevented from removing their personal belongings from the shacks before the demolitions began.

In marches and memorandums submitted to state and corporate partners in the Kulula Project, Siyanda shack-dwellers have stated that they do not want to move to eNtuzuma, away from jobs, schools and farther on the periphery of the city, where transport costs are much higher. They have moreover refused to accept any relocation to “transit camps,” which cannot be considered suitable alternative accommodation.

Metro police have responded violently to peaceful marches by Siyanda residents. On Monday, 15 September, approximately 60 residents gathered to protest further allocation and occupancy of finished Kulula houses by those who are not affected by the freeway construction. Amid heavy police presence, a metro police officer reportedly brandished a loaded weapon at the crowd, shouting that he would shoot them with live ammunition if they did not disband.

Following shack demolitions earlier in May this year, residents marched to the Kulula Project contractor’s office to submit a memorandum, where they were fired upon with rubber bullets by police and sprayed with water canons. Five people, including a pregnant woman were shot, injured and rushed to hospital. These five were arrested by police at hospital, upon charges of “public violence.” All charges were subsequently dropped.

In addition to concerns over relocation, the allocation of houses and police brutality, residents in Siyanda say that the Kulula houses are unsound, unsafe and have not built with substantive consultation from the community, despite claims to the contrary by the Municipality.

Siyanda launched a new Abahlali baseMjondolo branch on Sunday and residents are determined to oppose state intimidation and to demand genuinely democratic planning.

For up to the minute information and comment on the crisis in Siyanda contact:

Thembi 0743423607
Mzo 0738701244

Click here to see some pictures.

http://abahlali.org//////node/4266

Letter from COHRE on the Siyanda Crisis

The Honorable Cllr Obed Mlaba
Office of the Mayor of eThekwini

City Hall, West Street
Durban 4001
Republic of South Africa

Re: Forced relocation of shack-dwellers in Siyanda, KwaMashu

Dear Cllr Mlaba,

The Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions (COHRE) is an international human rights non-governmental organisation based in Geneva, Switzerland, with offices throughout the world. COHRE has consultative status with the United Nations and Observer Status with the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights. COHRE works to promote and protect the right to adequate housing for everyone, everywhere, including preventing or remedying forced evictions.

COHRE recently learnt of the threatened forced relocation of shack-dwellers in Siyanda in KwaMashu, to make way for the construction of a freeway in the area. According to a press statement by the newly-formed Siyanda branch of Abahlali baseMjondolo, at least 50 shacks have been demolished this year in the area by the eThekwini Municipality without notice, a court order or the provision of alternative accommodation. COHRE has learnt that eThekwini Municipality promised that all those displaced by the new MR577 freeway would be moved to newly-constructed houses in the Kulula Housing Project. Siyanda residents have now been informed that an unspecified number of families will be moved to eNtuzuma and placed in ‘transit camps,’ which consist of government-built shacks or temporary structures, ordinarily used for emergency housing. As eNtuzuma is further on the periphery of the city, transport costs will be much higher for families as they will be further from jobs and schools. At the same time, the Municipality has reportedly decided to move families from other areas like Umlazi and Lamontville, who are not affected by the freeway construction, into the newly constructed Kulula houses. This has understandably caused much confusion within the community, and the situation is extremely tense at present.

COHRE is disturbed with the trend in Siyanda, and in Durban in general, to use state repression against peaceful protestors legitimately airing their grievances against housing rights violations. In May this year, residents protesting shack demolitions in Siyanda marched to the Kulula project contractor’s office to submit a memorandum of grievances, where they were fired upon with rubber bullets and sprayed with water canons by Durban Metro Police. During this incident five people, including a pregnant woman, were shot and injured, and subsequently arrested at the hospital for ‘public violence.’ The charges were eventually dropped against all of the protestors.

On 15 September 2008, a peaceful protest held by affected Siyanda residents to air their grievances about the allocation process of alternative housing in Siyanda, was again met with a heavy Durban Metro police presence, with one police officer allegedly brandished a loaded weapon at the crowd, shouting that he would shoot them with live ammunition if they did not disband.

COHRE has maintained that the manner in which unlawful evictions of shack-dwellers has occurred in Durban is unacceptable, and people have been treated inhumanely and without dignity in the process. In terms of international human rights law, for evictions to be considered as lawful, they may only occur in very exceptional circumstances and all feasible alternatives must be explored. If and only if such exceptional circumstances exist and there are no feasible alternatives, can evictions be deemed justified. However, certain requirements must still be adhered to. These are:

1. States must ensure, prior to any planned forced evictions, and particularly those involving large groups, that all feasible alternatives are explored in consultation with affected persons, with a view to avoiding, or at least minimising, the need to use force.
2. Forced evictions should not result in rendering individuals homeless or vulnerable to the violation of other human rights. Governments must therefore, ensure that adequate alternative housing is available to affected persons.
3. In those rare cases where eviction is considered justified, it must be carried out in strict compliance with international human rights law and in accordance with general principles of reasonableness and proportionality. These include, inter alia:

§ Genuine consultation with those affected;

§ Adequate and reasonable notice for all affected persons prior to the scheduled date of eviction;

§ Information on the proposed evictions, and where applicable, on the alternative purpose for which the land or housing is to be used, to be made available in reasonable time to all those affected;

§ Especially where groups of people are involved, government officials or their representatives to be present during an eviction;

§ All persons carrying out the eviction to be properly identified;

§ Evictions not to take place in particularly bad weather or at night unless the affected persons consent otherwise;

§ Provision of legal remedies; and

§ Provision, where possible, of legal aid to persons who are in need of it to seek redress from the courts.

In the past the eThekwini Municipality has not complied with the above principles, particularly with regard to obtaining a court order and providing adequate notice for evictions. On 6 October 2008, COHRE released a report on the situation in Durban entitled Business as Usual? Housing rights and ‘slum eradication’ in Durban, South Africa. The report found that unlawful evictions are commonplace in eThekwini Municipality, and while the Municipality is to be commended on building a considerable number of houses each year, the houses that are being built are often located so far out of town that living there is unviable for many of the urban working classes due to unaffordable transport costs to work, schools, and hospitals. The report also expresses serious concern about the size and quality of the houses that are being built and over the failure to provide adequate levels of basic services to shack dwellers while they wait for formal housing.

While COHRE approves of the provision of adequate alternative accommodation in the event of an eviction, we condemn the existence of so-called ‘transit camps’, which are found to be highly inadequate and serve to destroy the already fragile socio-economic fabric of people’s lives. COHRE also condemns the current practice that effectively entails moving people from their own well-located shacks into government shacks on the urban periphery, without any certainty of the time period they will be there, or indeed what permanent housing options will made available to them in the future. If the Siyanda forced relocations are allowed to proceed it will only add to the excesses of the eThekwini Municipality documented in the recently released report, and roll back the significant recent progress made to improve relations between organised shack dwellers’ and the eThekwini Municipality.

COHRE therefore urges the Municipality to immediately halt all forced evictions of shack dwellers within its jurisdiction, and to cease the use of violence against those peacefully and legitimately protesting against their housing rights violations. COHRE appeals to the Municipality to ensure that all Siyanda residents affected by the new freeway are provided with housing, as promised, in the Kulula Housing Project, and to investigate the allocation of these houses to other residents from outside Siyanda.

We look forward to your response and to an ongoing dialogue with the Municipality on the rights of its people to adequate housing. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,

Salih Booker
Executive Director

cc.

The Honorable Lindiwe Sisulu
Minister of Housing

Dr Michael Sutcliffe
eThekwini City Manager

Memorandum to the Mayor of Cape Town

AEC Memoranda to Dyantyi, Thubelisha and Trafalgar

Update: Click here and here for newspaper reports on the march.

24 July 2008
Memoranda presented to MEC Richard Dyantyi, Thubelisha Homes, and Trafalgar Property Management

Below you will find the text from the memoranda presented to MEC Richard Dyantyi, Thubelisha Homes, and Trafalgar Property Management at today’s march. Unfortunately, no representative from Trafalgar Property Management bothered to attend to accept a memorandum. After prolonged negotiations, the SAPS superintendent accepted it on their behalf.

As Trafalgar was unwilling to send a representative to accept a memorandum, the N2 Gateway joint committee representing residents of the Joe Slovo Phase 1 flats, the Joe Slovo informal settlement and the Symphony Way settlement in Delft will be meeting to plan further action that will insure that Trafalgar addresses the needs of the poor.

—————————————————————————————————

24 July 2008

Memorandum to Thubelisha Homes:

You were given the responsibility for building housing as the principle agent and developer of the national N2 Gateway Housing Project. This was a special responsibility and you could not deliver.

First, your forcibly removed people to Temporary Relocation Areas with the false promise of housing. Then, you were responsible for the building of flats of substandard quality for poor people who need homes. Then, you carried out a mass eviction of people who were on the waiting list for housing for more than twenty years; six months later they are still on the pavement in the dead of winter opposite your empty houses. Now you want to evict more people from shacks to build more shoddy housing.

Is it any surprise that you ran out of money, not trying to deliver adequate, decent, affordable housing, but because of lawyer’s fees for eviction court cases? This is like a curse that you have put on yourself for not thinking of the poor.

This is not the first time that you have attempted to exploit the poor people of this country. For years, you have gone unchallenged and now you have met your match, it is too late for you.

And now:

– because you could not manage this N2 Gateway Housing Project;
– because you participate in the outsourcing and privatisation of housing delivery;
– because you operate like an apartheid agent;
– because you are cowards;
– because of your gross violation of human rights through mass evictions;
– because of your bureaucracy and corruption;
– because of your combination of extravagant spending with poor workmanship and lack of capacity;

You are now dead. We do not expect any letters or summons from ghosts. The truth will now arise. Fair well and good riddance.

REST IN PEACE

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24 July 2008

Memorandum to Trafalgar Property Management:

You are an international company that manages properties for rich people. Yet, for the past year, you have been attempting to manage the flats in Joe Slovo Phase 1, shelter for poor people that you treat as if they were homes in rich suburbs.

We do not know you. We never met you. We do not have any agreement with you. Yet, for the past three months, you have been sending the residents of Joe Slovo Phase 1 threatening lawyer’s letters because they refuse to pay your extravagant rent.

The agreement you have is with Thubelisha Homes, not with the residents of Joe Slovo Phase 1. We never signed any contract with you. We don’t need any more letters from you as they create heartache and pain for pensioners and single parents. Keep your papers and ink.

In future, avoid abusing poor people on behalf of the state. Do not participate in the privatization and outsourcing of housing management. We are sick and tired of government agents.

Now that you are buried, we can rest easy knowing that you can no loner exploit the poor people on the N2 Gateway Housing Project..

REST IN PEACE

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24 July 2008

M E M O R A N D U M

To Richard Dyantyi, MEC for Local Government and Housing:

You are responsible for seeing to the needs of over half a million pensioners, single parents, farm workers and other poor people who desperately need proper housing, especially now that it is winter. This is your job.

But your current annual budget allows for only 12,000 homes to be built, when in fact the need increases by 22,000 units each year. If you continue business as usual, the number of homeless in the Western Cape will increase, instead of decrease, by another half of million. When you think of your children, think of all our poor children living in shacks, in backyards, and homeless, especially now in the wintertime. Is this the future you wish for our country?

You need to declare the housing backlog a State of Emergency. Start by scrapping the laws that allow for the eviction of poor people until we all have homes, security, and comfort.

Your department must take direct responsibility for housing, housing delivery, and housing management. But you continue to outsource and privatise housing and housing delivery, as if it is a solution, rather than acknowledge that this is part of the problem. Evict Traflagar and Thubelisha Homes, not the poor people. To us, Trafalgar and Thubelisha Homes are now dead and buried.

You have been given one more chance to deliver on the needs of the poor. To educate and inform you about real public participation and the needs of our communities, see the ballot box that we have left you. Take this as your mandate for delivery. Also, take it as a reminder that we will not vote until we have land and housing. No land, no house, no vote.

Yours sincerely,

On Behalf of the poor communities of the Western Cape

–~–~———~–~—-~————~——-~–~—-~
For more, please visit the website of the Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign at:
www.antieviction.org.za
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AEC March on Richard Dyantyi, Thubelisha Homes, and Trafalgar Property Management – final reminder

Anti-Eviction Campaign Press Statement
Wednesday, 23 July, 2008

—
Event: March for community control over the housing process
Time: 10am
Date: Thursday July 24th, 2008
Location: Assemble in Keizergragt Street (march to Provincial Department of Local Government and Housing)
—

Cape Town — All three communities affected by the N2 Gateway fiasco – the pet national housing project of Lindiwe Sisulu – will be marching tomorrow morning to claim that they are not stupid, that they can think, that they must be at the centre and in control of any housing policy that effects them. Communities are tired of the government’s authoritarian way of governing. This is not a protest about lack of service delivery, but a protest about the undemocratic structure of government.

Communities are calling on government to end the privatisation of services to private companies like Thubelisha Homes and Trafalgar Properties. Communities are marching to Provincial Department of Local Government and Housing to claim service delivery as their own and to mandate government to carry out the wishes of the people in the manner the people decide.

1. Housing is not an excuse to evict shackdwellers.
2. Sustainability is not an excuse to raise rents on shoddily constructed flats.
3. Order is not an excuse to violently evict families who have nowhere else to go.

We are marching to claim our right to dignity! We are marching to claim our right to humanity! We will assert our right to express ourselves despite government’s attempts to silence us and prevent us from being heard!

Phansi Forced Removal! Phansi High Rent! Phansi Privatisation!

For more information:

Ashraf Cassiem 072 976 9446
Mncedisi Twalo 078 580 8648
Gary Hartzenberg 072 3925859

Memorandum of Demands to Mayor Obed Mlaba, 28 September 2007

A Memorandum of Demands to Mayor Obed Mlaba

Submitted by Abahlali baseMjondolo and Allied Organisations on Friday, 28 September 2007

We the shack dwellers of Durban & Pinetown and our comrades from around the province are democrats and loyal citizens of the Republic of South Africa. We stand here because we are being evicted from our homes and forced off the farms and out of the cities. We stand here because we are dying in shack fires because we do not have electricity. We stand here because we are being raped when we try to find a safe place to go to the toilet in the night. We stand here because we are denied the right to visit the graves of our ancestors. We stand here because in many settlements thousands of people share each tap and toilet. We stand here because children are being forced to stay in their parent's shacks long after they are grown and have their own children. We stand here because we fear that 2010 will be our doom. We stand here because your Municipality breaks the law every time it demolishes our shacks and evicts us without a court order. We stand here because it is clear to us that the rich do not want to give us any space in the cities, in the rural areas or any where in the country and that the politicians have decided to be the partners of the rich. We stand here because our councillors do not represent us and so we have to represent ourselves.

The same economy that made the rich to be rich has made the poor to be poor. The wealth in this country was built on the theft of our land and from our work in the farms, mines, factories, kitchens and laundries of the rich. We can not and will not continue to suffer the way that we do. We can not and will not allow our voices to be stifled. The time has come for the poor to be heard. The time for politicians to talk for and about the poor while they make deals with the rich is over. The time has come for politicians to talk to the poor and to talk to the poor openly and honestly and respectfully so that we can, together, ensure that there is a place for everyone in this city and in this country.

Mayor Mlaba, today we the shack dwellers of eThekwini make the following demands to you:

· We demand participation in genuinely democratic processes of consultation and citizenship.

· We demand an immediate moratorium on the evictions and demolitions that result in some people being left homeless and others being forcibly removed out of the city.

· We demand adequate land and housing in the city so that we can live in safety, health and dignity.

· We demand an immediate moratorium on the selling of government owned land to private developers

· We demand a commitment to the expropriation of privately owned land for collective, social housing

· We demand an immediate commitment to seriously explore the possibility of upgrading rather than relocating each settlement and to undertake this exploration in partnership with each settlement

· We demand an immediate moratorium on the eviction and harassment of street traders

· We demand that electricity be installed in all shack settlements.

· We demand an adequate supply of well maintained toilets in all settlements.

· We demand an end to the shortage of taps in our settlements.

· We demand refuse removal in all settlements.

· We demand well-resourced and staffed health facilities and support for our own initiatives to care for people living with HIV/AIDS.

· We demand support for our crèches and an end to the exclusion of our children from schools and universities.

· We are threatened by criminals and we are threatened by police officers who treat us as if we are criminals. We therefore demand policing that respects the poor.

· We demand an immediate recognition that all settlements will experience natural growth, especially as children grow up, and that this requires existing shacks to be expanded and new shacks to be built.

· We demand an immediate explanation as to what happened to the R10 billion Phoenix East housing development that you promised us after we marched on you on 14 November 2005.

· We demand an immediate explanation from you as to what happened to the piece of land adjacent to Loon Road promised to the Foreman Road settlement when you visited the settlement while campaigning for the 2000 local government elections.

· We demand an immediate explanation from you as to what happened to the piece of land across from the Kennedy Road settlement which was promised to Kennedy Road by Yakoob Baig while campaigning for the 2000 local government elections.

· We demand an immediate investigation into the rampant corruption in the drawing up of housing lists.

· We demand an immediate investigation into the activities of the notorious Pinetown gangster landlord Ricky Govender.

· We demand an immediate investigation into the activities of the notorious police officer Glen Nayager.

We also want to use this platform to, with our comrades who are here today from around the Province, make the following demands to the other Municipalities and to the Provincial Government:

· The Slum Elimination Act is immoral and illegal. Our settlements are communities to be developed not slums to be 'eliminated'. This Act must be scrapped immediately.

· There must be immediate action to prevent farm workers from being evicted, harassed and banned from visiting their ancestor's graves.

· There must be immediate action to prevent the enclosure of land for private game reserves.

· There must be immediate action to prevent the threatened evictions in eNkwalini

· There must be immediate action to prevent the eThekwini & Msunduzi Municipalities as well as private landowners from continuing to carry out illegal demolitions and evictions and forced relocations to rural ghettoes like Park Gate and France.

· Those of us living in municipal flats note that in addition to providing substandard housing, the councils charge rents way in excess of our ability to pay. We therefore demand the writing-off of all rental arrears.

· We opposed the hosting of the 2010 World Cup on the grounds that we couldn't afford to be building stadiums when millions have no houses. But now that it is coming there must be an immediate commitment to declare that the World Cup will be an '100% Evictions Free World Cup' all across the province. i.e. That there will not be any evictions of shack dwellers or streets traders.

Today people from around the city and the province are uniting in support of our struggle. Today we express our support for our comrades elsewhere. We stand with our comrades in Joe Slovo in Cape Town and we stand with our comrades in Protea South, Kliptown, Thembelihle, and Thembisa in Johannesburg. We also stand with our comrades in Harare, Istanbul and Port-au-Prince. We assert, in particular, our support for Shamita Naidoo, Louisa Motha and all of the people of Motala Heights who are facing violence, death threats and the constant threat of illegal evictions at the hands of Ricky Govender.

Today, we demand answers. We have approached the municipality on many occasions, and many promises have been made to us. Yet still we have no land. We still have no houses. We are still being pushed out of the cities. We still have no electricity and so we are still terrorized by shack fires. The municipality says it will house us. We demand to know when. We demand to know where. We demand to know how many houses. We demand to know who will be resettled. We demand to receive all of this information in clear language and on a regular basis and to be consulted about these decisions.

We are here to stay. We will not go away. We will not be silent.

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Click here for various entries on the march at which this memorandum was supposed to be presented to the Mayor and its violent police repression.