Category Archives: samora machel

Newspaper articles on the 1 October protest in Cape Town

Click here to see some pictures from this protest.

http://www.iol.co.za/capetimes/klapmuts-protesters-block-road-1.1394377#.UGr94ZhFyFd

Klapmuts protesters block road

Jason Felix

Klapmuts residents vented their frustration against poor services and houses in a protest that started at 5am, barricading roads.

They marched on the Klapmuts Main Road, burned tyres tree stumps and road signs, chanted and sang Struggle songs. They protested about a poor sanitation, roads and formal housing.

Protesters blocked the road with dirt, rocks and broken concrete water pipes. Some 50 residents protested on Main Road, while a group of about 400 sat on a field next to it.

Negotiations between police and community leaders failed after local ward councillor Sophia Louw did not arrive to address the protesting residents.

Police warned protesters to disperse but they ignored the this.

After an hour, at 6am, police fired rubber bullets and tear gas at the crowd. Protesters ran between shacks and houses.

Motorists passing the area were turned away by protesters who threatened to stone cars if they passed.

The situation calmed down, but at 1pm two police Nyalas drove into the area and all the residents re-grouped and took to the streets again.

Police again fired rubber bullets and tear gas at the crowd. Residents jumped over a wall of a sports field to get away from them.

Community leader Malibongwe Gebha said some residents had been on a housing waiting list for 20 years, and were promised formal housing in August last year.

“The municipality told us that houses will be built once the land was bought from its owner. The land was bought this year and we thought we are going to move in, only to be told that residents from [nearby] Koelenhof will have to move in [instead],” Malibongwe said.

“We want our houses and we will not stop at anything. Until our demands have been met we will protest,” he said.

Anneline Damonse, 44, who is unemployed, said the municipality had promised her a house since she had moved to the area in 1989.

“Since I started living in a shack, we were promised houses. We looked forward to having decent toilets, a nice home and running water. This was all just empty promises made,” she said.

Meanwhile, in the city centre, more than 400 residents of Samora Machel and Sweet Homes Farm in Philippi marched from Keizergracht Road to the offices of the MEC for Human Settlements, Bonginkosi Madikizela, to hand over a memorandum of demands yesterday.

Madikizela’s spokesperson, Bruce Oom, said the memorandum was received by the department and would be checked.

Shack dwellers’ movement Abahlali baseMjondolo organised the march and mobilised residents from the areas “because the government has sidelined the poor”, said its provincial chairperson Mthobela Qona.

“We will fight for poor people living in unacceptable conditions. Residents of the area live without toilets and they have been promised formal houses for years now.”

In August nearly 500 residents from the settlements closed several roads, demanding sanitation, housing and electricity.

The city is unable to provide services because the land is privately owned.

Sweet Home Farm community leader Siyambuleka James said they would protest until their demands were met.

http://ewn.co.za/2012/10/01/Housing-MEC-receives-memorandum

Housing MEC receives memorandum

Rahima Essop

CAPE TOWN – Western Cape Human Settlements MEC Bonginkosi Madikizela on Monday received a memorandum of demands from protesting shack dwellers.

Dozens of residents from three informal settlements marched on the provincial legislature earlier in the day.

Sweet Home Farm community leader, Siyamboleka James, said residents want basic services and homes.

“They need to engage the community and communicate openly.”

The MEC’s spokesperson Bruce Oom said, “The issues are related to housing. We will definitely look at them. However, the reality is that the Western Cape can only deliver about 12,000 houses per year.”

The province has a housing backlog dating back to 24 years.

The province has recorded the highest number of service delivery protests in 2012.

Open Letter to Mayor Patricia de Lille regarding her failure to receive our memoranda and treat us with dignity

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Open Letter to Mayor Patricia de Lille regarding her failure to receive our memoranda and treat us with dignity

Dear Mayor Patricia de Lille,

Re: failure to receive our memoranda and treat us with dignity

As shackdwellers from Sweet Home, Samora Machel and Langa TRA, we would like to express our shock and extreme displeasure at the way you have treated us by refusing to accept our memoranda during our march on the 1st of October 2012.

Almost 500 of us decided to march on the Mayor, the Premier and the offices of the Housing Development Agency to show how we are being ignored by the government when they fail to engage with our legitimate grievances. Despite this, you as the Mayor continues to ignore us, disrespect us, and undermine us.

When we organised the march, city officials called on us to meet with them at the Civic Centre as required by legistlation. These officials agreed to help facilitate our march from Salt River Train Station to the Civic Centre, the Provincial Parliament and HDA. However, at the last minute, without even consulting with us, our march was re-routed forcing us to begin at Keisergraght and to not go to the Civic Centre. We assume this was a political move by the City to prevent us from coming to your office.

Officials did assure us, however, that the City would still meet us at the provincial parliament to receive our memorandum.

This unilateral re-routing of the march is a violation of the 1993 Gatherings Act and shows how our Constitutional right to march and gather when we want and where we want is being assaulted from – Marikana to Durban to Cape Town. We feel shamelessly undermined by the City of Cape Town which had no good reason to prevent our march from Salt River Station.

Expectations not fulfilled

The purpose of our march as poor shackdwellers not aligned to any political party was to meet the Premier and the Mayor who are responsible for ensuring that government talks to us and works with us. Yet, neither the Premier nor yourself in the capacity as the Executive Mayor of our City feel that we are important enough to accept our memoranda in person.

Furthermore, Mayor Patricia de Lille, you have shown us the most disrespect because you did not even bother to send over a representative from your office to accept the memoranda in your place. We have proof that you have been informed that we requested you to receive our memoranda on the 1st of October and you have even replied acknowledging receipt of our request (see the attached email correspondence).

Instead you kept us waiting outside the Provincial Housing Department and we eventually, reluctantly, agreed to request that MEC Madikizela forward our memoranda to your office.

This type of behaviour is shocking to us! Do you think so little of us poor shackdwellers that you don’t even recognise us as human beings?

We don’t know if you and your fellow government officials will even respond to us or address our demands which we have attached for you. You will probably just throw it in the dustbin with the memoranda from all the other protesting communities in the City of Cape Town. You’re officials will probably continue to ignore our emails and phone calls when you fail to provide us with the services promised to us.

Just in case you do bother to read it, we have attached our memoranda. If you fail to respond and to meet with us within 14 days, we will be returning to your office.

Signed,
Lulama Magadla (084 433 8461, elulama6@gmail.com)

On behalf of:
Sweet Home shack settlement
Samora Machel informal settlements forum
Abahlali baseMjondolo baseLanga TRA

1st October: Shackdweller communities to march on the Housing Development Agency and Housing MEC Madikizela

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Shackdweller communities to march on the Housing Development Agency and Housing MEC Madikizela

Event: Shackdwellers to march in CBD
Date: 1st October
Time: 10am
Location: Keizergraght to the Provincial Legislature to HDA offices on Bree St

Tomorrow, a collection of shackdweller communities from Sweet Home informal settlement, from Samora Machel in Philippi, from Langa Temporary Relocation Area and from Abahlali baseMjondolo in Site B in Khayelitsha, will be assembling in Keizergraght where we will be marching to express our frustration at the ‘lip service delivery’ of government in our communities.

Not only does the government fail to provide us with services, but they also fail to meaningfully consult with us about how these services should be delivered to us. They do not treat us as human beings. They do not treat us with dignity.

We are tired of empty promises from politicians who we vote for as our leaders but who become unscrupulous leaders. We are fed up with the horrible conditions in which we live. As the poor, our human rights and democracy are still invisible to us. We feel that our rights to basic services, water, roads and sanitation are being undermined and we are being treated in such manner in which we don’t belong in the province and in this country.

We therefore march on our government and their representatives.

We are marching on the Mayor for her mistreatment of us. For instance in Sweet Home, her office makes promises and then does not keep them. Then when we protest, she says we are being manipulated by ‘third forces’.

We are marching on the provincial executive as they have promised us housing but don’t deliver. And when they do deliver, only the corrupt benefit.
We are marching on the Housing Development Agency which has been given the responsibility by the Human Settlements Department to provide us with dignified housing, not the government built shacks we have been ‘temporarily’ dumped in for eight years.

Attached are some of the memoranda our communities will be presenting to the above organs of government. We wish to be clear that we are marching as poor communities and we are not associated with any political party or NGOs. We represent ourselves.

For more information, please contact:

Siya @ 0730151454
Lulama @ 0844338461
Cindy @ 0760866690

Sowetan: Raging blaze leaves 30 CT families homeless

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http://www.sowetanlive.co.za/news/2010/12/22/raging-blaze-leaves-30-ct-families-homeless

Raging blaze leaves 30 CT families homeless

2010-12-22 07:24:05.0 | Unathi Obose

A 35-YEAR-OLD man burnt to death during a fire that destroyed 10 shacks in Cape Town’s Samora Machel informal settlement late on Monday.

The fire is thought to have started at a local meat stall and allegedly left 30 families homeless.

Resident Busiswa Joni, 19, said the fire started at a local meat stall and quickly spread to the shack behind it.

“We tried to extinguish the blaze using water and sand but could not because of the strong wind,” Joni said.

“We don’t know how this fire started. The stall was not operating at the time since the owner went to Eastern Cape two months ago.”

People at the scene lambasted the provincial government for the housing backlog in the area.

They said if the government had provided them with decent houses the fire would not have affected them.

Lizo Phacwane, 40, said he lost everything in the blaze.

“I was asleep and heard people shouting ‘fire, fire’. I grabbed a bucket, ran to the tap and fetched water to help my neighbours extinguish the fire,” he said.

The fire spread quickly and burnt down Phacwane’s shack. He said he did not even have time to go into the shack to fetch his identity document and driver’s licence.

A distraught Phacwane said he sent his wife and three children to Eastern Cape on Sunday and did not know what he would tell them.

Security officer Chumani Liwa’s shack was partially damaged by the raging blaze. He thanked his neighbours for saving his shack and belongings.

“I was at work when the fire started, but my neighbours broke the window and saved my fridge, bed and blankets. I lost only my TV and clothes,” he said.

Liwa lambasted ANC councillor Monwabisi Mbaliswana. He accused him of making false promises.

“Mbaliswana promised us houses a long time ago but each year they put stickers on our doors saying they are still counting us,” said Liwa, showing Sowetan three stickers pasted on his door.

Mbaliswana defended himself. He said he was in talks with Western Cape MEC for human settlements Bonginkosi Madikizela to relocate the community.

“We are waiting for Madikizela to allocate us land. We cannot build houses in this area,” he said.

As usual after a shack fire each family will receive three packets of nails, 10 poles and five sheets of corrugated iron from the city’s department of informal settlements. Residents claim the material is not enough to rebuild a shack.

Cape Times: Protesting youths rock township

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Philippi is not an AbM area. But the usual point still stands. Destroying traffic lights, blocking roads and burning tyres is damage to property and it is disruption but it is not violence. On the other hand the police action of firing rubber bullets is violence.

http://www.capetimes.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=5697315

Protesting youths rock township

October 22, 2010 Edition 2

VIOLENCE has erupted in Samora Machel, Philippi, with a crowd of youths destroying traffic lights and barricading streets with burning tyres.

Police Nyalas were deployed and rubber bullets fired into a group that refused to disperse and repeatedly lit fires on street corners last night.

The police blocked off roads into Samora Machel and diverted traffic to Mitchells Plain, while residents warned motorists to avoid flashpoints.

The protest was the latest called by Abahlali baseMjondolo in the past two weeks.

In Browns Farm, mobile toilets were dragged into the street and set alight.

In Khayelitsha, Mew Way was blocked off because of an earlier protest.

No injuries or arrests were reported. – Staff Writer