Cape Town’s political leaders remained largely invisible this week during the city’s spreading protests over housing shortages which, particularly in Langa and Guguletu townships, set ”Cape-borners” against amaKwaduka (rural newcomers).
Monday saw crisis meetings at the metro council’s head offices, but an encounter with community leaders scheduled for Tuesday was postponed. A rival community meeting was held in Guguletu that night. The council’s housing committee called for calm after its regular Wednesday meeting.
With mayor Nomaindia Mfeketo apparently ill, city manager Wallace Mgoqi took the lead, addressing the tense Guguletu meeting.
City officials want to redress housing grievances — there is a 260 000-house backlog — by means of relocations. About 2 000 families living in shacks next to the N7 Vanguard Drive in Langa, next to the Joe Slovo informal settlement where the first houses of the N2 Gateway Project are appearing, will soon be moved to a ”transit site” near Delft, 25km away.
Another 2 500 families from other shack settlements in Cape Town will also be temporarily resettled there.
In Langa, discontent has simmered for months over the perceived unfair housing allocation for the N2 Gateway Project. A new housing list was drafted on the basis of who lost their shacks in January’s fires which left 12 000 shack-dwellers homeless. Most are said to be amaKwaduka from the Eastern Cape. Every year an estimated 48 000 migrants arrive in search of work, better schooling and health services.
Complaints about councillors’ broken promises and general absence have emerged in all the protests since last Friday. Tyres have been burnt and barricades erected in a range of suburbs in Langa, Guguletu and Khayelitsha, where residents emptied sewerage buckets on to the roads to Happy Valley in Cape Town’s northern suburbs.
”There is often no contact between councillors and communities. Councillors are not informed about people’s needs … They sit somewhere nice and air-conditioned,” says Siyabonga Memela, manager of the Institute for Democracy in South Africa’s Local Government Centre.
Given legitimate concerns about the slow pace of service delivery, Memela said, people now ”want to find the public space to vent their feelings”. More protests are likely with municipal elections looming.
More than 30 people have been arrested in Cape Town since last weekend. The message is that illegal actions will not be tolerated.
But the council admitted it had fallen short in communicating its plans. ”People claim they are toyi-toying because there’s no delivery. We are saying there is a plan … There is an information gap between us,” said its spokesperson, Mandla Tyala.
Initial steps to inform the public are aimed at 200 councillors and ward committee members. In a second phase, community groups will be involved. A briefing for councillors, ward committees and sub-councils is also scheduled.
Mr Delivery, where are you?
Local protests against lack of basic service delivery and housing, which first erupted in Harrismith in the Free State last September, are becoming a national trend. Since the start of the year, delivery-related unrest has spread to six other provinces.
January
- Bayview residents in Chatsworth, Durban, protest against the disconnection of water meters.
February
- In Phomolong, near Hennenman in the Free State, residents protest against lack of service delivery. Roads are blocked with burning tyres. Councillor Banks Tshabangu is accused of corruption.
- In Mmamahabane, near Ventersburg in the Free State, residents attempt to block the N1 in protest against poor infrastructure, lack of housing and sports facilities.
March
- About 5 000 residents of Embalenhle township, near Secunda in Mpumalanga, take to the streets. Mayor Mdibanifi Tsheke says the grievances were addressed.
April
- Phomolong erupts again over the bucket sewage system, lack of housing and slow municipal service delivery. Burning tyres block roads and a library is set alight.
- About 500 residents of Kliptown, Soweto, march to the police station to protest lack of housing delivery.
- In Cato Crest, Durban, police fire tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters demanding houses.
May
- Residents of Nelson Mandela Metropole, Port Elizabeth, block streets with burning tyres to protest against lack of housing. Protests engulf Soweto-on-Sea, Red Location, KwaNoxolo, Zwinde and Govan Mbeki informal settlement. Protests hit Ramaphosa village near Motherwell and KwaZakhele. Eastern Cape Premier Nosimo Balindlela and Minister of Housing Lindiwe Sisulu promise action.
- Residents of Embalenhle again hit the streets in protest against poor service delivery and alleged nepotism in the Govan Mbeki council.
- Residents of Steynville block the N12 highway in the Northern Cape in protest against poor service delivery and council maladministration.
- Tensions again flare in Secunda over council’s failure to address grievances. — Marianne Merten