Living in the township of Sicelo Shiceka can be a pleasant experience — if you happen to live on the right side of Morris Street.
Named after the minister of co-operative governance and traditional affairs, Sicelo Shiceka, the township’s origins go back 10 years when Johannesburg squatters put down roots on an open plot of land a few kilometres outside Meyerton, the main town in Midvaal. Midvaal is the only Gauteng municipality the DA runs and even Sicelo Shiceka is divided into the haves and the have-nots.
The haves live in houses made of red bricks, sturdy structures that have withstood the test of heavy rains and floods that wreaked havoc in the area. They live close to the main road that takes you into Meyerton, where the shops, schools and clinics are. The taxi rank was recently paved and a new community hall was unveiled two weeks ago as part of the sports grounds, with tennis courts and a soccer pitch.
At the library residents can lounge on dark brown leather couches or access free internet services on the flat-screen computers, which each library in Midvaal has been given. The roads are neat and clean and even rubbish knows its place — a site a good kilometre away from the houses.
The other side of Morris Street is a different picture. Badly constructed shacks line up next to the street with no way of seeing where the one house ends and the next starts. Here unsupervised toddlers roam the streets barefoot carrying an empty beer bottle in each hand — probably collected from the local tavern’s rubbish bin up the road.
Today they carry bright yellow ANC pamphlets given to them by adults they say they don’t know. A pre-teen offers an explanation of what the pamphlets say: “They want us to go and see Zuma in iPitoli [Pretoria] but we don’t know when we should go.”
Puddles of water reveal the drainage problems in the area and tarred roads on empty land are all that came of a planned housing project.
At the side of the road a DA campaigner pulls up his 1980s’ model BMW and distributes pamphlets and T-shirts to encourage residents to vote for the DA in the local government elections. He tries to convince them that the ANC councillor, who claims the DA will take away pensions and social grants if it wins, is lying.
The dozen or so interested residents page through the booklet of the municipality’s achievements they have benefited from and see pictures of children swimming in the town’s pool and doing the diski dance during the World Cup. But if they want to enjoy those pleasures they will need to cross Morris Street.