The Mercury
By Faith ka-Manzi
The poorest of the poor will be left even further behind unless those responsible for helping them are held to account and public scrutiny.
CATO Manor is once again a murderous site of repression and forced removals, with Abahlali baseMjondolo member Nkululeko Gwala’s murder just the most recent incident.
Service protests in Cato Manor have become more violent as residents have become more desperate. They are trying to raise awareness of their plight, says the writer.
Who is to blame, and how can this spiral of violence be reversed?
Last Wednesday at the Cato Crest Community Centre at least 2 000 people gathered for a meeting addressed by leaders of the eThekwini Municipality and the ANC regional executive.
Those present included provincial Health MEC Sibongiseni Dhlomo, who is also the chairman of the ANC’s eThekwini region, mayor James Nxumalo, ANC regional leader Monica Jama and councillor Mzi Ngiba from ward 101.
The protests against councillors and lack of service in Cato Crest’s ward 101 shackland and the formal housing area in Cato Manor’s ward 30 have been under way for months. One other community leader from the shacks was killed in March after leading land invasions in vacant areas as a result of the housing shortage.
The protests, which regularly block traffic along Spine, Rick Turner and Bellair roads, reached a critical point last week when government property was destroyed, including the offices of Ngiba and ward 30’s Zanele Dzoyiya. Protesters say that neither of them serve their constituencies and that they are involved in corrupt allocation of council resources, including RDP houses.
I attended the meeting, as both a resident and as a University of KwaZulu-Natal researcher studying Cato Manor’s problems. One of my colleagues taped the public meeting and provided the recording to those who requested it. When journalist Nathi Oliphant wrote about Gwala’s murder in the Sunday Tribune yesterday, he reported that Dhlomo had accused his newspaper of “planting agents to record meetings on its behalf”.
Dhlomo should know that we are not Tribune agents. We are the kind of citizens who are not afraid to speak out when we see injustice, and provide information to the press and society.
In the US two of these whistleblowing citizens are Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden, who are being unfairly prosecuted for leaking information about the government of President Barack Obama. The world knows more about the US’s extreme violence in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen thanks to Manning, and about its frightening surveillance capacity thanks to Snowden.
Likewise in South Africa we have a Right2Know campaign concerned about official secrecy – such as the US-style General Intelligence Laws Amendment Bill – and it needs the support of every member of our society. Go to www.r2k.org.za.
For example, the police should be investigating Dhlomo and other speakers for incitement to murder. In addition to Gwala, who was shot 12 times a few hours later, three others were targeted at last Wednesday’s meeting, and are presumably in hiding.
Before the crowd was incited, other community residents spoke about problems in the area.
One said: “We are tired of hooligans breaking into bottle stores and destroying the robots.” He said that hooligans had attacked a Somaliowned tuck shop, but the Somalis had beaten the attackers off. The police had been useless, he said.
Another called for the army to be brought in to restore order.
The final resident to speak before the mayor and MEC said that the ANC was being disturbed by “new arrivals” ( which
izifikanamthwalo), is often used as a xenophobic pejorative.
To her credit, Jama, who was the MC, continually reminded those at the meeting that the ANC did not encourage violence.
Nxumalo’s main message was that ward 101 shack residents should have lower expectations. Because “land does not expand”, they would never be able to satisfy everyone. Even after buying nearby plots, there would not be enough housing for everyone, so some people would be moved to Cornubia.
Nxumalo also blamed residents who had tenants, as well as the Occupy Umlazi movement, which began at Zakheleni Squatter Camp next to the Mangosuthu University of Technology a year ago.
Members of the movement occupied an uncleared plot right next to their councillor’s offices.
In that instance, however, our contacts in Zakheleni insist that their protest led to the council supplying more water, sanitation and electricity.
It is well known that if community service protests create a nuisance in a creative way, sometimes not only do radio traffic reports pay attention to them, but President Jacob Zuma or other dignitaries also visit the scene.
In the case of Cato Manor and Cato Crest, the visits by provincial and municipal politicians did not lead to delivery or even a change in councillor. So the protesters kept increasing the pressure, to the point of last week’s explosions.
Dhlomo was the least forgiving of those expressing grievance. He bragged that ward 101 was the “Gedleyihlekisa Zone”, named after Zuma. Dhlomo told Nxumalo that his “home boy” Gwala should be relocated to Inchanga, where Nxumalo claimed he had a “proper house”, and that he should “scrub his heels because he is leaving today”.
“It’s either he goes or the community goes. He must go. He is not wanted here,” he said.
A few hours later, Gwala was assassinated.
In recent days, as Nelson Mandela continued to struggle for his life and as Zuma entertained Obama, a microcosm of the ANC’s degeneration played out here.
It is obvious who is responsible for the public threat to Gwala, whom I never met but understand was a strong-willed activist committed to his community.
But it is not obvious how this terrible conflict between politicians and their furious constituents will end. Making what we know about this conflict public is a small step towards raising the price of political violence.
Ka-Manzi is based at the UKZN Centre for Civil Society
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