When Thembekile Hlongo received her Ten
Years of Freedom t-shirt in 2004, she probably never believed her dreams of a
“better life for all” would fade as much as her t-shirt.
Now, eleven years later, the bitter irony
of her t-shirt was ignored as she joined other women and men of her community to
confront the shock of a second impending eviction in eight months.
Employees of one Kevin Naicker built the 25
two-roomed block houses in Mkhondeni in a settlement called Nkawana in February
this year. The majority of the households on Annidale farm, where they had come
from, had strongly resisted the move, even threatening one of Naicker’s
representatives. But when Naicker’s men persisted, the community gave in, and
insisted instead on being provided with a decent settlement. They were then assured
that Naicker had promised to build every family a four-roomed house and would
ensure the provision of clean water. The households wanted the relocation to
take place after the houses and facilities were complete, but when Naicker sent
trucks to move them in November last year, promising the completion of the
settlement after the relocation, they felt they had no choice but to go. Since
the move, no further construction has taken place.
Proper housing and other facilities were
not the only promises Naicker reneged on. The only source of water is the
trickle of a stream down a sharp rock-strewn path. Less than a kilometer
upstream is Mkondeni, one of Pietermaritzburg’s oldest, heavy industrial areas.
Thembisile Shabalala’s concern that the water is poisoned with industrial
pollutants is entirely valid. “One woman has already died here. How many more
of us will die?”
When Naicker bought Annidale farm and
illegally evicted the 55 families living there, demolishing their homes so that
he could park his transport business vehicles, he erased generations of
history. The families had been labour tenants, providing free labour to white
farmers in return for land to live on and farm. Like so many vestiges of labour
tenancy around the province, these families mark their place and their history
by indicating ancient graves. All that now remains is the graves.
Standing on the bulldozed site where her
home had once been, Khethiwe Mngwengwe, showed me the avocado pear and peach
trees she and her children used to harvest, and the plot where once her
vegetable gardens had been. When her life had been more certain and stable, livestock
farming had supplemented her food stocks and income. She never dreamt they would
be evicted. “The previous farm manager, Bev, had given us a piece of the farm.
The boundary ran from the firebreak [on the far left] right to the top of the
hill and all the way down to the valley over there [centre top]. We very happy
about this, and we were happy to move up the hill where the owner wanted us to
go. That’s why we never claimed the land. We knew it was ours.” However, years
later when the Msunduzi municipality failed to support the land donation by
providing services, the planned resettlement was abandoned and the farm was
sold to Naicker.
Another 15 of the 55 families were sent to
houses Naicker had built on traditional land under two amakhosi, amakhosi Mlaba
and Ndluli. It is alleged that Naicker paid an induna R20,000 per site, but the
families who moved there say they had no idea it was traditional land until
after they had been relocated. The remaining ten families were less fortunate.
When their houses on Annidale farm were demolished, they were left to fend for
themselves. “We have nowhere to live. We just live in the wilderness, sleeping
at the houses of relatives who will have us. It is very difficult for those of
us who have children,” said Petros Muswire
But, while households at Nkawana settlement
all have toilets, rickety though some of them are, the households at Nkanyezini
do not. “We are forced to use the veld. Can you imagine that?” asks Khethiwe. What
hurts more than the indignity of no toilet, though, is that she has been forced
to send her two teenage children to live with relatives, at a significant
financial cost. This is both so that they can go to school, and also because
the house is too small for privacy for a family of six. “My daughter cannot
bath without my boyfriend seeing her. One cannot live like that.” And yet,
Khethiwe knows all too well that her struggle to secure a safe place to live,
with access to water, clinics and schools, is far from over.
Khethiwe and Bongani Mthalane requested
AFRA’s help when, to their horror, they heard they were to be evicted a second
time.
Housing scene
It turns out that Naicker not only
illegally evicted labour tenants from the farm he bought, he resettled them on
land he does not own. This land belongs to Forsyte Porps 5 (Pty) Ltd, and last
week the owners served the occupiers of Nkawana with notice of motion
(eviction) papers.
Furthermore, the people Naicker relocated
to land that falls under the two amakhosi have heard that this too may have
been an illegal settlement. “There’s a case before the court now because the
inkosi does not want us on his land,” Khethiwe explains. “It seems the induna
was not supposed to allocate these sites because the people who used to live
here a long time ago, before it was made into a game reserve, are now all
returning. Some houses here are even built on their graves. The inkosi is very
angry about this, and the people all around here do not want us here.”
On Sunday, Siya Sithole from AFRA explained
that AFRA will not oppose the eviction from
because Naicker had no right to put them on this land in the first
place. “It is hard to have to say this but it is unlikely that any court will
rule against this eviction.” However, AFRA will bring a case of illegal
eviction against Naicker. And AFRA will also request the court to consider the
question of where the families must live if they are forced out of these homes
too.
Along with Siya and AFRA staff member,
Donna Hornby, Muden community activist, Jeffrey Ngobese, had come to
investigate. We listened as one person after another said they could see no
choice to their predicament other than to return to the land they had been
evicted illegally from in the first place. They want Naicker to take them back
and to rebuild the six-roomed houses he demolished.
In response, Jeff pointed out: “Here you
have no rights. Your rights are where you came from. But if you think Naicker
is going to help you, you will keep waiting for those rights. It is not for us
to beg him; this action you want requires pressure. And government did help us
after 1994 when it passed laws to protect our land rights, laws that Naicker
has now broken. If you want to wait for Naicker, you will be forced off this
land too – that is certain.” When Jeff warned them that the struggle for land
requires passion, a call rose up “we are angry!” Jeff told them that
Muden had struggled long and hard for land and had won back much of the land.
“I am here to say we, as Muden, will support you. We are with you.”
“Now it is time to take back our land. We
need to say clearly: ‘Do not play with our lives! Do not play with our
rights!’.”
12 July, 2015
Copy by Donna Hornby
Photos Yves Vanderhaeghen
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