How a poor people’s movement was crushed

“THE ANC has invaded Kennedy Road. We have been arrested, beaten, killed, jailed and made homeless by their armed wing.”



These are the distressing words of Sbu Zikode, now in hiding. He is president of the squatter movement Abahlali baseMjondolo (AbM).
The AbM was formed in 2005 in Durban’s Kennedy Road squatter camp. The people were tired of the empty promises from politicians. They started to demand and to organise – and now they are being punished.
Last month the youth wing of the AbM was holding a meeting when about 40 armed men attacked them, reportedly shouting “amaMpondo are taking over Kennedy. Kennedy is for the amaZulu”.
The attack on the poor has now become a tribal one as we wait for the whirlwind brought about by our “democracy”. The poor will increasingly be set against each other in the drive for political office and wealth.
The Kennedy attack left at least four people dead and thousands were forced to flee the settlement. The local ANC then apparently installed itself as the “sole authentic authority” in Kennedy.
The provincial government and the police appear to be in cahoots with this violent ANC militia. How else do we explain that those arrested were AbM members, the very people who have been attacked, their houses and businesses burnt down?
It is reported that when the police arrived on the scene the marauding mobs continued their mayhem – without any police intervention.
Clearly, the AbM has become a nuisance. It questions, it exposes and it’s cheeky. In the last elections they even had the gall to say: “No land, no houses, no water – no vote!”
The politicians are not going to rest until they have destroyed the voices of the poor who speak up and speak back.
Real democracy is under attack and we seem to be sleeping through it all. We can already see the heavy- handed responses of the police against service delivery protests.
It’s as if our beloved Msholozi is giving his children rubber bullets instead of the promised land of milk and honey.
The attack on the AbM moved Bishop Rubin Phillip, a friend of the late Steve Biko and now the Anglican Bishop of KwaZulu-Natal, to say: ‘I was torn with anguish when I first heard of the unspeakable brutality that has raged down on to the Kennedy Road shack settlement.
“In recent years I have spent many hours in the Kennedy Road settlement. I’ve attended meetings, memorials, mass ecumenical prayers and marches.
“I have had the honour of meeting some truly remarkable people in the settlement and the work of Abahlali baseMjondolo has always nurtured my faith in the power and dignity of ordinary people. I have seen the best of our democracy here. I have tasted the joy of real social hope here.”
It is this democracy of the ordinary people that is being murdered by local politicians, with the active support of the ANC and government.
The excuses by the local police used to justify the ANC takeover are laughable. They say the violence was caused by the AbM through the community safety initiatives they undertook, including the curfew on shebeens to stop trading after 10pm.
The truth is the police were first informed about these initiatives to curb violence exacerbated by alcohol abuse.
The truth is the poor have to take up their own initiatives after being abandoned by their government.
http://www.sowetan.co.za/Columnists/AndileMnxitama/Article.aspx?id=1074845

Is this democracy! I am totally outraged! And by the way, what millitant wing are they referring to?
Is there some military groups that does not belong to the country's military? For what war are they preparing?

Kennedy Road's 13 murder accused still wait for bail

November 05, 2009 Edition 2

Irene Kuppan

Thirteen people accused of the murders of two residents of the Kennedy Road Informal Settlement will spend at least two more weeks behind bars as they wait for the outcome of their bail application.

Although it seemed as if Magistrate B Mbulawa would give a judgment on the bail application yesterday, she eventually adjourned the case to November 18 without reaching a decision.

Mbulawa said after reflecting on all the evidence before her, she felt she needed to know which charges each of the 13 accused faced before reaching her decision. She said it would be unfair to deal with the case as if all 13 were facing the same charges.

For this to be clarified, an identity parade would have to be held for witnesses to point out which accused were allegedly involved in which offence, said investigating officer Inspector Krishna Naidoo.

The case was then adjourned, giving Naidoo two weeks to conduct the identity parade.

The 13 suspects, who appeared in the Durban Magistrate's Court yesterday, are said to be part of a gang that allegedly attacked residents at the informal settlement in September, killing two and injuring others.

The charges they face include two counts of murder, two counts of attempted murder, two counts of robbery with aggravating circumstances and two counts of assault with the intent to do grievous bodily harm, public violence and malicious damage to property.

Earlier in the bail application, Naidoo told the court some of the accused were part of a safety forum at the settlement and, while the committee operated, it imposed harsh regulations on the community.

Naidoo said according to residents, unhappiness about these rules and regulations had led to the violence in the area.

Under cross examination by defence advocate Terence Seery yesterday, Naidoo conceded that it was unlikely that 10 people (in the forum) would take on a community of 7 000 people.

The policeman said he was unaware that seven of the 10 members of the forum were Xhosa.

Seery said his instructions were that on the night of the attacks, a group of people was moving through the community shouting anti-Xhosa slogans in Zulu and it was this group that was the aggressor on that night.

Responding to Seery's questions about a possible motive for the attacks, Naidoo said witnesses claimed that when they were being attacked they were asked why they were revolting against the forum.

The advocate questioned whether the friction between the Xhosa and Zulu communities, which the policemen referred to earlier, could have been a motive for the alleged attacks.
http://www.abahlali.org/node/5979

South Africa:Amnesty Backs Calls for Kennedy Road Violence Probe
Franny Rabkin
21 December 2009

Johannesburg — HUMAN rights organisation Amnesty International has thrown its weight behind the call for an independent commission of inquiry into September's violence in KwaZulu-Natal's Kennedy Road informal settlement.

On September 25, about 40 men carrying assegais, knobkerries, spears and guns attacked the settlement during a youth camp held by the Abahlali baseMjondolo movement, a shack- dwellers' organisation. Two people were killed in the attack.

The organisation said yesterday it "deplores the continuing failure of the South African authorities" to investigate the human rights abuses at Kennedy Road "impartially and fully". Abahlali has accused local African National Congress (ANC) structures and the police of being complicit in the attacks and then going on to arrest Abahlali leaders for the violence, instead of the real perpetrators.

Thirteen people were arrested following the attacks. Some have been released on bail but five will spend Christmas in prison after the prosecutor and investigating officer did not appear in court at the latest bail hearing.

But Bhekisisa Mncube, spokesman for transport, community safety and liaison MEC Willies Mchunu, said on Friday the allegation of ANC involvement was "total rubbish". He questioned why Amnesty International had not called for a commission of inquiry into more than 30 deaths in recent taxi violence in Nongoma and Umlazi in KwaZulu-Natal.


CD Lier/Abahlali baseMjondolo
Mncube said the police "have done all they could in the complaints at Kennedy Road". He said there had been a full probe by an independent police task team and that people had been arrested.

Mncube said those arrested were "in court and would be found guilty or not guilty" and he asked whether Amnesty was questioning SA's judicial system.

Abahlali said it was targeted by the ANC because it had exposed corruption at local government level, especially in the allocation of government housing.

This was once again dismissed by Mncube, who said there was no evidence of corruption, despite the best efforts of the media to find it.

Abahlali, other civil society organisations and now Amnesty want an independent inquiry -- chaired by former chief justice Pius Langa.

Amnesty said that according to its own inquiries, there had been a "significant" delay in the police's response when Abahlali members called for help on September 25 and that the armed men had been looking for specific individuals, who were all Abahlali members.

Amnesty was also concerned about the lack of arrests connected with the mob that it said burnt down the homes of the arrested Abahlali supporters on September 27.

But Mncube said the government had gone to the Kennedy Road settlement in search of the gutted shacks. "We couldn't find them. We've asked these people, please bring evidence to us. We'll take it to the law enforcement agencies. No one has come forward," he said.

http://allafrica.com/stories/200912210100.html