Solidarity: Another Devastating Shack Fire in the Kennedy Road Settlement

11 08 2010

Click here to read ‘A Big Devil in the Jondolos: A report on Shack Fires’ by Matt Birkinshaw (2008).

Press Release: 10 August 2010.
Another Devastating Shack Fire in the Kennedy Road Settlement

If electricity, water and adequate housing were provided in the Kennedy Road shack settlement these recurring shack fires could have been prevented.

The Kennedy Road shack settlement burnt once again at about 10 pm on Sunday, 08 August 2010 – two hours before women’s day. As of today thousands of residents in Kennedy are homeless in this cold winter weather. If the municipality had given them houses or provided them with basic services, such as electricity, refuse collection, road access and water they would have been safe from fire. Fire is a serious threat to our lives. It is an undeniable fact that electricity is not needed by us but that our lives’ need electricity. In settlements that have electricity it is so unlikely to have fires of this nature as it is happening again and again in Kennedy.

Read the rest of this entry »


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , ,
Categories : Anti-Eviction Campaign, News & Press Release, Poor People's Alliance, Solidarity

IPS News: “Now We Demand They Do It For the Poor”

11 08 2010

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=52446

‘Now We Demand They Do It For the Poor’
By Davison Mudzingwa

CAPE TOWN, Aug 10, 2010 (IPS) – Weak floodlights barely held back gathering darkness as Somalia met Serbia in the finals of the Poor People’s World Cup. A small band of supporters were on hand to see and African side lift the cup in Cape Town’s Vygieskraal Stadium.

The Poor People’s World Cup drew 38 teams, predominantly from poor black and coloured communities far from the city’s glittering Green Point Stadium.

Two Worlds, Two Cups

Planners initially proposed Athlone, on the Cape Flats, as the site for Cape Town’s official World Cup venue, reasoning that the investment in infrastructure could breathe fresh life into this working class neighbourhood. The rows of council housing were too prosaic a backdrop for FIFA’s vision, and a picture-perfect location between mountain and sea was chosen instead.

It was left to the Poor People’s World Cup to host a tournament there, on the patchy grass of Avondale Athletics’ home ground. The teams, each adopting the name of a different country, played for a trophy and 5,000 rand (a bit less than $700) in prize money.

The tournament was originally planned to run concurrently with FIFA’s, to highlight the contrast between the daily lives of the majority of South Africans and the opulence of the World Cup proper. It began in June, but, fittingly, a struggle to find sponsors meant the finals were delayed by a full month, to Aug. 9.

Read the rest of this entry »


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , ,
Categories : Anti-Eviction Campaign, Archives, Athlone, Delft - evictions + resistance, Mainstream and Other News, Photo

Press: Coverage of the Poor People’s World Cup

11 08 2010

Over the past several months, the Poor People’s World Cup received significant press attention. Here is a review of some of that international press coverage:

The Guardian (UK)

Huffington Post (USA)

Blacklooks (Blog)

People’s World / Mundo Popular (USA)

Anarkismo (English) / (Italian)

CNN (USA)

The Zimbabwean (UK)

Kick It Out (UK)

Free Speech Radio Network (USA)

Press Tv

And nationally:

The Sowetan

Poor’s ‘World Cup’ keeps drugs at bay
21 June 2010
Francis Hweshe

ANOTHER world tournament kicked off in Western Cape last week.

Organised by the Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign, the 36-team
tournament was launched to run parallel with the Fifa World Cup and as
a platform to highlight the plight of the province’s poor.

Read the rest of this entry »


Comments : Leave a Comment »

Categories : Archives

Press Release: Final Day of the Poor People’s World Cup Today

8 08 2010

The remaining sixteen soccer teams will compete in final rounds of the Poor People’s World Cup at the Avondale soccer fields, next to the Athlone Stadium in Cape Town at 10am on Sunday, August 8th, 2010. It will feature teams from Tagelsig, Gugulethu, Delft, Athlone, Khayelitsha, Westlake, Crossroads, Hanover Park, and other communities each representing a different country. The all-day tournament will feature a knock-out series of games during which the sixteen teams will go head to head.


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , ,
Categories : Anti-Eviction Campaign, Delft - evictions + resistance, News & Press Release, Poor People's Alliance, Solidarity

Solidarity: Rural Network response to another killing by Farm Watch

26 07 2010

Another life has been claimed by the farm watch in eMasangweni at the farm owned by Mr. Channel of eNkwalini(Eshowe)

On the 23 July 2010 Mr. Patrick Mpanza was shot dead by the farm watch that is responsible for the farm of Mr. Channel. This incident happened while he was walking with his four kids, whom are all girls. According to the child that is the eye witness the farm watch told them to lie down on the ground, two of the four kids ran away while the other one was left with the father on the ground; however the father refused to lie down. By so doing the farm watch then shot him on the forehead.

The child that was left with the father asked the father if he was hurt, and the father replied by saying yes I am hurt. The child asked where you are hurt. That was the last words from the father, he couldn’t even reply to the child’s question. Later the child realized that the father had passed away.

Read the rest of this entry »


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , ,
Categories : Archives

Solidarity: Serving our Life Sentence in the Shacks

26 07 2010

Friday, 16 July 2010
Serving our Life Sentence in the Shacks

People all over South Africa have been asking the leaders of Abahlali baseMjondolo as to why the government continues to ignore the demands of the shack dwellers. They have been asking why after all the marches, statements, reports and meetings the Kennedy Road settlement continues to get burnt down through the endless shack fires. They have been referring in particular to the recent Kennedy Road shack fire on Sunday, 4 July 2010 that took four lives, leaving more than three thousand people displaced and homeless.

Without much more words to explain this continuous tragedy we have replied that in fact the shack dwellers of South Africa are serving a life sentence. Everybody knows that we are the people who do not count in this society. But the truth that must be faced up to is that we have been sentenced to permanent exclusion from this society.

Read the rest of this entry »


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , , ,
Categories : Archives

Solidarity: The Kennedy 12 Case Postponed – the Jailed Comrades to be Released

14 07 2010

Monday, 12 July 2010
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement

The Kennedy 12 Case Postponed Until 29 November – the Five Jailed Comrades to be Released Tomorrow

The political interference around this case continued in the lead up to the start of the trial today. The prisoners were not brought to court and the state witnesses were not summoned to appear in court making it impossible for the trial to begin.

Neither the Investigating Officer nor the prosecutor could explain why the prisoners were not brought to the court or why the state witnesses had not been summoned to appear in court.

Read the rest of this entry »


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , , ,
Categories : Archives, News & Press Release, Poor People's Alliance, Solidarity

AEC’s Ashraf Cassiem on the World Cup

14 07 2010


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , ,
Categories : Anti-Eviction Campaign, From NGOs, Video

Mitchells Plain Traders Respond After March

8 07 2010

Following a march that was held by the Mitchells Plain Traders on 03 June 2010 the City of Cape Town has responded through to both CHATA and the 5th Avenue Traders Associations. The city has noted that the issues pertaining to CHATA and the 5th Avenue Traders are distinctly different from one another. Mayoral Committee member Felicity Purchase has states that the process is not finalized and the allocation of bays will be revisited.

CHATA and other trades belonging to the other 6 different trader associations are not happy with the relocation. Although, it has been reported by the city that traders are extremely happy. This is an issue that CHATA will challenge with the city; traders are not happy. CHATA is requesting a meeting with all of the traders in the Town Centre, the Ward Councillor, the Sub-Council, the Mayor and Felicity Purchase.

In the Town Centre, the traders are not interested in gaining power or benefiting from the process, instead it is an issue of the livelihoods of traders that have been affected tremendously. Traders need to trade where there are feet and not on an island.

It was said that tourists would visit the Mitchells Plain Town Centre during the FIFA 2010 World Cup, but nothing is happening here for the traders and hawkers during this time. Instead, the nearby community is still supporting traders, as is the case on a daily basis.

One demand from CHATA was that reports from the tribunal and workshop that were conducted be made public documents. The city has not responded to this demand and we ask why? CHATA continues to pursue this demand as the public has a right to see what went on in these sessions.

For more information please call Mischka Cassiem (CHATA) at 0731286657 or Jasmine Page (5th Avenue Traders) at 0733688690


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
Categories : Anti-Eviction Campaign, Contact Us, Mitchell's Plain Informal Traders, News & Press Release, Solidarity

Solidarity: Standing with the Poor People’s Alliance at the 2010 US Social Forum

7 07 2010

As the World Cup began in South Africa in June 2010, the social movements of the Poor People’s Alliance continue to face off against the governing elite’s escalation of harassment, repression, and displacement.  At the same time, activists gathered at the second United States Social Forum — to bring together U.S.-based movements fighting poverty, racism and oppression, within the States as well as globally.  Some of the poor people’s organizations that gathered in the embattled and resilient, majority-Black city of Detroit for the USSF had met with members of Abahlali baseMjondolo and the Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign who visited the U.S. in 2009, finding common cause and inspiration in their creative struggles and visions for a better world.

On June 25 in Detroit, members of the Chicago Anti-Eviction Campaign, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, Picture the Homeless, Poverty Initiative, and other movement activists at the USSF gathered to play football — as a solidarity message to our allies in South Africa and their Poor People’s World Cup games happening at the same time.

We are with you!   Aluta continua!   Amandla Ngwethu!

For past examples of New York City-based solidarity statements and actions, see here and here.


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , , , , ,
Categories : Anti-Eviction Campaign, Poor People's Alliance, Solidarity

« Previous Entries