C O NS TA NTI A /WYN B E RG
“ Te l lin g it a s it i s” E-mail: post@peoplespost.co.za
Inside
Tuesday 3 May 2011
Poor take to the streets TAMMY PETERSEN
M Holocaust remembered
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City honours great citizens 44
ORE than 1 000 people from 12 areas braved the elements on Tuesday when they marched from Keizersgracht Street to the Cape Town Civic Centre in protest against what they call the “victimisation of the poor”. After handing over a memorandum to a City of Cape Town representative, Communities for Social Change (CSC), which arranged the protest, threatened the council with a 24-hour hunger strike on its doorstep if demands for follow up meetings were not met within the next seven days. The march comes after meetings with City of Cape Town officials failed to produce satisfactory feedback on issues plaguing the poor, Mario Wanza, the organiser of the CSC, tells People’s Post. He says the organisation is “satisfied” with the number of people who came from Hanover Park, Athlone, Manenberg, Mitchell’s Plain, Hout Bay, Heideveld, Lavender Hill, Lotus River, Ottery, Grassy Park, Elsies River and Leonsdale in support of its “Eerste Kos Dan Rent” campaign. “Their attendance showed their commitment to the cause, especially since things were rainy and wet in the city. We showed that a bietjie reën won’t keep us from demanding better lives for the poor. The spirit was there and we made our voices heard.” The group chanted slogans as they walked through the city
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streets armed with banners stating their demands. The memorandum, which was received by an official from the mayor’s office, listed the group’s demands, which include the halting of all evictions; the scrapping of municipal arrears as residents are “deeply in debt and unable to keep up with payments”; that ownership be given to tenants who have been paying rent to the City for up to 40 years; a change in attitude by the City’s anti-land invasion unit whose “kragdadigheid was experienced under the apartheid government”; improving service delivery and maintenance of community facilities to lower-income areas; and dealing with issues surrounding the upgrade of the City’s triple-storey flats, especially those by people who improved their flats from their own pockets. Errol Davids, the CSC coordinator for Hanover Park, says protesters will keep returning to the Civic Centre until answers are received. “Our demands are simple and not at all unreasonable. What we need is for the relevant officials to listen and address the needs of the communities. If they don’t, we will be back.” Mitchell’s Plain CSC coordinator, Sulyman Stellenboom, says he is “mobilising the people” to bring up the numbers to make a human chain around the Civic Centre later this month. “We are sick and tired of empty promises and blatant lies. Instead of taking an interest in the needs of the people, our local government is more interested in campaigning and getting re-elected.
If they don’t listen, we will be back
Bikers lead in feeding crusade
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Tel: 021 713 9440 Fax: 021 713 9481
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A LONG WALK: Scores of people gathered to join the Elite Disability Awareness Walkathon on Freedom Day (27 April) which was held in the parking area of Vangate Mall. The walkathon is an initiative by the Athlone police. The event was supported by Elite Foodtown and the Elite group of companies. The event is held to highlight the plight of the physically challenged and to create awareness around their ca pabilities rather than their inabilities. Photo: Sharief Jaffer
These are not the type of politicians who look out for the people. They only care about themselves.” Area-specific protests also took place in the past three months. In March, 3 000 residents from Manenberg took to the streets armed with posters asking the City to lower their rent and write off their rental backlog. Also under the banner of the CSC, more than 500 Hanover Park residents took to the streets two months ago and delivered a memorandum to the local rent office demanding that their arrears be scrapped. Last month, Mitchell’s Plain residents expressed their concerns about the scrapping of water arrears when they burnt a cardboard coffin containing hundreds of warning letters issued by the City. The coffin was loaded onto a hearse and taken from
Mitchell’s Plain Town Centre to the Beacon Valley Rent Office, where it was burnt in front of cheering protesters. Mayor Dan Plato says he has received the CSC’s memorandum, adding that no feedback has yet been given as “they can’t expect it immediately”. “We will respond in due time,” Plato says. He says the action is politically motivated; Wanza is standing as an independent candidate for the position of ward councillor in Manenberg and “everything should be looked at through a political lens”. He declined to comment on the further action being threatened, saying only that “if this is how they want to do it, it’s their problem”.
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