By Peter Luhanga
8 August 2017 Pastor Deon Snyman and Imam Rashied Omar addresssed community leaders in Dunoon at the weekend. Photo: Peter Luhanga
When Milnerton resident Deon Snyman drove into Dunoon township on
Saturday 5 August, he realised what a different world it is from the one
he is used to.
Piles of rubbish on the streets, raw sewerage flowing from burst
manhole covers, the smell of faeces on the light breeze blowing across
the sprawling shacks and RDP houses.
By contrast, Milnerton is clean, with fresh sea air blowing across neat houses.
“It looks like two different worlds,” said Snyman.
Snyman is chief operating officer for the Restitution Foundation, a
Cape Town based non-profit organisation that promotes socio-economic
justice, healing and reconciliation through restitution.
The Foundation, in collaboration with the Institute for Healing of
Memories, was in Dunoon to donate food parcels and blankets to needy
residents in the township.The food was presented to 15 community leaders
at the Dunoon Nasqshbandi Muhammadi mosque in Mnandi Avenue. The Dunoon
mosque has strong ties with Claremont Main Road Mosque.
Imam Rashied Omar of Claremont Main Road Mosque, who is also a board
member of the Institute for the Healing of Memories, said the
distribution of goods was not only about charity but also about
solidarity. “We are twinning our mosque with the Dunoon mosque, we are
trying to turn charity into solidarity to empower the local Dunoon
community structures,” said Omar.
Addressing the community leaders, Snyman blamed apartheid and
colonialism for rampant poverty in black townships and said white people
living in Table View and Milnerton needed to be reminded of their
responsibility for restitution. “I think white people who benefited from
colonialism and apartheid have to realise that we will not have real
peace and reconciliation if they do not take responsibility for the
past. Black South Africans need to maintain the pressure for justice,”
said Snyman.
He said he had been trained as a pastor in the Dutch Reformed Church, which was “an apartheid church”.
After completing his graduate studies in theology at the University
of Pretoria he realised if he became pastor in a white congregation he
would not be relevant and so he chose to be a pastor in a black
congregation in KwaNongoma, KwaZulu-Natal.
“I got to know my congregation members, they told me how apartheid
messed up their lives…They did not have the opportunity to go to
university and school. In the new South Africa we still live in
Milnerton and in Dunoon; we don’t know each other,” he said.
This, he said, was part of the reason “white people” were struggling to say they were sorry. A businessman sells chickens in Dunoon, with sewage running past his stall. Photo: Peter Luhanga
“When we talk about restitution it must be an apology that has no
conditions…you need to be humble. An apology is not just saying sorry.
People are greedy. They don’t want to give. They want to keep what they
have,” he said.
He said black South Africans were angry and white people were
“beginning to be scared now”. He continued: “The anger is scary but it’s
also good for people to realise that it’s no longer business as usual.
Things need to be changed.”
Fatima Swartz of the Institute for Healing of Memories said white
people did not want to accept that they were wrong and “make it right”.
“They say it was the apartheid government, not them,” said Swartz.
She said if anger was not dealt with constructively, it would explode into violence that would further divide the country.
“People don’t want to accept what they did was wrong. It’s not all
about land. Land is a big part of it but there are other issues that go
with the land: issues of identity, culture and family history.”
Dunoon community leader Busi Ganjanana said: “We have to understand
what we are dealing with here. We are dealing with two generations. One
that experienced apartheid and the other that just hears about it. We
have to engage schools, churches and educate them about what happened to
find solutions.”
Another community leader, Pindile Mazula, said black people were also
divided on tribal and cultural lines as well as by frontiers. “We need a
mediator to facilitate restitution,” he said.
Omar said Capetonians who did not speak isiXhosa needed to learn the
language as part of achieving restitution. “IsiXhosa language is not
taken seriously in Cape Town and because of the inequalities we need to
learn it.”
The Institute of Healing Memories has also organised discussions on restitution in Masiphumelele.
Published originally on
GroundUp
.
Thousands march to Parliament, including ANC allies Cosatu and SACP
By Ashleigh Furlong
7 August 2017 Monday’s march to Parliament was organised by #UniteBehind. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks
Several thousand people took to the streets of Cape Town on
Monday under the banner of #UniteBehind. They called for the ANC to
recall President Jacob Zuma.
The march to Parliament comes the day before the vote of no
confidence in Zuma. The protesters were members of dozens of civil
society organisations, and included farm workers, school children,
religious leaders and ANC members.
Outside Parliament, the protesters were addressed by former deputy
finance minister Mcebisi Jonas who said that South Africans could either
submit or fight. “As South Africans we fought very hard to be where we
are. We cannot allow our freedom to be sold as cheaply as it is being
sold,” he said.
“We made a mistake after 1994. We made a serious mistake. We
demobilised our communities. We demobilised society as a whole, because
we pinned our hopes to liberators and political parties. And that was
possibly the most dangerous historical mistake that we made as a
country,” said Jonas.
“We must consolidate a mass movement in this country that continues
to hold everyone in power, from local government right up to national
government, accountable,” he said. “We must take the future of this
country away from those who are abusing it.”
Amahle Gengqiwe, a grade 11 learner, told the crowd that if Zuma
isn’t recalled then they would come back to Parliament and “liberate the
people of South Africa”.
“If Zuma doesn’t step down how will Nyanga ever change?” she asked.
She questioned how their schools would ever be improved if Zuma isn’t
recalled. “Let us stand together dear MPs, and make sure you remove him
from that seat,” she said to much applause.
The march was also supported by Cosatu as well as the SACP, both
historical alliance partners of the ANC. “We stand with you to remove
this thief from inside our Parliament,” said Tony Ehrenreich, the
regional secretary of the Western Cape region of Cosatu. “When people
came together before 1994 they fought for a country that represents all
our people, where black and white and all of our religions could come
together and we could build the kind of land where our children could
prosper. The only children who prosper now are Jacob Zuma’s children,”
he said. A small group of counter-protesters came out in support of Zuma. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks The protesters’ response to the Bell Pottinger coined term “White Monopoly Capital”. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks
While many marchers wore T-shirts and held banners denoting their
support for a particular civil society organisation or movement, they
were united in their condemnation of Zuma and the corruption that they
believe has followed him throughout his tenure as president.
When marchers were informed that the vote of no confidence will be held via a secret ballot, they shouted in jubilation. The leaders of the march included religious and civil
society leaders, as well as Mcebesi Jonas, former deputy finance
minister. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks
Maria Balie, a farm worker from De Doorns, told GroundUp that the
whole Cabinet must be changed. “The reason I am here is because they
don’t see us anymore. They don’t see the farm workers anymore,” said
Balie.
Zandile Komani, a SACP member, told GroundUp said that she doesn’t
want the people to be oppressed by Zuma anymore. “[He] must save his
dignity and step down.” She was also opposed to the possibility of
Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma replacing Jacob Zuma, saying that the ANC is a
“not a family party, it is a democratic party.” Photo: Ashraf HendricksPhoto: Ashraf Hendricks
Published originally on
GroundUp
.
A National Guardsman stands at a Detroit intersection during the summer riots of 1967. AP Photo/David Stephenson
When most people see the movie “Detroit,” it’ll likely be their first encounter with the events of July 1967, when a routine bust of an after-hours drinking establishment led to five days of protests, looting and clashes with the police. Forty-three people died, hundreds were injured and thousands were arrested.
At the time, I was six years old and living in an all-white inner suburb of Detroit, though my recollections of the five violent days are spotty: fragments of news footage documenting the destruction, a dusk curfew (past the time I had to be home anyway) and a friend telling me that there would be a police officer on every corner of our neighborhood.
Like other six-year-olds (and probably many adults) in my neighborhood, I didn’t really know what was going on, or how it might end. The same can likely be said about the elected officials charged with maintaining order.
For many years thereafter, these events were known colloquially as “the riots.” Among many whites, conventional wisdom had it that the police raid provided an opening for black criminals in Detroit’s crowded 12th Street district to run amok, leaving death and senseless destruction in their wake.
It was only years later, as a graduate student in urban planning, that I was able to learn about the tensions – police brutality, inadequate housing and poor job prospects – that had been simmering in Detroit’s black neighborhoods for decades.
Enforcing a racial order
Between 1910 and 1920, Detroit’s black population grew from 5,700 to nearly 41,000 people as the automobile industry flourished and low-skill, high-wage factory jobs became plentiful. Between 1940 and 1960, the black population grew from 149,000 to 482,000 people – about 30 percent of the city’s population.
While Detroit grew geographically to accommodate newcomers, most blacks were confined to four districts in the city until about 1960. Venturing into other neighborhoods came at a considerable risk.
As historians Joe Darden and Richard Thomas detail in their 2013 book “Detroit: Race Riots, Racial Conflicts, and Efforts to Bridge the Racial Divide,” the Detroit police essentially functioned as enforcers of segregation – “the first line of white defense against the invading ‘black hordes’ that, if not checked, would overwhelm surrounding white neighborhoods.” In other words, if Detroit’s black residents protested or were in the wrong place at the wrong time, the reaction of the police could be swift and brutal.
For example, during Detroit’s 1943 riots, the police killed 17 blacks and no whites, even though white rioters vastly outnumbered their black counterparts. In some cases, the police stood by as white mobs beat blacks.
A Michigan state policeman searches a man on Detroit’s 12th Street. AP Photo
Walled off
Relegated to segregated neighborhoods, Detroit’s black residents would encounter housing shortages and substandard housing opportunities.
At the tail end of the Great Depression, private developers began building new housing units in Detroit, but strictly marketed them to whites. In 1941, one such development was approved adjacent to the historically black Eight Mile and Wyoming neighborhoods. It came with a caveat: The construction of a wall was the only way the Federal Housing Administration would approve loan guarantees to banks writing FHA-insured mortgages to white homeowners (who would be “protected”). Blacks seeking housing – already profoundly limited in their options – were literally walled off from accessing new housing in an adjacent neighborhood.
Like their relationship with the police, the housing situation in Detroit’s black communities would only deteriorate. In 1942, Life magazine published a feature story titled “Detroit is Dynamite.” The housing conditions depicted – people living in shacks, trailers and tents – were so destitute that Life’s publisher limited the story’s distribution to North America, presumably so the Axis powers couldn’t use it as anti-American propaganda.
The meanest, dirtiest jobs
What was behind the racial animus aimed at blacks, from the hostility of the police to the restrictive housing measures?
It’s difficult to fully disentangle the sources, but one major conflict arose on crowded factory floors during World War II.
Historically, blacks fortunate enough to be hired for automotive factory work were given what Detroit historian Thomas Sugrue characterized as the “meanest and dirtiest jobs.” But management would strategically elevate black workers to higher positions if it suited their needs. For example, in 1943, the Packard Motor Company hoped to heighten racial tensions among its mostly white workers in order to sow dissent within the union. After being integrated with black workers on shop floors, 25,000 white workers participated in a wildcat walkout. This event was commonly referred to as a “hate strike.”
Apprenticeship programs in trade unions often excluded blacks. This dynamic was especially pernicious because most apprentices would go on to have long, high-paying careers. The Detroit Urban League reported that in 1966, there were 41 black apprentices in all skilled trade unions out of a total of 2,363 apprentices, a rate of 1.7 percent.
And though blacks fared well in municipal positions – filling 36 percent of city jobs in 1946, roughly commensurate to the percentage of blacks living in Detroit – many of these positions were the lowest-paying: janitor, groundskeeper, sanitation worker.
Other industries were even less receptive to hiring blacks. Because retailers didn’t want their white customers to have to interact with black clerks and salespeople, any black hires were relegated to backroom work.
No easy fix
Given the extremely limited opportunities for blacks in housing and employment – and with very little political voice in city government – civil unrest boiled over on a hot July weekend in 1967. At the time, it was the most deadly civil uprising of the 20th century.
But it was only one of dozens of other civil insurrections in other cities during the mid-1960s, including Los Angeles, Newark, Cleveland and Chicago (and not all were driven by grievances in the black community).
Damaged stores and houses after the rioting in Detroit in July 1967. AP Photo
While Detroit was still smoldering, President Lyndon Johnson appointed Illinois Governor Otto Kerner to chair the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorder. Their report implicated local police forces as a primary source of civil unrest, along with unemployment and limited housing opportunities.
Partially in response to the Kerner Commission’s findings, courts began to order large urban districts to integrate their schools with mandatory busing plans that would shuttle white students into schools in black neighborhoods and vice versa. In metropolitan Detroit, U.S. District Court Judge Stephen Roth’s busing plan involved 85 suburban districts and Detroit proper.
My suburban Oak Park neighborhood in the Berkley School District was one of the 85 included, and while my memories of the riots are hazy, I distinctly remember the response of many of my friends and their parents to Judge Roth’s plan: resistance. There was chatter of moving away if the busing plan were implemented, and as it wound through appeals courts, a cottage industry of yellow wooden placards, carved in the shape of a school bus, sprung up like dandelions on the front lawns of my neighborhood, with the words “No Busing” written in large black letters.
Nonetheless, the Berkley School District, to its credit, sent my class on a field trip to Detroit’s Greenfield Park Elementary School. When we arrived, the majority black student population feted our class and a few from other suburban school districts with a warm welcome. There were live choir and musical performances, along with classroom visits. Their daily routines and lessons seemed no different from our own.
But in 1974, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Judge Roth’s busing order. While intra-district busing was still allowed, inter-district wasn’t, and my classmates and I ended up staying put.
Would school busing plans have ultimately solved racial disparities? In the end, they didn’t address the biggest problem of all: segregated neighborhoods and suburbs. Busing, where implemented, worked as intended during the regular school day, but did little to integrate segregated residential communities.
Busing addressed the symptom, but not the problem: systemic racism that had hardened over the course of decades, creating segregated enclaves in cities across the country that persist today.
A controversial book about Nelson Mandela’s last years has been withdrawn. Flickr
Amid conjecture, speculation and a sea of assumptions about a book – “Mandela’s last years” – that most people have not been at liberty to read, including myself – it’s only fair and reasonable to raise a number of questions we hope will be addressed in the near future.
The book was released at bookstores throughout South Africa in late July. The author, Dr Veejay Ramlakan, head of Mandela’s medical team, reportedly wrote the book to document the courage and strength of this global icon up to the very end of his life.
But, some family members - notably his widow Graca Machel - and executors of the Mandela estate, have publicly distanced themselves from the book. Machel also reportedly sought legal counsel.
Objections have been raised about alleged breaches of confidentiality and disclosure of private information.
While the author claims that he wrote the book with the permission of a family member, the identity of this member remains unknown. The publishers, in acknowledgement of respect for family unhappiness and threats of legal action, subsequently withdrew the book.
Many questions remain about the content of this book. What was already in the public domain prior to publication? What new information was disclosed? Does the public have a legitimate interest in the alleged disclosures in the book?
Historically, many books have been written and published about public figures. Think of Mahatma Gandhi, Diana, Princess of Wales and other prominent politicians, statesmen and leaders including Nelson Mandela himself. What is unique about this book is that it has been written by a medical doctor and anti-apartheid activist. And that it has been written about the last years of his patient and comrade who is also a global icon.
It’s not the first time that a medical professional has written about his life, work or patients. But most such works have been written with the subject being portrayed anonymously, or with consent – to adhere to the sacrosanct rules of professionalism that promote confidentiality around the doctor-patient relationship. In this case, however, it is clearly impossible to anonymise a story about someone as uniquely identifiable as Mandela.
One can only imagine that this dilemma must have created several competing conflicts of interest for the author based on competing loyalties. These include loyalty to a patient during his lifetime and posthumously (as enshrined in the World Medical Association’s Declaration of Geneva), his loyalty to the state as an employee of the South African Defence Force and his personal right to freedom of expression. On the face of it, satisfying all these loyalties would have required a number of negotiations and engagements – with professional bodies, medical ethicists, the South African Defence Force as well as the next of kin and executors of Mandela’s estate. This is an assumption and so the extent to which this did or did not occur remains unclear at this point in time.
Family dynamics
Family dynamics are complex and challenging at the best of times in almost all families. This has been illustrated globally with the British Royal family, the Kennedys, Obamas, European monarchy and many others.
In Africa, the personal and public lives of leaders, statesmen and politicians have been widely discussed in the public media. When such disclosures, debates and publications are in the public interest, it’s often easily sanctioned by civil society. The public figures and their families accept such transparency as an integral part of public life.
In South Africa the complexity of family dynamics is increased in traditional cultures where individuals are embedded tightly within communal structures such as families and communities. In the context of such a communitarian ethic, value systems of families need to be explored. This is so because such value systems are linked to respect for family, elders and even ancestors. Respect for those who may exist in the afterlife is a strongly held value.
Hence one can assume a heightened sensitivity to literary works that may be perceived to dishonour not only the deceased but the family as well.
What the law says
Legally, journalism and authorship fall within the limits of contractual relationships. It is not uncommon for claims of defamation and invasion of privacy to arise in the setting of disclosure in literary media. This must often be balanced with rights to freedom of thought and expression which is constitutionally protected in South Africa.
Is it possible for claims of defamation or invasion of privacy to be raised on behalf of those who are no longer living? This falls out of my area of expertise and more directly in the realm of legal experts and publishers. One can only assume that such matters were discussed and that the publishers involved secured written consent from next of kin/executors and that this was included in any contractual arrangements with the author.
Evidently, this contentious book has focused attention on potential ethical and legal issues related to both the medical and literary worlds. Many questions remain unanswered and in keeping with the ethical principle of justice, judgement must be suspended until a detailed account of factual, objective content of the book is in the public domain.
A veteran activist explains why she’s protesting with civil society rather than with political parties
By Liz McGregor
7 August 2017 Veteran activist Liz McGregor explains why she’s joining
the #UniteBehind march against Zuma on Monday. Archive Photo: Ashraf
Hendricks
Monday
and Tuesday this week will be momentous days for Cape Town. Normal
business will be suspended. Streets will be taken over by protesters
demanding the removal of President Zuma.
On Tuesday, the day of the No Confidence Vote in Parliament, the
march will be led by the DA. On Monday, 7 August, the march will be led
by #UniteBehind, the exciting new coalition led by civil society and
faith-based communities.
I will be marching on Monday. My history is this: my heart has long
been with the ANC but for the past two elections, I have found myself
unable to vote for them. Instead I considered their most viable rival,
the DA. But they too have turned out to be a disappointment. For the
past 10 years, I have lived in Sea Point, where the DA has over 90% of
the vote.
In such a strong position, they could have exercised visionary
leadership. They could have encouraged their white voters to examine the
roots of their privilege and acknowledge the pain of the black people
banished to remote townships during apartheid. They could have helped
Sea Point Imagine an inclusive, sustainable future in which those
impoverished and marginalised by apartheid could again find a home.
Instead they have sided with property developers. During the day, Sea
Point is full of black workers and school children who get up 4.30am to
get to work and school. Meanwhile, all over Sea Point, new housing
complexes are being built, all aimed at the wealthy, mostly white, many
foreign.
Buildings owned by the province which could have been converted
into affordable housing, are being sold off by the DA to private
developers. Apartheid-era racial inequality is being reinforced. Vague
assurances of future affordable housing come without timelines. They do
not reassure.
We could have looked for inspiration to other great cities: London,
for example, where all new developments must contain a sizeable portion
of affordable housing. Or, even more pertinently, Berlin, where
inclusive housing includes signposts on many street corners, reminding
citizens of where past atrocities occurred. This is how a sustainable
society is built: when we are constantly reminded of where we come from
and what sort of country we want to create. Instead the DA has
prioritized short term, unilateral gains over nation-building. This is
not leadership.
How then does one effectively engage with the disaster overtaking our
country in the form of the grand theft of state resources by Zuma and
the Guptas? Metaphorically wringing one’s hands in dismay and impotent
outrage in the Twitter/Facebook echo chamber hardly does it.
Then, in early April, I received a round-robin whatsapp message from
Zackie Achmat, calling for a meeting of CBD/Atlantic Sea Board community
to discuss how to celebrate the life of Ahmed Kathrada, who had died a
few days earlier. I knew Zackie from the extraordinary campaign he
spearheaded for universally available ARVs in the early days of
democracy.
The meeting was held 3pm on Sunday, 3 April. Reclaim the City, one of
the NGOs which forms part of what was to become the #UniteBehind
coalition, had just started occupying part of the long empty,
province-owned Helen Bowden nurses’ home (which the DA is now trying to
sell to developers).
The meeting was to be held inside but security guards locked the
gates so we ended up sitting on the pavement outside, with the roar of
traffic from Granger Bay Boulevard in our ears. The occupiers, a couple
of older women wrapped in blankets against a chilly wind, participated
from the other side of the fence. Axolile Notywala, now general
secretary of the Social Justice Coalition, another #UniteBehind
affiliate, chaired.
It was decided to organise a memorial service for Ahmed Kathrada
which would celebrate his values. Volunteers were called for. I put my
hand up.
On 7 April at St George’s Cathedral, Pravin Gordhan combined a
tribute to Kathrada with a passionate call for citizens to act to help
save the state. Equally powerful were the voices of the young black
leaders who spoke: Vuyiseka Dubula of the Treatment Action Campaign;
Phumeza Mlungwana of the Social Justice Coalition and Tshepo Motsepe of
Equal Education.
In Khayelitsha on Freedom Day, 27 April, #UniteBehind was launched. Again it was the voices of youth that predominated.
For me, this is what distinguishes #UniteBehind: it is led and driven
by young people, young black women in particular. South Africa is a
young country – about 40% are under 25. They are both our present and
our future.
Working with #UniteBehind – in a bit part role, as a part-time
volunteer – has given me renewed hope for our future. They are
disciplined, resourceful, incredibly hard-working.
#UniteBehind and its constituent NGOs ask a lot of their members. A
few are graduates but most come straight from township high schools.
Resources are thin. Some are paid a stipend but most are volunteers.
They are thrown into the deep end. Within days of joining, they are
organising complicated logistical operations; chairing meetings;
engaging with municipal and provincial authorities. They rise to the
challenge. Education is ongoing. This is a highly effective and dynamic
leadership incubator.
Most are from the communities with which they work. They understand
the hardship of life in resource-starved townships. Campaigns are
carefully chosen and effectively executed. Research is meticulous;
strategy is carefully thought out but also wily and agile.
What animated the formation of #UniteBehind is the knowledge that the
money being stolen by the Guptas and their predatory allies in the ANC
could help fix many of these problems that make everyday life so
difficult. For many, it is not the ANC they have given up on, it is the
thieves within it. So far, 26 Cape Town organisations have joined the
#UniteBehind campaign for a just and equal South Africa. Together with a
range of faith communities they will gather at 3pm on Monday in the
CPUT parking lot on Keizersgracht to march on Parliament to demand that
ANC MPs vote to recall President Zuma. See you there.
Views expressed in this article are not necessarily GroundUp’s.
Published originally on
GroundUp
.
Busing addressed the symptom, but not the problem: systemic racism that had hardened over the course of decades, creating segregated enclaves in cities across the country that 
Evidently, this contentious book has focused attention on potential ethical and legal issues related to both the medical and literary worlds. Many questions remain unanswered and in keeping with the ethical principle of justice, judgement must be suspended until a detailed account of factual, objective content of the book is in the public domain.