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Alexandra residents would like to know how money was found so quickly to rebuild more than 80 structures that were demolished last month, yet no money was available to improve service delivery to the township.
The second phase of the Alexandra shutdown protests took place on Wednesday with aggrieved residents marching to Sandton, demanding to know where the money was coming from.
“What about the people of old Alex who have waited and are still waiting patiently for RDPs? What will happen to them? Most importantly where will the budget for that rebuilding come from?” asked convener of the shutdown movement, Sandile Mavundla.
Mavundla, with the backing of dozens of other residents, challenged Johannesburg mayor Herman Mashaba to tell them whether, in rebuilding the demolished homes, he was “now proclaiming the area where the structures were as a township”.
“How can he proclaim something that was built illegally and make it legal?” he asked.
‘Old residents should take priority’
The main bone of contention appears to be the fact that the mayor seems to be prioritising individuals who lived in the demolished homes – whom, according to the protesting residents, were not originally from Alexandra but recently came to the area after they were evicted from the inner city – over residents who have been residing in the area for years.
As the protesters made their way from the streets of Alexandra, which were filled with burnt tyres, to the skyscrapers of Sandton, Mavundla told City Press that the 80 structures that were demolished were not even occupied.
“I want to be honest with you my sister, those houses were not yet occupied by anybody. Those houses were still empty. No one was living in those structures. Those people were lying. Where are they now?”
Following the demolitions, Mashaba and the Economic Freedom Fighters’ Gauteng chairperson Mandisa Mashego appeared in front of a crowd of attentive Alexandra residents and assured them that the City of Joburg would immediately rebuild their houses.
“The City must make a plan within the next few weeks. The City must rebuild your structures. I understand you are here illegally, but the City removed you illegally. Two wrongs do not make a right,” Mashaba told the crowd.
RT @PalesaDlamini_0: Mavundla says the 80 structures that were demolished were not occupied. #AlexShutdown pic.twitter.com/fdbuQwpLYr
— City Press (@City_Press) June 19, 2019
Mashaba’s pressing on
Mashaba’s promise did not sit well with the Alex community, who claimed that the individuals who had built those structures were not from the area, but had flooded in from other parts of the city.
During the first Alexandra shutdown, which took place earlier this year, the main issue that the people of the area had raised was the increase in illegal structures in the township.
Regardless of the march by Alexandra residents to the city’s regional head office in Sandton, Mashaba insisted that the rebuilding of the structures in question would continue.
He told City Press: “We are doing assessments and we will announce the date of when the construction will begin. We are definitely continuing because it was the City’s fault.”
Asked about the crowd of Alexandra residents who had awaited his arrival in Sandton Mashaba said that he could not jump at their whim.
“I am the mayor of Johannesburg, not of just one area in the city. I had serious service delivery projects to attend to. There was nothing pre-arranged but I sent two officials to go and meet with the people of Alexandra and receive their memorandum,” he told City Press.
For 29-year-old Nkanyezi Maingele, who was born and bred in Alexandra, the marches were not in vain.
“The most important thing is that these marches catch people’s attention. They have sparked debate and have given people a glimpse of what is really going on in Alexandra,” he told City Press.
“We live in Alexandra, an area surrounded by all these suburbs. Every day the people of Alex walk to work, but when we march peacefully to Sandton we are blocked and prevented from taking certain routes.”
RT @PalesaDlamini_0: Police draw weapons as protesters call for them to shoot ."Dubula" they proclaim. pic.twitter.com/PJzPIZ6WSN
— City Press (@City_Press) June 19, 2019
Sitting outside the municipal offices with the rest of the crowd that waited for Mashaba to address them, Maingele told City Press that “pigs would fly” before Mashaba showed his face.
“To tell you the truth he is a coward. I don’t think he will show his face. If people walk all the way from Alexandra to Sandton, the least you can do as a mayor is to show up and make them believe that they matter.”
Playing politics
Thembeni Manana, a committee member of the Alex shutdown movement told City Press that politicians had used Alexandra and its struggles for their political games.
“The first shutdown just brought us politicians wanting to bring change but after elections we are still stuck here and our conditions remain the same,” she said.
“We are asking where the interest of these politicians actually lies because it looks like our poverty and situation have become their field of play.
“Although the first shutdown yielded no results for us it doesn’t mean that we will just sit down and do nothing. We will fight to the bitter end until we see something change. We need to fight until there is bloodshed within white monopoly capital because it is the biggest enemy right now.”
Hoping for change
Like many who stood at the gates of the regional municipal offices Manana said that she hoped Mashaba would address their concerns.
“We are hoping that Mashaba will respond to the memorandum delivered to him in April. We want to make him a working mayor. We want to make sure that he delivers. He has shown that he is more interested in the white communities. He said he would bring change to our community, so he must bring it.”
57-year-old Jessica Kgaladi has lived in the area all her life. She said that although no changes had taken place, the residents of Alexandra had to keep on fighting.
“Maybe this time someone will take us seriously. The last time Mashaba came, the president came, Makhura came but all they did was make promises but delivered nothing. We are tired of empty promises,” she said.
“We will keep on doing this until somebody hears us, otherwise we will not vote in the next elections. I was born in 1962, in a shack and I am still living in a shack.”
Kgaladi told City Press that she currently shared one and a half rooms with 16 of her family members.
“When we sleep we have to put some furniture on top of our wardrobes to create space.”
Addressing the issue of the 80 structures that were demolished and Mashaba’s announcement to rebuild them, Kgaladi said: “uMashaba uyanya. And angeke simdedele ukuthi anyele eTownship (Mashaba is full of cr*p, and we won’t allow him to cr*p on this township) because illegal structures are put up by individuals who are not from Alex and that is why the area is over-populated. Mashaba has turned Alexandra into a human dumping place and we are not going to allow that.”
The protests have been linked to an ANC strategy to remove Mashaba.
However, Mavundla rubbished these claims.
“If this march was led by the ANC the number of people taking part would probably fill 10 stadiums. There would be more people if it was organised by a political party. But it’s just us, ordinary people who are concerned about service delivery,” he said.
“The mayor is always ducking and diving. He doesn’t have an interest in us. He doesn’t take Alex seriously.”
Contrary to Mavundla’s statement that the shutdown protests were not politically driven, Mashaba had no doubt in his mind that that was exactly what was happening.
He told City Press: “These protests are driven by the ANC, by people at the highest level of the ANC. It’s all just a ploy to divert my attention from investigating the Alexandra Renewal Project looting.”
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