Monday, May 21, 2007

A Squatter Shack Settlement History, South Africa






The following is an article written by Auntie Dulcie C. Winegaard, an anti-apartheid activist who since 2004 has been chairman of Rural Women Association, South Africa. Dulcie has been fighting for the rights of the poor for over 30 years.



HAVE YOUR SAY

Rural Women Association‘s (RWA) support of integration is evident in all our many programs. With respect to the current residents of Montagu’s informal settlement, Mandela Square, our mandate is to help them remain in their known environment where they have lived for years, and in addition to make effort to improve their living standards. With the proposal for an eventual housing plan for the residents of this community now being considered by the Breede River Winelands Municipality, the residents wish to have these houses built where they have lived for years, and not be moved to government match box housing elsewhere.

Mandela Square is an historical site and needs to be honoured as such in our community. It is a monument of the struggle against Apartheid in our small town which sits within the Breede River Winelands Municipality and includes three disadvantaged communities, Mandela Square being but one of them.

The settlement rests on the south side of Muscadel Road which is the main route between Montagu central and the large extended township of Ashbury. Approximately fifty households are settled here. Over the years there has been relatively little growth either in the number of shacks or population.

RWA has come a long way with the settlement, the chairperson, Dulcie C. Winegaard was actively part of the changes that unfolded here in the latter years of Apartheid, and since that time has continued to offer support and help where possible. In addition Mrs. Winegaard participated in the original decision to name the settlement “Mandela Square”.

The present residents are organized, meet every few months, and with the support of Rural Women Association, additional meetings are held to discuss the concerns and needs of their community. One vitally important need was to have a crèche where the many babies, toddlers and additionally, children requiring after school care, could be accommodated. Because parents go to work on farms and the packing industry, babies are often left with young children for long hours, minors who themselves should be in school.

Thus the crèche became a must for the health, advancement and preservation of these children. To date 25 infants and children have been registered by the Dept of Social Services.

Numerous letters were written by Rural Women Association to local government and other bodies with no response. And still we continue to wait for our local and provincial governments to support RWA in this effort. The funds which built this crèche were private funds loaned to RWA because of the
desperate needs of the infants and children.

In RWA’s vision of what the settlement can become, Mandela Square has the distinct option of becoming an agricultural tourism village attraction which can become largely self sustaining if given the start-up support needed. Many South Africans and foreign visitors have already visited. RWA alone has given over 20 tours of the community. We believe this option should be energetically promoted.

Mandela Square residents, although knowing they live in poverty, are nevertheless very proud of their community. Some members have lived here for many years. As a pastoral community it is unlike the two other Montagu township communities. Gardens thrive here and RWA will continue to support their gardening efforts. Of note, RWA has applied for a vegetable stall to be emplaced by the taxi stand on the north side of Muscadel Rd so that Mandela residents can sell their produce within walking distance. They have no vehicles to transport heavy vegetables any distances. Breede River Winelands Rotary Club has agreed to pay for its installation. Such a stall is a significant incentive for the gardeners to increase their produce volumes and earnings, which is their desire, although as is generally the case repeated requests to negotiate the matter have been ignored.

What will bring greater pride to the residents is access to the land surrounding this
community so expanded agricultural plots for vegetables can be grown for sale, a project that RWA will oversee for the residents benefit. Larger gardens and some minor livestock, as will a decent housing project, will allow Mandela Square to become a showcase for all visitors especially in preparation for the 2010 World Cup.

For your information the history of Mandela Square is as follows:

Because the local authority of the old regime was not eager to have Blacks in Montagu, this resulted in the black people staying in the backyards of the greater community. Then the Transition period occurred and one of the comrades Edward Feketa hired some business ground from the municipality and started a brick works project which became a fast growing business.

The RDP houses you see in Ashbury were to be built and according to the social compact committee this brickwork project was to render employment and services to the people.

But at this time things got ugly and mean.

Comrade Edward was notified to close down the brickworks. Comrade Tom who was evicted from one of the farms here was also staying on the premises. Their houses were good structures, built with wood, in which the families stayed.

One misty July morning at 5 am all the comrades were called to the Edward’s and when we got there, a full squad of police with their Caspers, vans and cars, were surrounding the house. These racist invaders called on the Edwards family to come out of their home. The mamas were confused and terrified as you can imagine. The other mammas tried to get their own families to safety. Children were screaming.

Immediately the squad was ordered to remove all furniture from all the houses. Then to our horror a bulldozer swiftly crunched these homes into small pieces. Comrade businesses were eliminated to this day.

The “officials” that ordered this brutal action are still in top positions in our local municipality and have never been made to answer for these and other hateful actions. To this day they show no remorse and have with little exception, refused co-operation with our Rural Women’s Association, holding old grievances for the chairperson having dared confront them in the old days not so long ago.

Our leaders went to ask them the reason for their action but received no explanation, only silence. There was no possibility for the comrades to stay living there, their homes destroyed and their furniture ruined by the rain.

Up to this day, those illegal actions of the authorities are a mystery and have never been explained.


Of note, shortly thereafter, Comrade Edwards, while in a discussion with the police on the roadside, was killed by a car, or so we were told.


Comrade Tom, following a second eviction of his family fell into serious illness and also passed on.

Then MAG, Montagu Ashton Gemeenskep gave some space on their garden lot which became Mandela Square. Most of the comrades that used to stay in people’s back yards went to stay there, building wood and tin shacks.

More tragedies happened when contract workers who were transported to Montagu from various places in the Northern Cape, to be exploited with low wages, were evicted at the end of harvest, many having started relationships with local women. The result was that they did not return to the north but began living beside our local garbage site. This happened after each harvest. Although the Human Rights Department and the Dept of Labour came to Montagu to aid these vulnerable people, when they left the bulldozers returned, leveling the shacks and shelters along with all the people’s possessions.

About 15 families suffered this fate. Then mamma Dulcie confronted the Mayor, at the time Mnr De Wett. Some enforcement was applied and these families were moved to Mandela Square with just the clothing on their backs. These people are still here in their humble dwellings, struggling to make ends meet while living a life of pastoral harmony with great respect and tolerance of each other.

How did this crèche come about? One morning during a routine visit to Mandela Square, I found many infants and toddlers all on their own. A farmer had arrived for pickers and nearly all of the adults jumped aboard and left. I was so upset and cried bitterly, then expressed my anguish to the project manager of Rural Women who promised to raise funds for a facility. That was about 4 months ago.

Our intention was to help the residents build a shack facility, emplace trained staff and supply daily and nutritious food from our many gardens, and thus to bring these infants and children into a place of safety and preparation for formal schooling.

Knowing from past experience that RWA would never get permission for building a crèche we informed the residents they must build the shack themselves which we would oversee construction on and supply materials. Only residents of Mandela Square worked on the initial building completing the concrete pad, the fencing, garden, and the frame work structure. They felt they were entirely in their right to build another shack, as did RWA.

On being told by municipal authorities they must stop building or face consequences, including the threatened destruction of the facility, RWA’s project manager arranged for friends to complete the roof, siding and door which is now complete, so that we might safely lock it up while attempting to resolve difficulties with the local authority. Water was brought to the location via RWA’s huis tuintjie program which has now emplaced 200 metres of new water lines and taps which you will see near most of the shacks.

This crèche facility is now part of the Mandela Square history, because as the Department of Social Services was shocked to realize, it is the first official crèche in the Montagu area for coloured and black people. We were the only town in the Breede River Municipal region which didn’t have one. In an area with such need we were somehow overlooked even though RWA has been submitting proposals for close to 3 years to numerous funding bodies, most of whom are mandated to address requests such as ours.

Rural Women Association is a vibrant and active NPO in the Montagu region and our programs stretch as far afield as McGregor, Bonnievale, Paarl, Saron, Touwsrivier and shortly, Mossel Bay. We also participate in programs in Zolani and Robertson.

Cape Winelands Municipality states that our food security program is the flagship food security program in the Boland region as does the District Governor of Rotary responsible for all of South Africa and Namibia. RWA believes that it is to any authorities’ advantage to work with our organization. We succeed! And we firmly believe that failure is not an option

Yes, the original intent was a shack, and it is designed like a shack. Looking from Mandela Road you will see other shacks that are the same appearance; only this one is larger, better built and has become something more than a shack.

This crèche, although threatened with being destroyed recently, has been actively opposed by certain parties in Montagu. Rural Women Association continued to build regardless. We have no choice. The children must come first, and this is the year 2007 after 13 years of democracy,

We hope this crèche will develop Mandela children and others from Ashbury, to hold no racist hatred or fear, enabling them to advance into the magnificent future South Africa holds for them.

Where poverty dominates in our community, RWA will continue to struggle to help, educate and empower,. And we wish to do this by joining hands with government authorities; utilizing both the national and provincial policies legislated to improve people’s lives.

But never doubt it; Daq vir daq, the struggle continues.

In closing I draw from the Bible, Mathew 12, and Verse 7:

“If you had known what these words mean; I desire mercy, not sacrifice. You would not condemn the innocent. For the Son of Man is the Lord of the Law.”

And:

Mathew 12, Verse 11: He said to them, if any of you has sheep and it falls in a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out? How much more valuable are these children than a sheep?”


Dulcie C. Winegaard, Chairperson
Rural Women Association
March 19, 2007





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