9 July 2013
Abahlali baseKennedy Press Statement

Statement on Last Night’s Road Blockade by Kennedy Road Residents

Last night, and again this morning, hundreds of us blocked road around the Kennedy Road shack settlement with burning tyres. There is still a heavy police presence in the settlement.

The reason for these road blockades is that Mayor James Nxumalo failed to keep his promise to meet with us. On the 25 of May this year we organised a major road blockade. More than 500 people held the road. At that road blockade we handed over a memorandum of demands which included (1) that the upgrade of Kennedy Road and the provision of housing at Cornubia for everyone that that cannot be accommodated in the Kennedy Road upgrade that was negotiated with Mayor Mlaba’s administration be implemented; (2) that formal electricity be provided to the settlement and (3) that Nigel Gumede be immediately dismissed from his post.

We received a letter from the Mayor’s office on the 4th of June. In that letter the Mayor promised to meet with us by the end of the month. Today we are more than a week into July and we have heard nothing further about this meeting. Therefore we blockaded the road again to demand that the Mayor keep his promise to meet with us to discuss our demands.

We will continue to educate the politicians in their duty to obey the people.

We would also like to inform the media that the local ANC are planning a new plot against our movement in Kennedy Road. We relaunched over movement there, and held an election, on the 20th of June. Ten days before the relaunch, on the 10th of June, the ANC area committee held a meeting at Kennedy Road at 2:00 p.m. Ordinary residents of Kennedy Road were not advised of the meeting and because it was held during working hours most people were away at work. At this meeting there was a presentation by the Municipality and Khula Construction to present a plan for housing in the area – in fact they presented a plan to build a transit camp in Dodoma Avenue near Kennedy Road. On the 13th of June the area committee of the ANC called a meeting of 12 ANC members to discuss who would be appointed as the Community Liaison Officer (CLO) for the project and who would get what jobs on the project. At this meeting it was stated that S’bu Zikode would be a threat to the project and there was a discussion about a similar plot to the ANC attack on our movement in Kennedy Road in 2009. The matter has been reported to the police.

We will continue to defend our right to organise, democratically, outside of party politics. We will continue to demand land and housing in the cities and to oppose all forms of corruption, comradism and repression.

Mbusiwa Sibetha, Kennedy Road Abahlali baseMjondolo Chairperson: 072 306 3782
Bangeni Gumede, Abahlali baseMjondolo Youth League Spokesperson: 079 977 1723