http://sacsis.org.za/site/News/detail.asp?iData=144&iCat=253&iChannel=1&nChannel=News

Time for Grassroots Urban Planning

The crisis of social exclusion in our cities is a key factor in the ferment in grassroots political society. It has been central to much popular protest in recent years, to the emergence of well organised grassroots movements to the left of the ANC and, also, the catastrophic pogroms in May.

Thabo Mbeki and Jacob Zuma both support a coercive response to this crisis. Their support for legislation to eradicate shack settlements is, ultimately, support for the state to send in men with guns to drive the poor out of the cities. None of the major shack dwellers' organisations have shown any inclination to rally behind the broader Zuma project. If he leads the ANC in the 2009 elections on his current platform of outright hostility to the urban poor he is certain to confront the same 'No Land, No House, No Vote' campaign that resulted in major clashes between police and shack dwellers during the 2006 local government elections.