Township Politics: Civic Struggles for a New South Africa

Mzwanele Mayekiso

Description

This insider’s account of an extraordinary period of national political transition is also a primer on a new radical philosophy, the street–smart Marxism that developed in South Africa’s sprawling townships between 1985 and 1995 and rendered them ungovernable for the apartheid state. Mzwanele Mayekiso, a young leader of the “civics”—as South Africa’s popular community organizations are called—spent almost three years in prison as a result of the civics’ militant organizing. Here, he interlaces his personal story with caustic assessments of apartheid’s hand–picked township leaders, with rebuttals of armchair academics, and with impassioned but self–critical analyses of the civics’ struggles and tactics. He ends with a vision of an international urban social movement that, he argues, must be a crucial component of any emancipatory project.

Sujets

• Littérature Sud-Africaine
• Littérature sud-africaine
• Afrique du Sud
• Alexandra
• Township
• Apartheid
• Politics
• Protest
• South Africa under apartheid
• South Africa
• Sudáfrica

Informations

• Publié par: UJ Press
• Date de parution: 24 février 2023
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781776424283
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 18 Mo

Extrait

Township Politics: Civic Struggles for a New South Africa

Published by UJ Press under the Hoopoe Press imprint University of Johannesburg Library Auckland Park Kingsway Campus PO Box 524

Auckland Park 2006 https://ujonlinepress.uj.ac.za/

Compilation © Mzwanele Mayekiso 2023 Chapters © Mzwanele Mayekiso 2023 Published Edition © Mzwanele Mayekiso 2023

First published 1996 Montly Review Press, New York ISBN: 978-0-85345-965-1

This Edition 2023

https://doi.org/10.36615/9781776424283

978-1-7764242-7-6 (Paperback) 978-1-7764242-8-3 (PDF) Cover design: Hester Roets, UJ Graphic Design Studio Typeset in 9/13pt Futura LT BT

Contents

Prologue by Tho z àmile Bohà

Foreword by Mel King Prefàce

Part 1 : A Welcome to Alexandra

1 AleXàndrà às Freedom Dàwned (eàrly 1990s) 2 My pReaexâdRâ YeâRŝ 64-85

Part 2: Alexandra at War . AleXàndrà Awàkening (198198) 4 The Adven of peoe's power (198  Lessons of he Urising  Beyond Aàrheid Bàrs (1981989)

Part 3: Alexandra in the Interregnum 7 Bàck o he Srees ànd he Srugge (19891990) 8 Civics ànd "WorkingClàss Civil Sociey" (19891991) 9 From Proes o Develomen? (19891991) 10 Càmàigns for CommuniyConrolled Develomen (1990199) 11 From Proes o Wàr (1990199) 1 the Dràmà of Locàl Governmen Negoiàions (1990199)

5

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7 11

17 35

9  86 108

1 1 1

19 190

10

PRoloGUE ThozamilE Botha

The book, Township Politics: Civic Struggles for a New South Africa is the first of its kind to be written by an activist, reflecting on the national urban struggles of the 1980s as a participant observer; utilising his community, Alexandra Township, as a case study.

Mayekiso’s book is easy to read, yet very nuanced in its intellectual analysis of community struggles during the period of apartheid and it also projects into the future of democratic South Africa. It compares and contrasts the lived experiences and the quality of life of township residents (with the middle and upper-class opulent lifestyle of the suburban dwellers) who in the main were excluded from the mainstream economic and political activity under apartheid. Though the conditions of racial inequality haven’t ameliorated but exacerbated in the period of democracy as it remains constant.

Alexandra township is adjacent to the exclusive and wealthy suburb of Sandton, the richest in Sub-Saharan Africa, yet the two communities exhibit an anomaly of poverty and wealth juxtaposed in post-apartheid South Africa. It also confirms the racial disparities of Johannesburg as a divided city under conditions of democracy, as the Sandton suburb is predominantly white while Alexandra is totally black.

Township Politics analysis is very familiar to me as it describes the condition of township communities in South Africa including my own city, Gqebera

i i

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TOWNSHIP POLITICS

(former Port Elizabeth) where I was a leader of the Port Elizabeth Black Civic Organisation, PEBCO, and a trade unionist.

The book was published in 1996, only two years after the onset of the post- apartheid democratic dispensation, based on Mayekiso’s experience as an activist, organiser, and community leader of the Alexandra Civic Organisation.

Reading Mayekiso’s analysis of urban struggles in Alexandra and South Africa before the advent of democracy; it is clear that 26 years into freedom, there doesn’t appear to be a definable quality improvement in the lives of people, nor any discernible transformation of the urban environment, because the suburb remains majority white in its population demographics, and wealthy: whereas the township continues to exhibit the old patterns of underdevelopment, poverty, and unemployment. In essence, the features of the apartheid city persist and are more stubborn in their perseverance under conditions of democracy.

In other words, the post-apartheid city is still racial and unequal in its development. Though, Mayekiso’s forthcoming Second Volume of Township Politics will provide a robust analytical reflection that helps us to understand in a more aggregate way: to isolate the bottlenecks that hamper the development of a truly non-racial city; the reasons why development stagnated and perhaps how best we could unlock the potential that exists to break new ground in meeting the commitments and promises of developing a representative city, inclusive and non-racial.

It is also clear that the democratic state has attempted to redefine the urban environment, through the introduction of the Urban Renewal Programs in which billions of Rands were invested in places like Alexandra township, Bekkersdal, Mdantsane, etc, but what remains murky, perhaps not well accounted for and documented is the extent of progress in the development discourse, as these environments remain unchanged and instead the situation is getting worse.

The introduction of the Reconstruction and Development Housing Program, which prioritised township residents to access the housing market, through the first-time home buyer scheme (and other housing mechanisms) didn’t destroy the edifice of apartheid planning as it only extended the township instead of integrating it with the suburb to create a non-racial City. And, the concept of integrated human settlement development was not applied as economic/