Two people have been blinded this week in violent reprisals from State and local ANC-linked thugs as they try to push land occupiers out of Cato Manor in Durban, South Africa. Pic: AbM

The relatively new occupation, organised with shackdwellers’ movement Abahlali baseMjondolo (AbM), has been shaken by the extreme violence, which saw Smiso Maphumulo shot in the eye on Tuesday and Noluthando Masikiza blinded on Thursday. In a statement, AbM said:

Their ‘crime’ is that they have been impoverished by a system of oppression and have occupied land in order to have a place to live. The government of this country has no regard for the poor. It treats our legitimate and urgent aspirations for justice as criminal and rules us with violence.

The municipality has been interdicted by the High Court in Durban to refrain from demolishing, destroying and burning people’s property in seven land occupations, including the new land occupation in Cato Manor.

The court interdict further states that people whose homes were demolished are allowed to reconstruct. But because the ANC in the Province considers itself as law unto themselves they have continued with the evictions in violation of the court interdict.

Yesterday the Anti-Land Invasion Unit continued to demolish people’s homes. When the shacks were destroyed the materials were burnt. This was an unlawful and violent attack undertaken by a criminal state.

In Women’s Month the government of the ANC keeps emphasising their role in the fight for the rights of women. We ask which women are these when armed agents of the state can shoot at women who are poor and living under shameful conditions?

The situation in Cato Manor is getting out of hand because the ANC does not want to respect the processes of the law and because it holds impoverished black people in such contempt that it does not recognise our humanity. Continue reading “Cato Manor Resistance : A Repeat of mass Evictions under SA Apartheid”