The presence of heavily armed police and security guards at the University of Witwatersrand seems to have put paid to any chance of stakeholders coming together to seek a solution to the ongoing funding crisis. Instead the struggle has been characterised by terrifyingly violent running battles with police in the past week, which have left some students battered, and no time at all for the round table.

There was a large police presence at Wits on Tuesday, with the SAPS cracking down on any potential protests (Photo: Greg Nicolson)

Daily Maverick
Bheki C. Simelane
17 Oct 2016

“It doesn’t feel like campus any more, it feels like a military base. It’s frightening,” first year Bachelor of Science student Tshegofatso Magano told Daily Maverick. Magano was speaking from the Wits West Campus last Thursday as running battles between police and students continued.

Magano said, “I was appalled and shocked to experience for the first time police shoot at students.” The 19-year-old Magano said he had never participated in a protest in his entire young life and the sight of heavily armed police on campus scared the daylights out of him. “It’s hectic.” Magano said as he inspected a rubber bullet wound to his leg from last Monday’s violence.

Many Wits students are young middle-class individuals who have never participated in protests, let alone violent ones. There is no guessing what the violence incubated by the prolonged presence of the heavily armed new guard at Wits (police) is doing to the psychology of these students.

“How many police do you think are here?” one female student asked on Thursday. “All of them I think.”

While she and her colleagues burst out in laughter, they might also have realised that this view was not far-fetched.

When being shot at, students capture the emotions in their songs. As shot after shot rang last Monday afternoon after the violence had spilled onto the streets of Braamfontein, occupants of Diamond House, some of whom are Wits students, started singing students’ favourite struggle anthem, Solomon Mahlangu. The song captured the mood, but also spurred students on.

Hanging from almost every window, occupants of nearby buildings joined in the singing of the song, much to the delight of students. It was sung beautifully.

Throughout last week, Wits students showed resentment for three names, – police, Adam Habib and Blade Nzimande. Police for “indiscriminately shooting at us unprovoked and taking over our campus.” Habib for ‘playing double standards and neglecting students’ interests’, and Blade for ‘pleading ignorance and reneging on the Government’s promise of free education’.

Last Monday just before the violence spilled into Braamfontein, some 200 students ended trapped in one of the halls. Everyone in the room was teary, choking from tear gas fumes. At this point police would have shot at a shadow, while a police chopper hovered low above the building, occasionally and conveniently ejecting more tear gas and ensuring that no one left the building.

Frightened and apparently shaken female students huddled along the passages, gasping, amid a litter of condoms. There is a belief among students that apart from curtailing the spread of HIV, condoms also contain the effects of tear gas fumes in the eyes.

“Have some,” said one female student as she handed a handful of condoms to an international journalist. “Thanks, I only use condoms for one thing,” he said while tears trickled down his cheeks. He had stopped complaining about the absence of local journalists to capture the scenes of choking students.

Fear was written all over students’ faces when they finally got a chance to leave the room. They sped off hurriedly with their hands blocking their ears.

“Shooting at us gets me so agitated that I want to fight back. I just want to retaliate,” Wits BA Law student Rashaad Yusuf Dadoo said. Dadoo was unlucky. Trapped in the hall with other students, Dadoo had a rubber bullet repel off his left elbow while he struggled to see and breathe because of teargas fumes. He was on the verge of collapsing. Trapped with students were also some SRC members, among them Wits SRC Deputy General Secretary Fasiha Hassan, who tried to move Dadoo around to try to protect him from further tear gas inhalation, but the fumes were everywhere.

Speaking from the West Campus on Thursday, first year Bachelor of Science student, 18-year-old Raheel Walljee said she no longer trusts the police. Walljee and her three friends had been attending class but chose to join a meeting at the West Campus on Thursday during break. As student leaders were explaining how students should conduct themselves during protesting, almost out of the blue police started firing rubber bullets.

“I don’t trust the police, not any more. They must leave. They are intimidating and scary. I have never been involved in a protest, let alone one characterised by so much violence. It’s a truly traumatic experience. We are here for a purpose but considering the state of affairs, we should be forgiven to think that we are better off in the safety of our homes,” Walljee said.

Students and journalists have all been treated to dramatic scenes of violence during the 2016 fees protests at Wits. On Monday 10th, students watched in shock as a police officer attacked student activist Mcebo Dlamini. The momentum felled both and a struggle ensued as Dlamini tried to break free. The moment was widely captured. Dlamini’s gesture indicating which direction students should march, aggravated the officer. The students were to march through a heavy police guard, and the officer felt Dlamini’s gesture in that direction undermined his authority. This played out on the steps of the Great Hall. (Dlamini was reportedly arrested regarding this incident over the weekend.)

The sight of angry students throwing themselves at armed guards lashing away with their batons instantly blurred the line between bullets and books, war and peace, between guardian and foe, hooligan and student. Both police and security guards constantly resorted to action which agitated students. The police shot at students while guards denied them entry into the Great Hall, sparking more chaos.

And apart from the fact that police drove students onto the streets of Braamfontein – a fortress of Johannesburg’s haves and have-nots – it became difficult to tell whether students or Johannesburg junkies perpetrated the violence that played out on the Jorissen/ Melle intersection where a bus was also torched.

Police presence was not only beefed up towards the end of last week, but the operations and directions of senior officers on campus were more sophisticated. Protesting students were swiftly combated by police. Gatherings were closely monitored, forcing students to change their strategy and protest overnight.

Many first year students who said they had never participated in protests were of the view that the strike was not yielding any positives except being reduced to daily running battles with police.

“These running battles will not take us anywhere, we need either a plan or a solution,” one student said. The students argued that authorities would not take the call for free education seriously if there were divisions or they disagreed.

South African students’ call for free education also has a demand that education be decolonised. Students’ demands would be better supported if they remembered that while free education for all might be achieved in a single announcement, decolonising the system might take a while. Currently most South Africans would like to believe that so far students have been reasonable in their demands for free decolonised education.

Wits University said learning will continue on Monday, while some students vowed to continue with the shutdown. Meanwhile a heavy police presence continues to haunt students and cause discomfort for many more while negotiations drag on. D

Related posts:

1. South African student protests and re-emergence of people’s power
2. Kolkata, India: Reflections on the Jadavpur Protests
3. Spring Comes to JNU: Love, Laughter and Rage

The first African People´s Tribunal on Transnational Corporations, that recently took place on 16th and 17th August in Manzini, Swaziland, was perhaps the most counter-hegemonic and brave event to bring some hope to mining affected communities in Southern Africa.

Pambazuka
Boaventura Monjane*
02 Sep 2016

Community members in Tete Province, Mozambique, presenting their case (Photo: Anabela Lemos)

Held in the context of the SADC Peoples´ Summit – an alternative popular gathering in parallel to the official Heads of States and Government summit, the Tribunal brought together activists and community members from rural areas where Transnational Corporations (TNCs) extract various minerals in Mozambique, South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Swaziland.

One of the strongest points about this Tribunal session was the opportunity that affected community members had to raise their voices and speak for themselves, about their own lives and the hardships they endure daily, exposing to a physically present jury, the atrocities and injustices perpetuated by Transnational mining Companies.

In addition, after days of overland journeys under arduous circumstances, including bureaucratic embarrassments at the boarders – as was the case of the Zambian and Zimbabwean community members – being at the same place in session with other people who have been equally affected by the extractive industries, created an environment of compassion and built a strong sense of comradeship, which will certainly strengthen mutual solidarity among the affected. The emotional tones through which the affected presented their cases demonstrated exasperation but also some kind of hope that the situation could be reversed.

Although the jury of this Tribunal was not expected to give any legally binding verdicts upon the evidences of the cases submitted and presented by the offended witnesses, a final pronouncement or positioning statement of the “judges” will perhaps be a crucial missing element for the affected people to get that strong confidence that destructive TNCs actions in their communities – and the industrial mining sector as a whole – can in fact face legal action and corporate impunity can in fact be stopped. They may be more certain in believing that those disastrous actions are wrong and unjust, and therefore must be opposed. As Gianni Tognoli stated in the opening of the Manzini session, the affected peoples presented their cases “not just as victims, but most importantly as the principal subjects of law”.

In their presentations, the affected community members announced demands to both the mining companies and their governments. There were similarities on the negative impacts caused by the mining activities (pollution, health problems, destruction of water and soils, displacements, etc.) and the demands were also clear: supported relocation of the communities, participation of the communities in decision-making, compensations of material losses (houses, contamination of water…) and more.

Gaining a slice of the cake or leaving the coal in the hole?

The argument that “leaving the oil in the soil and the coal in the hole” is predominantly promoted by experts and academics – and not necessarily a demand from workers and local poor communities – was clearly denied at the Peoples´ Tribunal in Swaziland. From the cases presented in Manzini it was clear to see that indeed, negatively affected communities by mining demand immediate “reparation” since the damage is already done and the impacts are already happening. However, it was equally clear to notice that there is a growing understanding, by local communities, that the narrative of development through extractivism is a myth – more and more they are seeing that mining is in reality an escalating looting of their resources and results in a deepening of poverty, food insecurity and water pollution. “We prefer to see the mine closed”, demanded a community member from Tete province in Mozambique.

The case of Xolobeni (Kwa-Zulu Natal province, South Africa) that was presented at the Tribunal, showed that local community in Pondoland Wild Coast is struggling to prevent Australian firm, Mineral Commodities (MRC), from extracting titanium in sand dunes in the Amadiba traditional area. This resistance has already caused the assassination of an anti-mining activist Mr. Sikhosiphi Bazooka Rhadebe in March 2016.

Threats and discouragement of organized struggles that resist mining is escalating everywhere, but there is also a determination not to give up: “We are not going be intimidated. MRC will never mine in our land”, said Nonhle Mbuthuma of Amadiba Crisis Committee as she finished her testimony at the tribunal.

The next session of the People´s Tribunal will take place in May 2017 in South Africa.

______

*Boaventura Monjane is a Mozambican activist and journalist. He is a PhD student at the Centre for Social Studies/Faculty of Economics at the University of Coimbra and researcher at the Centre for Civil Society, University of Kwa-Zulu Natal

Related posts:

1. 2016 SADC Peoples’ Summit – The Manzini Peoples’ Declaration
2. Popular University of Social Movements Workshop in Zimbabwe – Final Statement
3. Vale e Jindal julgadas na Swazilândia por danos ambientais e violação de Direitos Humanos

The current conjuncture in southern Africa in the political, economical, social, cultural and environmental arenas, shows that the region is progressively being affected, in different forms, by the advance of three devils facing humanity today: capitalism, neo-colonialism and patriarchy.

2016 SADC Peoples’ Summit
19 Aug 2016

The Manzini Peoples’ Declaration

We, the more than two thousands representatives of the people of southern Africa, members and affiliates of various Social Movements, Trade Unions, Economic Justice, Human Rights, and Environmental Networks, Feminists, Women and Youth collectives, Non-Governmental Organisations, individual activists, students and academics, gathered in Manzini, Swaziland, from August 16 to 19 for the SADC Peoples’ Summit, held under the theme: “A Peoples’ driven SADC committed to total liberation for all”. We gathered in this land of stunning and courageous people to dialogue and envision a better SADC for all, by exchanging views, struggles, experiences, dreams and love.

The current conjuncture in southern Africa in the political, economical, social, cultural and environmental arenas, shows that the region is progressively being affected, in different forms, by the advance of three devils facing humanity today: capitalism, neo-colonialism and patriarchy.

The region is faced by ongoing and deepening multi-crisis as a consequence of neoliberal economic policies. Transnational Corporations (TNCs) capture and control of peoples’ means of production such as land, water, seeds, forests and seas is escalating with the complicity of political and government elites. We see greater levels of poverty and unemployment as a result of the inappropriate development models that are based on extractivism, exploitation of people and violation of Human Rights.

Public space is progressively closing in all SADC countries meanwhile the actions and work of social movements and activists are being criminalized.

A People´s Tribunal on Transnational Corporations took place at this Peoples’ Summit. The Tribunal started its work with the hearing of a series of cases from southern Africa, where the interventions of extractive TNCs are gravely violating the fundamental rights of the communities, with the alliance of governments, which ensure full impunity for corporations. The independent analysis and judgment of the Tribunal will make visible the atrocities caused by corporations in the region.

After 4 days of discussions at the Manzini Peoples´ Summit, the following are our deliberations, recommendations and demands:

Democracy and Good Governance
We have identified five countries that need to be urgently dealt with:

Lesotho
• SADC must force Lesotho to implement the SADC Phumaphi commission of inquiry resolution in solving the Lesotho crisis;
• The detained soldiers of Lesotho must be released from maximum prison;
• SADC to ensure that no one is above the law in Lesotho and strengthen democracy, rule of law and media pluralism;
• Wives of the detained soldiers in Lesotho with the assistance of other countries should start campaign demanding the release of the detained soldiers.

Mozambique
• We call for an immediate end of war in Central and Northern Mozambique;
• President Nyusi must use his constitutional power to stop military operations and meet RENAMO´s leader urgently in order to reach a perennial peace agreement;
• Stop the assassination and kidnapping of activists, academics and members of the opposition.

Swaziland
• The country must be democratized by unbanning political parties;
• King Mswati must respect the rule of law and human rights as he assumes chairpersonship of the SADC, starting by allowing political parties in Swaziland.

Zimbabwe
• Zimbabwe government must respect human rights and allow democracy to flourish;
• The SADC must ensure that police brutality against innocent civilians, especially women and children, comes to an end;
• SADC must respond to and investigate the mysterious disappearance of political activists;
• SADC countries must tell the Zimbabwean government to dissolve establishment 64, Statutory Instrument 64 of 2016 and general laws Amendment 64 of 2016.

Mauritius
• We support the demand of Mauritius’ Social Movements for complete decolonization of the country and the closure of the United States´ military base on Diego Garcia;
• We call on the SADC heads of States to support the coming initiative to table a resolution at the upcoming UN general assembly on this issue.

Industrialization and Employment
• Governments must provide farming spaces in communities;
• Public policies must advance pro-poor agenda;
• Governments must nationalize all mines in order to create jobs. The domestication of Africa Mining Vision is need so that African can benefit.

Education
Corporate power is progressively capturing formal education institutions and curriculums to advance market and profit-based agenda. We propose a new and counter-hegemonic approach to address an alternative form of popular education for radical and emancipatory social and political change. Examples of the Popular University of Social Movements (UPMS) are to be promoted in order to reverse the current trend where the elitist and exclusionary formal education facilitates the spread of oppression and progress of capitalism.

We therefore demand:
• Free, quality, public and peoples’ driven education with innovative and emancipatory learning methodologies.

Women, Feminism and Gender
• SADC countries must protect women from sexual abuse, especially in Swaziland and Lesotho;
• Full participation of women in decision making must be ensured;
• Women should be allowed to own land in all SADC countries;
• Government should channel resources toward businesses that can empower women;
• No law or culture should be adhered to if it abuses or looks down upon women;
• Governments must provide protective measures and sanitary towels must be supplied to girls and women monthly for free;
• Governments must implement the Maputo Declaration on Agriculture, allocating half of the budget to women small scale farmers.

Natural Disasters
• Governments should intervene and provide water and farming inputs to mitigate the droughts in all areas affected by this disaster.
• Governments must ensure that an effective early-warning system is put into place to mitigate the effects of natural disasters – such as droughts.
• A regional campaign to demand SADC governments to prioritize and address drought-affected areas is needed.

Youth and Students
We note that effective and efficient Natural Resource governance and management is key to sustainable development financing in Africa. We therefore call SADC governments to:

• Domesticate the Africa Mining Vision to ensure the promotion of:
- Value addition to our natural resources;
- Local content development, and
- Policy reforms that plug Illicit Financial Flows (IFFs)
• Commit to domestic resource mobilization: No to conditional aid and debt that plunder resources of future generations!

The continued deterioration in democracy and good governance in SADC has marginalized youth from regional development process. We therefore call SADC governments to:
• Respect principles of democracy and good governance;
• Implement political governance policies reformation to allow youths’ participation in governance systems (youth quota system);
• Ensure transparency and accountability, Rule of Law, Human rights and Free and fair elections;
• Ensure young people are included in the decision making process and participate in all relevant spaces in SADC;
• Strengthen economical empowerment of the SADC youth;
• Equally promote youth interest and opportunities across the region;
• SADC must facilitate the skill and talent development of young people;
• A policy in relation to contracts, where a significant percentage goes to young entrepreneurs

Global trade structures and injustice
• Governments should ensure a safer and conducive trading environment for informal business.
• SADC must exit from the western economy
• We commit ourselves to campaign against unfair and oppressive trade agreements, to stop neoliberal policies promoted by the World Trade Organization.
• We demand a Stop to corporate impunity

Health
• Every person living with HIV should have access to viral load testing every 6 months and all health facilities must have viral loading machines;
• There should be free TB screening and X-ray for people living with HIV;
• Mosquito nets should be circulated to all health centres and be freely accessible;
• Scale up pediatric HIV treatment in all countries in the SADC region;
• Formalize and create conditions for payment for care workers;
• Governments must increase access to quality health care and training institutions;
• Decrease the doctor-patient ratio;
• Education about health issues must be intensified.

Agriculture
• Small-scale producers, fishers and farmers need a voice in developing agricultural and environmental policies.
• We demand a free circulation of peoples´ seeds across the region and the right of production, saving and sharing of native seeds among people.
Globalize the Struggle, Globalize Hope!
Nothing about us, without us!
SADC for the people!

Manzini, 19 August 2016

Related posts:

1. Popular University of Social Movements gathers in Harare: social movements and academics to dialogue on the state of land, seeds and food in SADC
2. Popular University of Social Movements Workshop in Zimbabwe – Final Statement
3. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Walter Chambati – Statement

Popular University of Social Movements Workshop: “Land, seeds, food, water, people and the climate in SADC – 15 years after the agrarian reform in Zimbabwe” – Harare (Zimbabwe), 12 -14 July 2016

FINAL STATEMENT

Preamble
Over the past 15 years, Zimbabwe’s fast track land reform programme redressed colonial land inequalities and now provides lessons for its neighbours on how to democratise land ownership and broaden economic participation. From July 12-14 2016, various social movements and academics from Zimbabwe, Mozambique, South Africa, Ivory Coast, Spain and Portugal gathered in Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare to discuss and debate the state of land, seeds, food, climate and people in Southern Africa. The event was being held under the banner/auspices of the Popular University of Social Movements, known by its Portuguese and Spanish acronym, UPMS.

The key outcomes of this meeting are as following:

We acknowledge that women are the main agricultural producers in the region. As such, women should be at the center of all agrarian reform, food sovereignty and self-determination initiatives.

We are a diverse group comprised of social movements, activists, peasants, and academics, women, men and youth gathered here in Harare to discuss on land, water, seeds and people in the SADC Region.

We believe that:

• Communities should have autonomy in deciding the utilisation of resources and should be empowered to make decisions related to their development now and generations to come.
• There is need to share resources in order to protect peace and the integrity of farmers and the citizens of a country.
• Land remains central and plays multiple functions hence it is central to our livelihoods, thus we need to protect the democratisation of land ownership for food sovereignty.
• Building collective struggles to fight for the redress of social inequities and articulation of movements is crucial.
• Popular and academic knowledge to inform our struggles is key
• Privatisation of land should be denounced and stopped. As such land should be taken out of the markets for greater access by the citizens of a nation
• Social struggles should be mobilised between institutional and extra institutional spaces. These should be peaceful and in support of the advancement of people’s rights.
• Capitalism, colonialism and patriarchy should be denounced and fought against. We acknowledge that the State is a contested terrain and that we need to work from within and from outside the State. We acknowledge that some of the problems that we are currently facing are a manifestation of problems that have historical ties to colonialism. We see the effects of colonialism and the brutality it causes and how it cocoons people in poverty.
• People know what they want and as social movements we should contribute to the construction of post-colonial states in order to match the new realities and to break boundaries caused by class, race, gender, age, religion, ethnicity, etc.
• We should delink ourselves from colonial ties and develop new home-grown frameworks to support the people of Africa in realising socio-economic, political and environmental rights.
• We need to re-enforce the importance of the peasantry that should be understood as a diverse group devoid of colonial Eurocentric definitions.
• In the formation of local agro industries owned and controlled by peasants and in the establishment of mechanisms that support peasants development.
• Some NGOs and peasant organisations are disconnected from the peasants on the ground and there is need to reconnect leadership with the grassroots.
• There is need to decolonise the mind and to recognise the value of indigenous knowledge systems, food and seeds. Currently, there is colonisation of culture and this impacts on foods and the choices that consumers make.
• We denounce the use of constitutions in some African countries to impede the redistribution of land to peasant farmers.

We demand:

Agriculture policies/agroecology
• Agricultural policies should support and promote agro-ecology for food sovereignty. As such, land use and access should be oriented towards agro-ecological practices for food sovereignty.
• In Zimbabwe, we call for the defense, democratization and deepening of the agrarian reform.
• In Mozambique, we call for immediate stopping of land grabbing and privatization of land.
• In South Africa, we call for a radical land redistribution and agrarian reform.

Mining
• Mining acts should not override agricultural activities. As such there is need to protect farmers and their livelihoods from victimisation and from capitalist interests.
• Land for agriculture should be protected against mining activities and where benefits are shared this should not be at the expense of the environment. There must be synergies between sustainable mining and agriculture for the benefit of peasants to promote food sovereignty.
• Mining should not be given precedence over agricultural activities. As such legislation and policies on mining should not undermine agricultural activities of a nation.

Knowledge
• The use of academic knowledge for the service of popular struggles.
• African states should endeavour to mobilise internal resources to support demand driven African research that benefits its peoples This research should be self-determined across spheres.
• We call for our governments to support our farming and the development of our indigenous farming, seeds and knowledge systems.

Funding
• Public funds should not be abused by the State. As such, community participation should involve wide consultation and the participation of marginalised groups.

Regional Trade
• Member states should promote intra African trade agreements and ensure the establishment of local markets, as the SADC protocol on trade.

National/local markets
• There is need to protect local markets from the domination of markets by Multinational Corporations
• We call for the State to put in place infrastructure that supports peasants so that they have access and links to reliable markets that lead them to improved livelihoods now and generations to come.
• Governments should capacitate peasants and provide them with information infrastructures and link them to adequate markets.
• There is need to reconnect producers and consumers through public procurement policies.
• We need to reorient the focus of production towards home markets before satisfying international needs.

Harare, July 2016
Popular Education for radical social transformation!
Globalize the Struggle, globalize hope!

List of participants and organizations

Related posts:

1. Popular University of Social Movements gathers in Harare: social movements and academics to dialogue on the state of land, seeds and food in SADC
2. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Walter Chambati – Statement
3. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Elizabeth Mpofu – Statement

Following weeks of public demonstrations against corruption, bad governance and a rapidly deteriorating economy, people all across Zimbabwe heeded a call last week for a nationwide stay-away, in an act of defiance against the government.

Africa is a Country
Jacquelin Kataneksza
12 Jul 2017

In recent weeks, protests both within and outside the country have increased in both number and intensity. On Friday July 1, the Zimbabwe-South Africa border post, Beitbridge, was shut down and a Zimbabwe Revenue Authority warehouse set on fire, after citizens took to the streets to protest a government ban on the importation of basic goods.

On Monday July 4, public transportation drivers in Harare clashed violently with police during riots over police harassment and extortion on the roads, while in London, UK activists besieged Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa. The following day, teachers, doctors and nurses in Zimbabwe began nationwide strikes over the government’s failure to pay their salaries on time.

President Robert Mugabe’s order for Zimbabweans to “go about their normal business” on Wednesday went unheeded. Rather, the national stay-away day, galvanized by the social media movement #ThisFlag (to contest ownership of national symbols by the ruling party), marked one of the biggest and most peaceful stay-away actions since 2007.

In South Africa, a wing of demonstrators from the #tajamuka movement, called for Zimbabwean residents there to protest outside the Zimbabwean consulate. The Zimbabwean government responded by shutting down the social media networks, particularly Whatsapp, in an effort to thwart the stay-away. The Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (POTRAZ) further warned members of the public against sharing information or images pertaining to the stay-away, citing such materials as threatening, subversive and offensive, and stating that anyone generating or sharing such materials would be arrested. Hackers from the group Anonymous Africa retaliated by shutting down government websites and the state controlled broadcaster, the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC). In the aftermath of the stay-away, leaders of the #tajamuka movement are calling on citizens to march on the State House this coming Saturday and demand Mugabe’s resignation.

While stay-aways have been held several times since 2000, this one is markedly different on account of its non-partisanship, and its use of social media as a mechanism through which to foment and coordinate dissent: Citizens, through direct public mobilization, have deliberately articulated the need for an alternative social order; they have done so without a formal opposition political party to galvanize them; they have done so using the technological avenues available to them. Zimbabwean Twitter feeds, Whatsapp threads and Facebook walls have become spaces of electronic civil disobedience.

This digital activism is not restricted to the online environment. It has manifested in the form of collective public action. The use of social media platforms allows for the co-construction of a new type of social movement and the possibility for alternative forms of social, political and economic organization. Concrete demands have been made. Calls have gone out for the government to remove roadblocks that police officers use to demand bribes, pay civil servants on time (by the end of last week, the government had paid some of the salary arrears), take action against corrupt ministers, remove import controls (which have since been somewhat relaxed), and rescind plans to introduce “bond notes” as a means of easing the liquidity crisis in the country.

Mugabe’s government is facing serious popular resistance. Could this resistance be the basis of a national movement with real political potential? Yes, absolutely. Zimbabwe is in a new phase of politics. The public demonstrations – both organic in the form of riots and protests and organized in the form of the strike and national stay-away – point to an increasingly active and performative citizenry. Through the interface of global digital platforms and local activism, Zimbabweans are reconfiguring visibility and voice, understanding them locally, nationally and transnationally, and thereby illuminating new possibilities for alternative subjectivities and social formations.

But, there are concerns. As things stand, three separate resistance blocs are most visible; #ThisFlag, #tajamuka and Acie Lumumba’s fledgling political party, Viva Zimbabwe. A key challenge moving forward is to foster a continued coalescence of ideas, visions and plans beyond anti-Mugabe rhetoric and politics. The recent and ongoing actions in Zimbabwe point to very real forces at work, with the potential to transmute political and social arrangements within the country. Looking ahead, Zimbabweans will need to harness those actions, ideals and agendas cohesively so as not to lose momentum or face the risk of falling into obscurity – the unfortunate and all too common destination of many such movements.

Related posts:

1. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Elizabeth Mpofu – Statement
2. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Walter Chambati – Statement
3. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Boaventura de Sousa Santos – Statement

Workshop “People Land Seeds Food – 15 years after the agrarian reform in Zimbabwe”. Universidade Popular dos Movimentos Sociais – Workshop Harare – Zimbabwe 12 to 14 July 2016.

Statement – Boaventura de Sousa Santos – Centre for Social Studies/University of Coimbra – ALICE Project

This Popular University of Social Movements workshop intends to perform a deep and serious discussion, in a form of exchange, on the meaning of the Zimbabwe land reform, looking at its impacts after 15 years. As Zimbabwe is intimately linked with other Southern African countries, the workshop will also look at the current situation in the neighbouring countries, regarding issues such as land, seeds, food, water and climate, aiming to strengthen cooperation and co learning from the available experiences.

Related posts:

1. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Walter Chambati – Statement
2. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Elizabeth Mpofu – Statement
3. Popular University of Social Movements gathers in Harare: social movements and academics to dialogue on the state of land, seeds and food in SADC

Workshop “People Land Seeds Food – 15 years after the agrarian reform in Zimbabwe”. Universidade Popular dos Movimentos Sociais – Workshop Harare – Zimbabwe 12 to 14 July 2016.

Statement – Elizabeth Mpofu – Zimbabwe Organic Smallholder Farmers Forum

This Popular University of Social Movements workshop intends to perform a deep and serious discussion, in a form of exchange, on the meaning of the Zimbabwe land reform, looking at its impacts after 15 years. As Zimbabwe is intimately linked with other Southern African countries, the workshop will also look at the current situation in the neighbouring countries, regarding issues such as land, seeds, food, water and climate, aiming to strengthen cooperation and co learning from the available experiences.

Related posts:

1. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Walter Chambati – Statement
2. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Boaventura de Sousa Santos – Statement
3. Popular University of Social Movements gathers in Harare: social movements and academics to dialogue on the state of land, seeds and food in SADC

Workshop “People Land Seeds Food – 15 years after the agrarian reform in Zimbabwe”. Universidade Popular dos Movimentos Sociais – Workshop Harare – Zimbabwe 12 to 14 July 2016.

Statement – Walter Chambati – African Institute of Agrarian Studies

This Popular University of Social Movements workshop intends to perform a deep and serious discussion, in a form of exchange, on the meaning of the Zimbabwe land reform, looking at its impacts after 15 years. As Zimbabwe is intimately linked with other Southern African countries, the workshop will also look at the current situation in the neighbouring countries, regarding issues such as land, seeds, food, water and climate, aiming to strengthen cooperation and co learning from the available experiences.

Related posts:

1. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Elizabeth Mpofu – Statement
2. UPMS Workshop Harare Zimbabwe 2016 – Boaventura de Sousa Santos – Statement
3. Popular University of Social Movements gathers in Harare: social movements and academics to dialogue on the state of land, seeds and food in SADC

That a judge in post-apartheid South Africa has to use terminology that harkens back to a centuries-old stereotype about black male sexual danger should tell us something about ourselves. That she feels confident to say that her racism is nothing compared to the “bigger issue” of gender violence should make us worry about racism masquerading as concern about African women’s well-being. That we think white male violence is not also endemic should make us ashamed.

Daily Maverick
Sisonke Msimang*
09 May 2016

Given the already strident voices that we hear calling for the death penalty and indeed the racialisation of crime in the South African media, Mabel Jansen’s comments must be taken very seriously.

Mabel Jansen is fundamentally different from Penny Sparrow and Matthew Theunissen because she holds a public position. Her private prejudices are a matter of public interest because she is a judge. In Jansen we see what critical race theorists mean when they say that racism is prejudice plus power. Apartheid wasn’t simply racist because some whites had anti-black views; it was racist because that hatred was legislated and backed up by institutional power.

Jansen has probably made hundreds of judgments involving black people; most of them will have been poor and of course many of them will have involved sexual offences. Every day she has performed her job, and on each of those days she has been racist. It is important to remember that as Eusebius McKaiser suggests in Run Racist Run, “racism isn’t restricted to what we do. Racism is also intimately about who we are. […]Racism has seeped into the character of the racist even when we do not see the racist performing racist action. As he goes no to say, “racist action comes from somewhere rather than being a random nasty event over which the person who committed it has no control”.

This is a crucial statement. We have, in Mabel Jansen, a racist character. The judge is therefore infinitely deserving of public outrage, and all South Africans who believe in justice should be outraged. Jansen’s role as a judge is especially ironic given her views. One of the greatest travesties of the negotiated settlement was that it did not sufficiently address the racist belief systems that were at the heart of apartheid. As a result, we had a generation of judges who carried out apartheid law, whom we inherited in 1994. Jansen, however, is a new judge. She became a judge in 2013 and before that served as a chair of the Pretoria Bar Association. She has been a silk since 1984. In other words, this is not a deranged member of the legal profession who has been sidelined by her peers. She is an individual in good standing.

There is no question that in the coming week she and her defenders will try to explain away her racism. Already she has suggested that her racist words were taken out of context and has claimed that she is being attacked. Already one newspaper group has suggested that the death of her husband (the details of his death and when it took place are not clear) has something to do with her racism.

Sensible South Africans will not believe this. The judge will have to go. It would be best if she resigned rather than subjecting the country to a long and dramatic hearing process, but we are not a country known for good leadership in this regard.

Even as she leaves the legal profession in disgrace, we will need to address the elephant in the room, which is that Jansen’s is an especially sneaky but common form of racism; the sort that masquerades as concern for black women. In her Facebook postings she claims that all black men are rapists and child molesters. When she is challenged for her racism in this regard she dismisses the concerns of her detractor and says she is talking about, “the bigger issue of rape”.

Already there are those who are agreeing with her, suggesting that she is merely pointing out “an uncomfortable truth”.

The contours of racism have always been gendered. Black women bear the brunt of patriarchy, of course, but in the racist mind, black men are brutal and highly sexed. Jansen’s words come out of the classic Black Peril narrative. Black Peril was the name given to the social hysteria that swept through white settler colonies in the late 1800s and early 1900s. It involved fabricated and sensationalised accounts of white women being raped by black men. Black Peril narratives were responsible for colonial and apartheid laws against “race-mixing” and often led to the incarceration, flogging or execution of black men.

Jansen takes a page straight out of this history in her Facebook postings addressed to Schutte when she writes, “Gang rapes of baby, daughter and mother a pleasurable pass (sic) time… They are simply now in a position to branch out and include white woman (sic). No Gillian, the true facts are definitely not those espoused by the liberals…”

The judge’s sweeping generalisations are appalling, of course, but they are also cast as fact. Her belief that these are “true facts” will be crucial for those seeking her dismissal. Jansen believes – as all racists must – that it is a “true fact” that black men believe “a woman in just there to pleasure them, period”. If she thinks that, how likely is it that an African man standing before her will receive any kind of justice? How can the presumption of innocence operate in the face of such alarming bias?

Jansen goes further, suggesting that black “mothers are so brainwashed they tell their children that it is the father’s birthright to be the first”. She also says she “has yet to meet a black girl who was not raped at about 12”. In matters concerning adoption, guardianship and child welfare, if all black mothers are brainwashed, and all African girls are raped by the age of 12, again, can a black woman ever stand before this judge with any sense of dignity and subjectivity?

One of the most disturbing aspects of the judge’s messages relates to her tone. She writes with urgency. She is passionate and driven. She is speaking out of a sense of mission and purpose. One gets the sense that Jansen believes that if she does not speak about this, about all of these “true facts”, then black men will never stop, and women – all of us, white and black alike – will continue to be victimised.

This is unsurprising in one sense. Self-righteousness goes hand-in-hand with racism. This is why racists so rarely apologise. They think they are right. Often, they also believe that their actions are motivated by a desire to “tell the truth”, or to combat social ills. Mabel Jansen has already begun to cast herself as a hero in the fight against sexual violence, as a way to justify her racism.

Never mind that white privilege keeps matters like rape and sexual violence against white women and children and nongender conforming people from public view. Never mind that white survivors of family violence tend to have more choices about whether and how to report their rapes and violations and therefore have far more confidentiality than black survivors and victims.

Never mind that white privilege allows white men to evade prosecutions, and keeps police out of white homes except in the most dramatic circumstances. When you live behind a high wall it is much harder for the police to simply barge into your home than when you live in a shack. And as we saw in the Oscar Pistorius case, white men in our society are generally given far more leeway than anyone else. One needn’t wonder for too long about what might have happened if a black man had been shooting guns in Tasha’s in the middle of the day as Pistorius did.

White male violence goes unchecked and unreported and is therefore hidden from public comment. In other words, we have a national political culture in which white men’s violence escapes comment while black male violence is fetishised and amplified.

Outrage over Jansen’s coarse racism should not overshadow the “true facts” in this matter. Her views remind us that gendered racism has always disadvantaged black men. Our analysis of racist sexism and sexist racism must be nuanced enough to understand that it has disadvantaged black women too and that these disadvantages have different contours and different material and economic implications.

Her views remind us that we live in a punitive culture in which black male misconduct is dramatised and sexualised by the very institutions that are supposed to mete out justice, just as black female victimhood is exaggerated and instrumentalised by people who don’t care about black people’s lives. Her views remind us that the Black Peril has not disappeared. We must be wary when racists dress themselves up as protectors of women’s rights in order to make moral claims that can never represent the struggles of black women. Our apartheid past is still present but out of the flames that engulf this career I hope we can build a future that is better and stronger than our present moment.

*Sisonke Msimang is currently working on a book about belonging and identity. She tweets @sisonkemsimang.

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2. Is violence against women too common, too ordinary to qualify as interesting?
3. South Africa: The inhumanity of dividing identities

Life is always difficult in the shacks. If you are poor and black you can be killed with impunity.

Abahlali basemjondolo press statement
12 Feb 2016

But it is not only the politicians and their izinkabi, or the police or private security companies that take our lives. We live in life threatening conditions every day. We die in the fires, from disease, drugs and crime. Our children die from diarrhoea. Our neighbours die because the roads next to the settlements are not made safe for pedestrians. The economy excludes us. The development of the cities excludes us. We are denied access to land, electricity, water, housing, education and work. We are also denied the right to participate in the discussions about the future of our society and in decision making about our lives and communities.

We do not count to this society. We are left to live a life that is dangerous, exhausting, and stressful. Death is always close by. We can work for years and still have nothing to give our children. We are treated like animals, not people. We are treated like rubbish. It is only in our struggle that the value of our lives is affirmed. We struggle for dignity but we also find dignity in struggle. We bury our dead with dignity.

On the 11th of January 2016 we were very sad to lose Khaliphile Jali. Jali contributed immensely to the struggle of Abahlali in Kennedy Road before we were driven out of the settlement in 2009. He was one of the Kennedy 12. He was one of the men arrested on fabricated charges and kept in Westville prison for a year. The charges against him, and the others, were thrown out when the case came to court. There was no apology for this fraud, this abuse to these men and their families. Jali was 33 years old. He had 3 children. He had been sick for a while before he passed on. He was laid to rest on the 24th of January at his Dayimane home in the Eastern Cape. He will be remembered for his courage in the fight against injustices and oppression.

On the 14th of January 2016 Abahlali also lost Baba Khumalo, an old umhlali from the Siyanda branch. He had a heart attack and passed on. Baba Khumalo was also a poor man. The stress of impoverishment means that heart attacks, high blood pressure and panic attacks are common, even among the young. He died fighting for dignified housing for his family and community. Baba Khumalo was married to MaZulu and had four children as well as grandchildren. We were very encouraged by the manner in which Abahlali branch in Siyanda supported and cared for the Khumalo family. At times of great loss like this the meaning of ubuhlali is confirmed as a living practice. Our struggle is not just about service delivery and materialism. It is also about the proud spirit of belonging to a collective who are determined to humanise the world.

On the 24 January 2016 we lost another comrade. James Nyathi was an umhlali who lived in the Marikana Land Occupation in Cato Crest. He was electrocuted to death while visiting a friend in a settlement in Chatswoth. He died instantly. Nyathi was originally from Zimbabwe. He was undocumented. He came to South Africa long time ago, while he was young, and found himself a partner who is a South African. They had one child. Nyathi was a very active comrade in good standing in our movement. When the police discovered his body he was registered as an unknown individual because he didn’t have papers. The state wanted to bury him as an unknown person. But he had family, neighours and comrades. His Cato Crest comrades refused to accept that the state should bury him. They went to identify and claim the body. They located his family and neighbours back home. The Cato Crest branch raised R6 000.00 from within the land occupation and negotiated with a funeral parlour to ensure that Nyathi had a dignified funeral. For us ubuhlali is well demonstrated in this tragedy. When comrades value human life we do all we can to lay our fallen comrades to rest with dignity. In the week of Nyathi’s passing the Abahlali Women’s League were up and down with food, donations and support to his wife. The spirit of neighbourhood and the love and care we witnessed during this difficult time for Nyathi’s family confirmed ubuhlali.

On the 6th of February we were very sad to lose another leader. Isac Mabika was an Abahlali branch coordinator. He was originally from Mozambique. He was 33 years and had two children with his South African partner. Mabika was a very active member and a leader in our Briardene branch. He was attacked by an unknown man at 6 in the morning and killed with an axe. Even in this time of great loss we were encouraged by the spirit of ubuhlali and unity of the community working hand in hand with the family to repatriate his body back to Mozambique. The suspect is still at large and no arrest has been made. Abahlali held a Memorial Service to honour Mabika on Thursday, 12 February. He will be laid to rest in Mozambique on Sunday, 14 February.

To be poor means to live with death as a constant presence. It means that daily life is a struggle for survival. As we struggle for land and dignity we must also take care of the sick and bury the dead.

Contact:
TJ Ngongoma 084 6139772
Zandile Nsibande 074 7675706
Thapelo Mohapi 076 1861884

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3. Enforced Disappearance Commission: Truth, Justice and Reparation for Dignity