SPEECH BY LN SISULU MINISTER OF HOUSING AT THE ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING OF THE ORGANISATION FOR CIVIC RIGHTS
25 August 2007
Durban
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Read by Special Advisor Saths Moodley
Invited guests
Ladies and Gentlemen:
Time and circumstances have not allowed us to meet, until exactly today. For me this is deplorable. Your organization has, as I read, been involved with matters on housing since the time of apartheid. Even in the new democracy you have been keeping busy conducting two important surveys that I will later refer to in this speech. But I would not like you to believe that we do not value civic organizations as the reason for us not having met quite earlier. Our excellent working relationship with the Federation of the Urban (and Rural) Poor attest to the fact that we do indeed believe that civil society has in our unfolding democracy an even greater role to play than during apartheid. What would account therefore for the failure to have met you sooner is perhaps the fact, and I would like to admit this shortcoming, we have not developed a broader view of the kind of relationship we would like to have with civil society. Thus, for example, whilst the emphasis by FEDUP on community savings has facilitated our relationship with that organization we have ignored those organization dealing with the ‘rights’ aspect on housing.
But the occasion has now come. And as I have been made to understand, you would like me to talk on the theme of partnerships for better and just living conditions. This is a theme that has been dominant in the thinking of civil society since the days of the liberation struggle. It was even more dominant within the liberation movement, hence the resonance to this day of the slogan ‘A Better Life for All’.
Both these two forms of organization, namely, civil society and the liberation movement, highlighted the fact that racial oppression in the form of apartheid simply masked a more fundamental problem of the structuring of society in ways that would enable the economy to benefit others whilst the rest were left mired in underdevelopment. It was this exposition of the ideology of apartheid that ensured that we married our real life experiences with theory. This is how, collectively, we came to understand that the destruction of apartheid was itself not sufficient to enable a better life for all. The economy needed to be transformed so that access to opportunities could be opened to all. I this regard in the adoption of the Constitution in 1996 was included the objective to ‘Improve the quality of life of all citizens and free the potential of each person’.
Thus, rights to land and housing were conferred to all, particularly those who previously did not have these.
It is true, Chairperson, that we cannot hope to achieve better and just living conditions for our people without realizing the rights to socio-economic development that they have been accorded by the Constitution. Our particular circumstance which has been bequeathed to us by apartheid dictates that we must not treat the process casually as if it is from the ordinary. A better life for all will not be achieved through economic processes playing out some assumed natural stages. Only a concerted and combined effort by those with a perspective of the origins of the rights we have in our Constitution will enable us to achieve a fundamental difference in the lives of people utilizing in this regard the rights they have been conferred. Because of their awareness that both injustice and underdevelopment are the direct historical products of past and continuing economic relations they confront the task with a determined purpose. They confront the issues that need dealing with as allies, and not merely as partners.
The privilege we have is that you are an organisation that was not only born but developed its strength in the fight against apartheid. Thus the two critical surveys you have conducted, namely, the 1997 Durban Community Survey and the 2002 Four Townships Survey, confirm not only that you are aligned to the homeless but also that you want to carve a role too for yoursleves in our developing democracy. That you have involved yourselves in their education and the study of their health problems makes you a dependable in our stage of democracy.
I would like to depend on an ally such as yourselves in highlighting the role that the scarcity of land plays in achieving a better and a just life for all. Not least because land apart from finance land is the predominant resource upon which all our strategies will fail or succeed. Limitations regarding the acquistion of land have thus, notwthistanding the achievements we have made in the thirteen years of our democracy in delivering 2,3 million low-cost house made us fall severly short on achieving an integrated society. Consequently, the spatial distortions of apartheid against which you yourselves fought are still a clearly visible sight on our landscape. If you take into account that our urban growth had been by 2.1 percent per year between 1996 and 2001, as a result of the process of rapid urbanization, you would realize that land availability is indeed the greatest threat we face in our delivery. You would realize that whatever strategy we have in place it will only be good if there is adequate land available to build human settlements, land that will enable integration.
Because access to land to build human settlements is a right that our people enjoy we are therefore enjoined to ensure that apart from providing land to satisfy the current demand for housing we are also able to set aside land that anticipates the growth of society. However, we can do none of this critical delivery and planning if we do not have land. It is on economic grounds, on issues related to security of tenure that your 1997 Durban Community Survey indicates 37 percent of the homeless around Durban find themselves living in the periphery in informal settlements. Marginalised, they therefore become susceptible to diseases that in an apparent contradiction to better life cut their lives short at often times.
Out of this arises the need to conduct assessments that would indicate the availability of land and help guide the development of integrated human settlements. Previously, as you would know, we had asked Municipalities to place a moratorium on land sales so that land is prioritized for housing. But this was state land. So the focus of the new effort should be on all other land that is not state owned. Through the research capability you have developed stakeholders such as yourselves could play a critical role in the process, particularly in provinces such as KwaZulu Natal that are most affected by urbanization.
You could too, by participating in processes related to the drafting of Integrated Development Plans (IDPs) consistently raise the challenge we face regarding the acquisition of well-located land. For our assessment indeed is that the developments that are currently taking place within the inner cities will not address this urgency unless a co-ordinated intervention that is supported by organizations such as yourselves is put in place.
Given that KwaZulu Natal receives the greatest number of in-migrants after Gauteng and the Western Cape, Ethekwini had a population increase of 27 277 in 2006. Here where a quarter of the country’s informal settlements are present greater numbers of people share rooms. The urban population is three times that that of rural areas. No wonder then that over 1 million people of the province live below the Minimum Living Level. No wonder that an organization such as yourselves would have seen their circumstance and resolved to want to be involved in alleviating their plight. This, despite the evidence that the historical backlog of housing is shrinking as a result of the state’s efforts in realizing their rights.
Finally, let me thank you for indicating the confidence you have in us and in therefore wanting to partner with us to confront the challenges I have spoken about. We do believe in you as you believe in us.
A radical turnaround in the socio-economic conditions of our people needs to be the defining character of the present state of our democracy. And for this to be achieved there has to be a determined effort from not government but the rest of society focused on those that are poor.
I thank you for having invited me and I thank you for all your efforts focused on the homeless.
I thank you.