Crowd Renting or Struggling from Below? The Concerned Citizens' Forum in Mpumalanga Township, Durban, 1999–2005

Abstract

This article considers the problems of water in Mpumalanga Township in Durban, South Africa, and examines the emergence and activities of the Concerned Citizens Forum (CCF), for whom activism around water services was centrally important. It contributes to the debate over the backlog in municipal services delivery and the attendant emergence of new social movements in post-apartheid South Africa. Set against a background of changes in water policy, a profile of the water industry and the drive to cost recovery, the article provides an account of collective action in Durban, by investigating the history and activities of the CCF. The article questions the standing of the movement and argues that the CCF is given to ‘crowd renting’, lacks transparency, and is prone to disorderly decision-making and racial and leadership crises. The article contextualises CCF's collective action programmes, including its activism over water disconnections, by situating them in Mpumalanga's neighbourhood politics. By doing so, the reader encounters councillors of the ruling and opposition parties, CCF city-based intellectual-cum-activists, African township youth activists and local council officials and bureaucrats. The collusion and conflicts between these various parties highlight political opportunism, careerism, and the ruthless pursuit of self-enrichment, revealing the complexities of collective action and the contentious politics of new social movements. The article also highlights the looming crisis of the breakdown of social citizenship in relation to cost recovery and the struggles over water services.

Notes

¹ This article is a revised chapter from my unpublished D.Phil. thesis, B.S. Siwisa, ‘“This is People's Water!”: Water Services Struggles and the New Social Movements in Mpumalanga, Durban, 1998 – 2005’ (D.Phil. thesis, University of Oxford, St. Peter's College, submitted in April 2006).

² I set out on many occasions to meet up with and interview the leaders of the CCF, namely; Ashwin Desai, Fazel Khan and Fatima Meer. Professor Meer was sick and bedridden during that time, and therefore it was not possible to interview her. I made many arrangements to interview Ashwin Desai, but despite agreeing to meet me, on each occasion he failed to turn up and never offered an explanation for why this was so. Dates and interview times were successfully set up with Fazel Khan, but he always pulled out at the eleventh hour, usually a couple of days before the interview when I called to confirm times and dates.

³ S. Tarrow, Power in Movement: Social Movements and Contentious Politics (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, second edition 2000).

⁴ D. della Porta and M. Diani, Social Movements: An Introduction (Oxford, Blackwell Publishers, 1999).

⁵ This is South Africa's macro-economic policy which was formally adopted by the government in June 1996. It is premised on tight fiscal policies and the liberalisation of the economy. GEAR was adopted within a whirlwind of disagreement among the tripartite alliance (ANC, Congress of South African Trade Unions, and the South African Communist Party).

⁶ D. Atkinson, ‘Taking to the Streets: Has Developmental Local Government Failed in South Africa?’ In S. Buhlungu, J. Daniel, R. Southall and J. Lutchman (eds), State of the Nation: South Africa 2007 (Cape Town, HSRC, 2007).

⁷ F.F. Piven and R.A. Cloward, Poor People's Movements: Why they Succeed, How they Fail (New York, Pantheon Books, 1977).

⁸ Piven and Cloward, Poor People's Movements.

⁹ Tarrow, Power in Movement, p. 6.

¹⁰ Interview with Heinrich Bohmke, Salmon Grove Chambers, Durban, 24 October 2002.

¹¹ P. Dwyer, ‘The Concerned Citizens Forum: A Fight within a Fight’, in R. Ballard, A. Habib and I. Valodia (eds), Voices of Protest: Social Movements in Post-Apartheid South Africa (Pietermaritzburg, University of KwaZulu-Natal Press), p. 107.

¹² Draft White Paper on Water Services (Department of Water Affairs and Forestry (DWAF), South Africa, 2002), p. 15.

¹³ Ibid.

¹⁴ Free Basic Water Implementation Strategy, Case Study, Durban Uni-City, prepared by Palmer Development Group (Department of Water Affairs and Forestry, Republic of South Africa, 2001). Also see http://www.dwaf.gov.za/FreeBasicWater/Docs/Casestud%20%Study%20Durban.pdf (retrieved March 2002).

¹⁵ http://www.umgeni.co.za/company/companyphilosophy/intro.htm#managementstructure (retrieved March 2002).

¹⁶ Ibid.

¹⁷ Free Basic Water Policy and Water Services Development Plan, http://www.dwaf.gov.za/FreeBasicWater/Defaulthome.asp (retrieved March 2002).

¹⁸ www.engineeringnews.co.za/eng/news/business/?show = 30537 (retrieved March 2002).

¹⁹ www.kzntopbusiness.co.za/Public_Services/Umgeni_Water.htm (retrieved March 2002).

²⁰ www.engineeringnews.co.za/eng/news/business/?show = 30537 (retrieved March 2002).

²¹ ‘Free Water for 55% of South Africa’, Daily Dispatch, 6 November, 2001. See www.queensu.ca/msp/pages/In_The_News/2001/November/55.htm (retrieved January 2002).

²² Free Basic Water Implementation Strategy.

²³ Ibid.

²⁴ Ibid.

²⁵ Free Basic Water Policy and Water Services Development Plan, p. 8.

²⁶ Ibid.

²⁷ Interview with Neil McLeod, 28 November 2002, Durban Metro Water Services.

²⁸ Ibid.

²⁹ Municipal Infrastructure Investment Framework (2000), p. i, emphasis in original.

³⁰ Ibid., p. 18.

³¹ Ibid.

³² Draft White Paper on Water Services (2002), p. 33.

³³ Towards a Water Services White Paper: Issues and Options Discussion Paper (DWAF, Government Gazette No. 23377, 2002), p. 41.

³⁴ Professor Dennis Brutus has been one of the key supporters of the anti-neoliberal social movements, including the CCF.

³⁵ Cited in, Economic Development Department: Corporate Services (Urban Strategy Corporate Services, Durban, n.d).

³⁶ R. Pithouse, ‘South Africa's Undeclared War on the Poor’, Green Left Weekly, 2000, www.Greenleft.org.au/back/2004/429p28.htm (retrieved January 2002).

³⁷ Since 1994, it has been estimated that about 500,000 jobs were lost nationwide as a result of factory closures; in 1999 alone, 180,000 workers were made redundant.

³⁸ S. Mosoetsa, ‘The Legacies of Apartheid and Implications of Economic Liberalisation: A Post-Apartheid Township’, Working paper, Crisis States Programme, Development Research Centre, LSE, 2004.

³⁹ Interview with Heinrich Bohmke, Salmon Grove Chambers, Durban, 24 October 2002.

⁴⁰ Interview with Mpumalanga activists, Zakhele Hlongwane, Thando Mchunu and Brian Ngwenya, Mpumalanga, Hammarsdale, 2 December 2002.

⁴² Ibid.

⁴¹ Constitution of the Concerned Citizens’ Group [CCG], p. 1.

⁴⁵ Ibid., p. 94.

⁴³ Ibid.

⁴⁴ Dwyer, ‘The Concerned Citizens Forum’.

⁴⁶ Ibid., p. 102.

⁴⁷ D. Forrest, ‘Social Movements: “Ultra-Left” or “Global Citizens”’ Mail & Guardian, 4 February 2003.

⁴⁹ Interview with Bohmke, Salmon Grove Chambers, Durban, 24 October 2002, p. 7.

⁴⁸ For a detailed history of the Anti-Privatisation Forum (APF), see S. Buhlungu, ‘Upstarts or Bearers of Tradition?: The Anti-Privatisation Forum of Gauteng’, in Ballard et al. Voices of Protest.

⁵⁰ Ibid., p. 7.

⁵¹ Forrest, ‘Social Movements’.

⁵² Interview with Mpumalanga Activists, December 2002, pp. 3–4.

⁵³ This is shown from the private and informal discussions and interactions between the author and the Mpumalanga youth activists. The case over the lack of transparency over the management of the organisation's finances became acutely visible during the Social Movements’ Indaba, held in Johannesburg in August 2002. The Social Movements’ Indaba gathered major anti-social movements from all over the world to protest against the World Summit for Sustainable Development (WSSD) convened by the South African government.

⁵⁴ Interview with Mpumalanga Activists, December 2002, p. 2.

⁵⁵ Dwyer, ‘The Concerned Citizens’ Forum’, p. 99.

⁵⁶ A. Mngxitama, ‘Let Black Voices Speak for the Voiceless’, Mail & Guardian, 22 June 2005.

⁵⁷ Interview with Mpumalanga Activists, p. 3.

⁵⁸ Ibid., p. 5.

⁶⁰ Interview with Bohmke, p. 4.

⁵⁹ Interview with Bohmke.

⁶¹ See A. Desai, We are the Poor: Community Struggles in Post Apartheid South Africa (New York, Monthly Review Press, 2002).

⁶² The leaders behind Operation Khanyisa were such figures as Trevor Ngwane and Virginia Setshedi, who held leadership positions in the Anti-Privatisation Forum (APF). For in-depth analysis on the Soweto Electricity Crisis Committee (SECC) and the APF, see A. Egan and A. Wafer, ‘Dynamics of a “Mini-Mass Movement”: Origins, Identity, and Ideological Pluralism in the Soweto Electricity Crisis Committee’, in Ballard, Habib and Valodia, (eds), Voices of Protest, pp. 45–65. See also, S. Buhlungu, ‘Upstarts or Bearers of Tradition?: The Anti-Privatisation Forum of Gauteng’, in ibid., pp. 67–85.

⁶³ To further frustrate the Durban local council, the residents endeavoured to pay their collection of ten rand in coins, thus making the amount collected difficult to calculate (interviews with Mpumalanga activists and Heinrich Bohmke, October to December 2002).

⁶⁴ Fanie Moyo's constituency stretches from Eshongweni, Berksfarm, Ntabentengayo, Cliffdale, Summerveld, to Alverstone and Mpumalanga. He had been politically active since 1991 as a member of the Congress of South African Students (COSAS) at Wozamoya High School in Eshongweni, and was elected Chairperson of the ANC Youth League there. In 1992, he was elected by the structures of the ANC Youth League in Mpumalanga as its Zonal Secretary. From 1995 until 2001, Moyo was the Regional Secretary of the ANC Youth League in the Durban West region. At the time of the interview, he was Chairperson of the ANC in Ward 7, and a local councillor on an ANC ticket in the same ward.

⁶⁵ Interview with Fanie Moyo, Mpumalanga Township, Hammarsdale, 13 December 2002.

⁶⁶ A Black Consciousness-oriented political party.

⁶⁷ An ANC-aligned high school students’ movement.

⁶⁸ Schori, ‘Poverty: Prime Enemy of Peace and Democracy’. http://www.gppac.net/documents/pbp/intros/a5_pover.htm (retrieved March 2002). Pierre Schori was Deputy Foreign Minister and Minister for International Development Affairs for Sweden. He was writing for People Building Peace (PBP), a publication of the European Centre for Conflict Prevention (ECCP).

⁶⁹ See the following reports, ‘News and Opinions on Situation in Haiti’ http://www.williambowles.info/haiti-news/2005/sa_haiti.html (retrieved in 2005). ‘Mlaba and Hadebe to Travel to Haiti’, http://www.konpay.org/pmwiki.php/Main/ReportJanuary6, http://www.olgp.net/ministry/haiti/news/1.6.05.htm (retrieved in 2005).

⁷⁰ ‘Mlaba and Hadebe Left for Burundi Peace Talks’, International Peacekeeping News – Issue No. 9, May 1995, http://www.csf.colorado.edu/dfax/ipno0.htm (retrieved January 2003).

⁷¹ M. Buthelezi, ‘IFP Thanksgiving Rally at Lindelani, Buthelezi, 1998’, http://www.ifp.org.za/Speeches/270604sp.htm (retrieved March 2002).

⁷² ANC Daily News Briefing, 18 December 1998, http://www.anc.org.za/newsbrief/anc/newsbrief/1998/newa1218 (retrieved in March 2002).

⁷³ Ibid.

⁷⁴ Minutes of Thekwini Council, Friday 24 May 2002, http://www.durban.gov.za/Council/minutes/20020524/view (retrieved June 2005).

⁷⁵ H. Bohmke, ‘South Africa: Former Rivals Unite to Fight Against ANC Attacks’, http://www.greenleft.org.au/back/2001/447/447p22.htm (retrieved March 2002).

⁷⁶ D. Zondi, ‘We Won't Pay’, Witness Echo, 14 March 2002, http://www.queensu.ca/msp/pages/In_The_News/2002/March/pay.htm (retrieved March 2002).

⁷⁷ Interview with Fanie Moyo, 13 December 2002.

⁷⁸ ‘Warring Taxi Organisations Convene Meeting [2005]’, http://www.sabcnews.com/Article/PrintWholeStory/0,2160,98058,00.html (retrieved March 2002).

⁷⁹ Ibid.

⁸⁰ Interview with Fanie Moyo, 13 December 2002.

⁸¹ It is not possible here to disclose the names of the informants for politically sensitive reasons. For professional reasons, I also have to maintain my promise of confidentiality.

⁸² M. Hardt and A. Negri, Empire (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 2000).