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Abstract
In 2005, the Zimbabwean government demolished huge swathes of low-income housing throughout the country's urban centres. This was one of the most radical reshapings of any country's urban housing patterns in the world's recent history. Yet any attempt to understand this event in relation to the current central concerns about the housing of the urban poor of agencies like UN Habitat, or the world's Millennium Development Goals, would only be partially helpful. So broadly are the parameters of what are deemed to be ‘slums’ drawn in such approaches that it has become difficult to evaluate where interventions should start and which policies might be most effective for improving living standards. The previous distinctions between housing types and problems for which housing specialists had argued—for example, that not all illegal housing types are slums—have slipped away. This paper argues that such distinctions proved to be crucial when analysing the demolitions in Zimbabwe, which centred on the legality of housing and not its inadequacy.
Notes
The outcomes for the rural people in these processes are very variable and will depend on whether those whose land is thus occupied are able to benefit from its increased value, which in turn depends on the fairness of local power structures.
One large informal settlement was Chirambahuyo, which was sanctioned by the state as a replacement for a squatter settlement that had developed in the last years of the civil war, in part due to internal refugees. This was sited on the edge of Chitungwiza, a huge dormitory town 26 kilometres south of Harare, developed in the last years of the illegal white settler government in the late 1970s in line with racist segregationist policies. However, Chirambahuyo was removed in the early 1980s. The absolute key difference with other demolitions, however, was that most of the residents were transferred onto legal plots in Chitungwiza with ultra-low-cost cores, water and electricity. As time went on this proved to be a major benefit for many (see, e.g. Schlyter, Citation2006).
Middle and upper-income residential areas also had some housing in their (more spacious) ‘backyards’ which was unplanned—often called ‘cottages’—partly because obtaining permission was complicated. However, despite threats, these were largely left alone.
The Times (UK), ‘Mugabe “Clean-Up” Victims Describe Plight to UN Envoy’, 1 July 2005. Available from: www.swradioafrica.com/pages/Murambatsvina.htm
Radio Nederland, ‘Driving Out the Filth in Zimbabwe’, 30 January 2007. Available from: http://static.rnw.nl/migratie/www.radionetherlands.nl/documentaries/070130doc-redirected
The Times (UK), ‘Mugabe's Human Rubbish Dump’, 6 June 2005. Available from: http://www.kubatana.net/html/archive/urbdev/050606timesuk.asp?spec_code=050601evictdex§or=URBDEV&year=2005&range_start=271&intMainYear=2005&intTodayYear=2011
Associated Press, ‘Zimbabwe Police Warn they will Crack Down Ruthlessly on any Protest’, 6 June 2005.
Zimbabwe Standard, ‘Our Bungling Govt does it Again’, 13 June 2005.
The Herald (Zimbabwe), ‘Demolition: Pigs found in Budiriro’, 14 June 2005.
UPI, ‘U.K. Blasts Zimbabwe, Yet Deports Refugees’, 24 June 2005.
Sunday Times, ‘Destitution and Despair in the New Zimbabwe Ruins’, 26 June 2005.
The Times, ‘Zimbabwe “Trash” Turn to Hovels for Homes’, 18 July 2005.
US FED News, ‘Demolitions, Evictions Continue in Zimbabwe’, 25 July 2005.
IRIN News, ‘Zimbabwe: Operation Live Well Struggles to Take Off’, 19 August 2005. Available from: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48674
Guardian, ‘Mugabe Defends Razing of Shanty Towns’, 10 June 2005.
BBC News Online, ‘Zimbabwe Demolition Images Shown’, 31 May 2006. Available from: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/5032156.stm
The report notes, for example, ‘there is general agreement that the building of shacks and extensions without approval … were not lawful. Therefore arguably these evictees were not lawfully present in the areas under current Zimbabwean laws’ (Tibaijuka, Citation2005, p. 65).
It is worth noting that such compensation, had it been paid, would have rarely helped those evicted from backyard shacks who were usually renting. The money would instead have gone to their landlords or landladies who were left on the plot.