Why our townships are hell

Townships came into existence under the apartheid regime, and black people were forced to live in them. Services to the townships were appalling, under apartheid most never even had electricity. Housing and schooling was also deliberately bad. This all formed part of the racist apartheid capitalist system that was built to exploit black people as extremely cheap labour.

Little has changed in the townships since 1994. This is because township residents are still exploited. All that has happened is that a small group of powerful black people have joined the white capitalists in the ruling class to exploit the majority of people. So everyday the rich and politicians steal from us and take our money by making us work as wage slaves, by selling us electricity and water, and by turning basic services and houses into products to make money out of us. Thus, society is not geared to meeting our needs but rather exploiting us – all of this madness is part of the capitalist and state system.

In Khayelitsha water, which is needed to live, is now sold to make money. The City, under both the DA and ANC, have cut peoples’ water off when the free lifeline is finished. This means no money, no water! But you need water to live! The same applies to Eskom and electricity. We have to pay for this, or we get cut-off. The result, people who can’t pay have to use paraffin to cook etc., which is dangerous and results in shack fires and death. But do the rich and politicians care? NO they don’t. All they do is use capitalism and the state to try steal from us and smash us when we complain.

Public spaces within our townships are also being privatised. You have to pay for things like community halls, which if they are meant for us, should be free. Developments in townships are for the local elite to use to make money from us. Local business people chose to build malls – for companies like Shoprite, Spar, FNB, Standard Bank – instead of using it to build the things we need like houses. When developments do come to our townships, no-one asks whether we want them. They never even ask us what we actually want! We are treated like mindless children – the rich and politicians make decisions and tell us what to do and force things on us whether we want them or not.

Housing too has become privatized. If you want a house you need money and loans from the banks. You spend your whole life paying these off – working to make the banks rich. Even the RDP houses are used by local business people, through local construction companies, to make profits. To cut costs they build poor quality houses that end up cracking and falling apart. Housing should be something that everyone should have; not something to make money from or for only people who can afford it. Thus we live in houses that are no better, and in some cases even worse, than under apartheid.

It is the politicians, the rich and the state that do these things to us. Under capitalism and the state system, we make the rich and politicians rich. In the end we die poor, and for long as the state and capitalism exist this won’t change. We have to fight against these if we are not going to die silent and poor. We need water, electricity, housing and spaces where we can express ourselves freely – these are the basics of a decent life. We, therefore, have to take all these things back – and workers and the poor have to take control of the economy directly to meet everyone’s needs. We also need to get rid of the state, and run society based on direct democracy. Only when this happens will we be truly free and only then will things like homelessness, cut-offs, evictions, crime, poverty, racism, sexism, frustration and misery end – only then will our townships stop being apartheid style hellholes.

Not Another COP Out!

For Climate Justice! Change the System

5pm Lookout Hill 25 Nov

Evening of talks, poetry & Music etc.

This November, ruling class scum (rich, politicians and state managers) from across the globe are descending, like locusts, onto the posh Durban Convention Centre for theCOP 17 meeting. We are told, by these very same ruling class parasites that they are coming to Durban and COP 17 to save us from global warming. Nothing could, however, be further from the truth!

It is, in fact, the ruling class who have caused global warming and environmental destruction. It is the rich and their friends in the state that have stolen and profiteered from oil and other minerals - so that they could live like kings and queens. It is them who have sent workers to die in the mines; it is them who have cut costs and poisoned workers in the factories and farms; and it is them who have dumped waste and air pollution all over the place, including in our townships. They have done this for two reasons - to make more money and become more powerful. While the rich have done all this, we have been forced to work in awful jobs (to increase their profits); to live in shacks and RDP houses that are falling apart; to live with no electricity and have sewerage running past our doors. When we complain, the ruling class try and silence us with the police. We say we will no longer be silenced!

The truth is that the whole COP 17 meeting is not about saving the environment or stopping global warming; it is rather about keeping the existing system in place – where workers and the poor are forced to work and live in misery – which includes being subjected to the bosses’ pollution! The COP 17 meeting is a meeting of the ruling class, by the ruling class, for the ruling class! It is about them trying to make money by buying and selling the environment, and screwing us over yet again.

The time has come to stop lobbying the ruling class – including those in the COP 17 meeting - as if they were our friends or as if they cared about us. The state and the rich are our enemies; not our friends. It is because of them, and the capitalist and state system that keeps them rich, that we live like dogs. To fight them and win the things we want – including less pollution - we need to use our own power. We need to stop going on our hands and knees and saying “please nkosi or please baas give me just a few more crumbs or please, please stop poisoning me at work or stop polluting so much”. We rather need to stand up and fight, and force them to stop doing what they are doing and give us what we want!

This means we need to begin linking our struggles and we need to build our class pride. Already townships protests are happening every day, and we need to start connecting these together so that they can become a massive movement. To do so, means recognising who our enemies are and who our friends are. To start to challenge the ruling class therefore, we need to continue to use direct actions, like protests, strikes and occupations, and build on these by directing them towards the right people - bosses, politicians and the state – and linking them up more and more until they become a massive force. That also means scoring victories here and now through our own actions, to win the things we need today like houses, clean water and cleaner working and living environments.

While we can and must win things today, if we want true freedom and equality, however, we need to build our movements into a huge force that can get rid of the ruling class, the state and capitalism in the future. We will only be free and equal when there are no more rulers and bosses. To do this we need to build on our existing struggles and through them fight for genuine People’s Power - where we run our own communities, cities and regions directly and truly democratically without scumbag politicians of any kind. We need to also begin to use workplace struggles, like for better wages and safer working environments, to also build our power as workers so that we can eventually seize the factories from the bosses and run them for the benefit of all. We don’t need any political party to do this, rather through our own movements, and through our existing struggles, we can build on our power until we are strong enough to get rid of the scum that rule and exploits us!

AGAINST COP17 AND THE RULING CLASS SCUM! FOR WORKING CLASS PRIDE! FOR WORKING CLASS POWER!