Linda Ensor
20 November 2008
Cape Town — Housing department officials and MPs yesterday dismissed suggestions in a Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) report that dissatisfaction over housing delivery was one of the key reasons behind the xenophobic violence this year.
They were responding to a presentation by HSRC's chief research specialist in the democracy and governance research programme, Adrian Hadland, on the research findings into the violence.
Hadland said 36 focus groups, convened in the troubled communities in four different areas immediately after the violence, had repeatedly cited as a major grievance that foreigners had houses when, in fact, they did not.
"Was housing a factor in the violence? Yes, absolutely, but it was not the only trigger." Rising inflation, unemployment and deepening poverty also played a part, and were likely to get worse.
Hadland said that about 900 protests had taken place throughout the country over service delivery over the past few years. The factors that had given rise to the xenophobic attacks were still there "and, if anything, even worse".
The HSRC recommended that there be greater transparency in the housing allocation process, and more communication by government about it.
But housing department chief director Clarence Tshitereke said the HSRC needed to assess the situation more comprehensively. The hurried study was too "superficial" to be able to draw a direct link between xenophobia and housing. T he focus should be on poverty in general, he said.
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