100 days into the Government of National Unity, the shack dwellers movement condemns a sharp uptick in forced evictions in informal settlements
100 days have passed since the formation of South Africa's Government of National Unity (GNU), a coalition led by the African National Congress (ANC) in partnership with the conservative Democratic Alliance (DA), and several other parties. This unprecedented coalition marks the first time since the end of apartheid in 1994 that the ANC is in governance without a clear parliamentary majority.
Within this broad coalition, political rifts have been amplified, particularly on key issues of unemployment, land rights, and housing. As these issues intensify, an alarming trend is emerging: an increase in forced evictions of mostly marginalized Black communities living in informal settlements.
Hundreds of shack dwellers led by Abahlali baseMjondolo, gathered outside the Kwadukuza municipal offices in Ballito, KwaZulu-Natal, on September 16 to protest planned evictions and also demanded immediate access to essential services, including water and electricity, and condemned what they describe as racially motivated displacement by wealthy landowners in collision with the municipality in the region.
Land ownership: a persistent inequality
In South Africa, land ownership remains one of the most contentious issues, a legacy of apartheid policies that concentrated land in the hands of a white minority. Today, approximately 75% of farmland is still owned by whites, while just 10% of the population holds 80% of the country's wealth. With official unemployment at 32.9% (45.5% among youth aged 15-34) and more than 50% of the population living in poverty, the struggle for land access and economic opportunity is acute. The unequal distribution of resources also translates to basic services, with 55% of households lacking running water and 34% without flush toilets.
Income inequality remains staggeringly high, making South Africa one of the most unequal countries in the world. For millions, informal settlements provide a refuge in an economy that fails to meet their needs. Yet, these communities are increasingly under attack, labeled as dangerous and inconvenient to middle-class urban areas like Ballito in Durban, where there are ongoing attempts to evict people from the settlements. This framing justifies their displacement as informal settlements are seen as "undesirable," obstructing tourism and urban development. A continuation of the painful legacy of land dispossession and the vulnerability of marginalized communities under the current government.
Thapelo Mohapi, Secretary-General of Abahlali baseMjondolo (ABM), a movement which since 2005 has been fighting for land and housing rights, argues that the recent wave of attempted evictions in Durban expose a troubling alliance between right-wing interests and economic elites. "The white people who were advantaged during apartheid are back through the GNU, evicting and driving black people from the cities," he explains. "The ruling ANC has adopted a neoliberal agenda where the poor don't matter, but the markets do."
Thapelo describes these forced removals as part of a larger strategy to take urban spaces for profitable development, and effectively to sideline South Africa's Black working-class citizens. "Our people are driven from the cities because the settlements are seen as symbols of poverty," he continues, noting that these neighborhoods are often branded "dangerous" or a "health hazard" to affluent, predominantly white areas. "They say tourism will fail as long as shacks are there, and that crime will rise. But this is just a façade to advance the interests of the elite, reducing working-class Black South Africans to 'human waste,' expendable once their labor is no longer needed."
Despite promises of equitable development through the years by the ANC-led government, nothing much has changed. Forced evictions of informal settlements continued unabated, and for the Black working class, these displacements are a painful reminder of the government's unfulfilled promises.
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The coalition's partnership with conservative factions like the DA has fueled the perception that the government is abandoning its commitment to address structural inequalities. For many South Africans, the absence of meaningful land reform has left little choice but to occupy land informally, resulting in a precarious existence marked by the threat of constant displacement.
Abahlali baseMjondolo remains vocal in challenging the portrayal of informal settlements as obstacles to progress but instead a fight for dignity and right to land. "We cannot accept being driven out of the cities our labor built," Thapelo asserts. "We refuse to be regarded as human waste, disposable once we are no longer useful to the elites. The cities should not be playgrounds for the rich while the poor are relegated to the outskirts. We will fight to make our voices heard and to claim our right to live and thrive in our own country." For Abahlali baseMjondolo and poor South Africans, these settlements represent survival, resistance, and resilience in the face of systemic inequality.
Nicholas Mwangi is a member of the Ukombozi Library in Kenya.
