Forced removals marked

COMMEMORATING the forced removals of District Six residents 53 years ago was different this time around for hundreds of claimants.

The minister of rural development and land reform was expected to present a plan in two weeks’ time, which outlines a new mechanism to speed up the restitution process.

The District Six Working Committee hosted hundreds of people at the Castle of Good Hope to commemorate 53 years since District Six was declared a “whitesonly” area.

By 1982 more than 60 000 people had been forcibly removed from the area to barren outlying areas on the Cape Flats, and every year February 11 was a sad day for families.

The forced removals were repeated in suburbs throughout the city, peri-urban and rural areas in all towns.

All people of colour were removed from upmarket areas and prime land, reserved for whites only.

District Six Working Committee chairwoman Shahied Ajam said the commemoration was a celebration of things to come.

In November, the Western Cape High Court had ordered the government to speed up the restitution process and present its plan on February 26.

Advocate Geoff Budlender had taken on the case on behalf of the claimants, arguing that 20 years after the restitution process was started, 89% of District Six claimants, or 1 078 people, had not received a home.

Ajam said: “Between 2019 and 2021, we want all 42ha to be developed into houses for 4 000 families. I am in contact with government.”

South African Human Rights Commission provincial commissioner Chris Nissen said: “We will be doing this not only in District Six, but in Newlands and Claremont, and all places where the injustice took place.”