No electricity, flooded shacks, broken communal toilets, crime, snakes . . . life is hard in informal settlements
AFTER losing her job as a domestic worker in an upmarket East London suburb due to her advancing years, Nongazi George moved to Nompumelelo in the hope that she would one day get an RDP house.
George, now 76 years old, does not know in which year she moved to one of Nompumelelo’s informal settlements.
Her dream of owning a house where she would live out her old age first started many years ago when she learnt that RDP houses were being built in the township.
And as many others have done, she too moved to the outskirts of the township with high hopes.
However, George, who is asthmatic and frequently uses an asthma inhaler, has been faced with one difficulty after another – and still has no house. And she is struggling to survive.
She lives in an area called Durban – a settlement built among the bushes overlooking East London’s leafier suburbs – a stark picture of two worlds, if ever there was one. George’s one-roomed shack is tiny, with netting as makeshift insulation, and she keeps it neat as a pin.
But it is one of many that are chronically deprived of services.
She said she paid someone R200 a few years ago to have electricity connected, not knowing this was illegal.
“But it still helps me. Outside it is dark at night and I can’t even go to the toilet. We live in terrible conditions here,” she said.
The illegal connections in the area led to five shacks burning down late last month. Sadly this is not uncommon.
The traumatised victims then pick through the charred remains of what were once their homes, trying to salvage what might be left of the building material and construct patchy shacks elsewhere. There is no alternative but to move on with their lives.
As if the costs of relying on izinyoka are not high enough, there is also the danger of real life snakes