Charting a route in Bay of confusion
With state structures collapsing around them, South Africans are feeling trapped and helpless, with an urgent need for vision, analysis and leadership.
This was the gist of an informal meeting of a group of academics and political analysts who conversed over coffee at the Boardwalk Hotel on Thursday.
Among them was Nelson Mandela University honorary professor, former Unisa vicechancellor and theologian Prof Barney Pityana, who said he was shocked by the level of insecurity in New Brighton, where he grew up and still regularly visits.
“At night, beds are pushed up against doors, otherwise the criminals barge in and people die,” he said.
“The criminals are the children of the children of the children of New Brighton, young boys from families who have lived in the township for generations.
“It is so different from when I grew up there.”
Pityana was sharing his experiences with retired political scientist Prof Peter Vale, political science PhD candidate Mphumezo Ralo and political analyst Mcebisi Ndletyana.
He said there were a few oases of positive development in New Brighton, the main one being the Mendi Arts Centre, which had become a venue for regular cultural gatherings.
“But people are afraid and they have lost the capacity to make their environment safer.
“All these people are avid ANC supporters, yet the party is nowhere to be seen. The councillor does not even live in the township any more.
“If you are looking for help from the police, you will be referred to the criminals in Dora Street, who are in control.
“People stay there because there is no alternative. So it is a form of entrapment.”
Pityana said that, strangely, the growing insecurity of the community was matched by an upswing in the attendance at churches like St Steven’s and the proliferation of traditional functions.
“Everyone has become an expert at clan names and slaughtering. There are WhatsApp groups revolving around these things.
“You’d think this would have a cohesive effect on the community, but it is not the case. Families have collapsed and there is no respect for the elderly.
“The gogo waiting for her Sassa [SA Social Security Agency] grant feels very unsafe.
“There is a sense of unhappiness.”
Ndletyana said along with kidnappings, mass shootings and extortion, the sense of hopelessness in Bay townships, including Zwide where he grew up, was epitomised by the multiple sewage spills in the streets.
“It will flow for weeks, kids will play in it and nothing is done because there is a normalisation of what is actually disgusting.
“We have lowered our standards. There is no outrage.”
Pityana said in his youth, confronted with this situation, a community would dig a sloot to at least allow the effluent to drain away until the leak was fixed.
Ralo said ironically this selfreliance had been discovered under an uncaring and repressive apartheid regime.
Ralo, who convened the mini-indaba, said with the May 29 election approaching and the endless convolutions in the council confusion reigned in Nelson Mandela Bay.
“There is a sense that we are all deurmekaar [confused]”.
Vale said amid crime and the current political chaos the biggest threat facing Nelson Mandela Bay was deindustrialisation.
“We are looking at the closure of factories and the flight of jobs.
“To fix this situation, we need proper analysis, and the installation of strong and ethical leadership.
“What we are seeing in council currently is the politics of accumulation.
“More broadly, to address this threat, we need to fix our collapsed state schools and invest more in technical education, in particular, which is in a shambles.”