Protesters keep up fight for housing

RECLAIM the City protesters stood defiantly and vowed to continue to fight for a disputed piece of land in Tafelberg yesterday.

Ndifuna Ukwazi Law Centre, on behalf of Reclaim the City, presented a review application to challenge the provincial government’s decision to sell the Tafelberg property to the Phyllis Jowell Jewish Day School in the Western Cape High Court yesterday.

“We are not going to stop, we are still going to go on with the struggle,” said the chairperson of Reclaim the City Sheila Madikana yesterday.

“We told the premier this morning we are going to carry on and we have a lot of surprises for her,’’ Madikana insisted.

Members of the organisation went on to say that their protest was symbolic because it showed them how the provincial government wants to create society today, while still seeking a return to a South Africa of old.

They feel the decision to sell the Tafelberg property will prevent the working-class citizens from having homes.

“Them preventing these developments, it shows us

We may achieve or we may not achieve, but we will continue fighting, because this is our land and we have been promised this land.

their backward mentality,” said Yameen Motala, a member of the Woodstock chapter of Reclaim the City.

The organisation feels that if the property is sold, it should be to the benefit of the community and not the government, who were supposed to work for its citizens.

Madikana said: “We may achieve or we may not achieve, but we will continue fighting, because this is our land and we have been promised this land.

“We are not doing this for us, we are doing it for the community, the lower-class people that are poor.” – Leland Edwards