Julian Sauls and lems in the Western Cape testify to the lack of political vision and the ad hoc approach of the provincial authorities, operating in line with the national housing policy of the ANC government.
Central and provincial government maintain that they have systems in place to
Up to now the SACP has concentrated its efforts on wooing commercial farmers' associations, the National African Farmers Union (NAFU), political and trades union leaders and big financial backers. Over 50 trades unions, political organisations and NGOs have signed up, with a combined outreach of 25,000 - yet, critics estimate, less than 2 per cent of landless people have been reached.
A number of organisations and networks are absent from the list of participating organisations, among them the Trust address the huge housing backlog (some 800,000 housing units nationally) and to eradicate the squatter camps they call 'informal settlements'.
A commitment has been obtained from banks to grant credit for those in the lower income brackets and the government is willing to offer for Community Outreach and Education (TCOE) which recently organised a tribunal against landlessness and rural poverty in the Eastern Cape attended by more than 300 representatives from rural communities across the country.
TCOE has exposed the government's willing seller and willing buyer' approach as a major obstacle to genuine land redistribution and called on the government to scrap the property rights clause in the Constitution.
Social movements inside and outside the 'Food, Land, NEI credit guarantees for those in the R3500 - 7000pm income bracket. However the reality in South Africa is that the majority of households have a monthly income below these levels.
These figures should also be read in conjunction with the 2.4 million households that are classified as 'inforJobs' campaign believe these are issues that must be addressed by any future people's land conference.
They also question the SACP's support for the creation of people's land committees led by farmers and traditional leaders.
They argue that to overcome decades of demobilisation and an over-reliance on service delivery organisations, militant mass movements of landless have to be built from below with the democratic control resting in the hands of the rural population. settlement plan. Two schemes per province are envisaged with the N2 Gateway programme (see below) being the pilot one in Cape Town.
Yet in the case of Cape Town the housing backlog stands at 261,000 units with a delivery capacity of 11,000 units per annum so at the current rate it would take over 23 years to clear.
The express purpose of the N2 Gateway project is the beautification of the access route from Cape Town International airport into the city. The intention to eradicate squatter housing by 2010, as stated by the national housing minister Lindiwe Sisulu, is directly related to the hosting of the Soccer World Cup tournament in 2010.
With the aid of a scheme that only recently saw the subsidy being increased to approximately R30 000, the state has assisted in the building of 1.614 million housing units since 1995, providing housing to 7 million people.
However many of these houses measure 3m by 6m. Most are structurally unstable with cracking walls and sagging foundations.
To add to the problem, since 1994 the national housing budget has on average accounted for less than 2 per cent of national spending. Informal settlements, meanwhile, have been growing at the rate of 14 per cent a year.
Clearly there is an abdication of responsibility by government to adequately house the population, with banks and private developers being brought in to fill the breach.
For hundreds of thousands households to be living in the backyards of others, and paying rent as well as surviving in squatter camps, is considered quite normal for those in authority.
Their haste in Cape Town ing lists for up to 20 years.
Resentment of the squatter communities, and of backyard/waiting list families at the incompetent handling of the allocation of houses linked to the N2 Gateway project runs deep.
Inter-community competition for houses to be built has now become the norm. Long established communities are at odds with relative newcomers to the city over the allocation of houses.
The corporate media has hinted at racial undercurrents becoming a more permanent feature of the conflict. The widespread demand for hous ing has been cleverly sidestepped and the focus placed on the plight and interests of one community as opposed to that of another.
Instead of assisting the homeless, the provincial premier won a court injunction against families who occupied an unoccupied school hostel.
Members of other homeless communities have been attempting to occupy empty houses vacated by the state as part of its downsizing of operations in the field of health and education.
Communities have yet again been compelled to take up struggles for decent hous ing through the establishment of crisis committees.
The demand for decent housing must be based on a public works programme aimed at developing and servicing new residential areas.
These areas should all have the necessary social amenities and housing units fit for human habitation. This must be coupled with a meaningful and progressive land redistribution programme.
• Julian Sauls and Peter Jacobs are members of APDUSA and active in the Anti- Privatisation Forum