Kliptown residents decry poor living conditions and lack of development despite the historic signing of the Freedom Charter.
The ANC may have been marking the signing of the Freedom Charter in Kliptown this week, but bitter residents of the township say they do not have freedom as they live in squalor.
Walter Sisulu Square in Kliptown memorialises the signing of the charter in 1955. It also welcomed the signing of South Africa’s Bill of Rights.
Residents will waiting for promised developments
But nearly six decades later, many of its residents are still waiting for promised developments.
Known as one of the oldest residential areas in Soweto, it consists of more than 10 informal settlements named after liberation stalwarts, including Chris Hani.
But for residents, these are mere names that hold a distant memory of what should have been a developed township.
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Behind the crumbling houses are congested informal settlements, while communal toilets line the road.
Freedom Charter diminished and rendered useless
Sandile Mqhayi, a community leader, said the vision of the Freedom Charter has diminished and is rendered useless as living conditions have worsened.
“They failed the community and what this place was meant to be. The conditions have got worse before our eyes, while the government stood by and did nothing.
“This was supposed to be one of the leading townships in Soweto, but today we live in the slums with high poverty,” said Mqhayi.
“That document of the Freedom Charter still remains one of the most powerful documents, but we have been failed by its implementation.
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“The poverty, lack of infrastructure and lack of investment are a sad reality.
“After democracy, there was a development that started in Pimville Zone 9, meant for the people of Kliptown, yet many of those people never benefitted. If they can’t correct the meaning of the document, then there is nothing to commemorate because they have failed to live up to those promises.”
The area still contains a mixture of apartheid-style four-roomed houses and thousands of contested informal homes.
‘Conditions echo that govt has forgotten us’
Another resident, Thakane Malefane, has lived in a two-room informal settlement in a yard with seven other households. She lives in the shack with her grandchild, while her older children erected shacks next to the main shack.
“The history that once resonated with this place no longer holds significance because our conditions echo that the government has forgotten us. We still don’t have electricity; no running water and sewage runs everywhere. We live here like animals,” she said.
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