Cape Town: Inside the Townships.
Such knocking on the door wasn’t the usual sort; figuratively speaking it was a demand to be heard.The place was the South African Parliament and the urging came from the African National Council to educate the nation’s black youth – ‘ANC press Vorster for immediate action’ read the headlines of the Cape Argus. In 1974 this coincided with my first trip to Capetown and although aware of apartheid I couldn’t believe that morning that SA law forbade black kids free secondary education.Sure, I hadn’t excelled at my own secondary school, but enough to read, write and go on to sea training college, finally shipping out at age eighteen.I didn’t take anything for granted – indeed I was happy to go on from secondary to sea school.And of UK schools at the time, there was some discontent: an Education Secretary, someone called Margaret Thatcher had just axed free school milk for under-seven year old kids, and who was further embroiled in the Tory debate to support grammar schools.
But we’d just docked on the RMS Pendennis Castle and after work we wanted to wash the salt out of our throats in the sailors’ port of Capetown.Most of the crew rated the historic seamen’s bars of Navigator’s Den, Somerset Arms and the Kimberley Hotel. Everyone wanted to get ashore after the voyage from the UK but we were lucky to be introduced to a local family by one of the guys.
I’d never heard of Margaret Thatcher but I thought stopping free milk was mean and that grammar schools were another form of elitist organisation, so this controversy seemed of relative consequence. Was this all the UK had to worry about?
Jimmy had sailed on the Pendennis for years and had probably known the Richards family just as long. In South Africa’s system of apartheid they were know as ‘Cape Coloured’ – in reality the family could trace their lineage from Malaysia as imported slaves right back to the founding of the port in 1652. Somewhere along the line they had changed their name to Richards from a native name, primarily because it conferred more social acceptance.Anyway we took a cab round to their apartment near the District Six area of Capetown and were warmly welcomed. The father worked on the wharf and they had two sons – John and Franck – in their twenties who worked as welders in the dry-dock, and a daughter, Jenny, who aspired to work in the UK; indeed the whole family were staunch Anglophiles, preferring to speak English rather that Afrikaans.
They told us that they previously lived in District Six but under apartheid laws the area was bulldozed five years earlier. The SA government destroyed the community due to alleged unsafe housing as well as reported crime and gangsterism – in reality though the government decreed D6 a ‘Whites-Only’ area. Some cynically said the D6’s close proximity to Capetown’s Central Business District and its high land values was another reason – social engineering at its worst.
They told us they had managed to save some money to move just outside D6 and just before the demolition started, thus preempting being forced out to the townships.
Anyway, it was a multi-racial, vibrant community. Most residents were employed as artisans, labourers and clerks, no matter that much of the SA press demonised it as crime-ridden. The Akkers described their own rented house there and how the community were mutually-supportive, that there were other families of mixed race from Malaysia, Indonesia, India and Europe – indeed, D6 was known as a ‘grey’ area, that is to say an area where blacks, Cape-Coloureds and whites lived together.
At this point to look at the colour bar and how perceptions discriminated on the basis of a person’s skin is probably best summed up through a quote from the Richard Attenborough movie Cry Freedom (1987). Based on the trial of the black activist Steve Biko, Denzil Washington’s Biko is asked by the Judge:
Judge: “why do they call you people black? You look more brown to me.”Steve Biko:” why do they call you people white? You look more pink than white.”Over thirteen years later, this quote explained much of the lunacy of apartheid, its refusal to see the real issues.
I thought the Richards were excellent people. They discussed apartheid and described to us the problems of living in a country where legislation such as the self-explanatory Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act 1949, and residential segregation under the Urban Areas Act 1923 consolidated the position of whites, but also the daily indignities of life in which they were forbidden to use some buses as they were Slegs Blankes (White Only), or even parks which could be Blanke Gebied (White Areas).
They had their own views upon the demonising of District Six and its eventual destruction from central government. “Yes, there was some gangsterism”, they said – “but after all didn’t you have problems with the Krays in London?”
I got the impression though that they weren’t radicals. They were accepting of their lot perhaps understanding that financially they were in a far better position than black people who had the rawest deal under apartheid. Having said that, the family compared injustices in SA against our lives in the UK, much of which they accessed through the BBC World Service. They enthusiastically listened to the parliamentary debates on the radio (television in SA was not introduced until 1975, probably to prevent dissemination of ideas) and were incredibly impressed by Britain’s democracy and free speech, our NHS and police force.
However, refocusing upon the townships the forced evictions from District 6 progressed with families banished to the three main areas of Capetown: Mitchell’s Plain, Langa, Gughulethu and Cape Flats. There were no niceties: papers were served and eventually the townships were filling up with people to the figure of thousands per day. At this point and having noted just who ended up there, it is useful to describe the townships in full: constructed on land which conveniently the government had no title to, i.e., there would be no legal demands for services or claims to compensation, most were built of corrugated iron – the proverbial tin shacks – services were minimal. Piped water – that most basic of needs – was intermittent with many residents drawing water from the rivers; electricity was of a similar unreliable nature as residents used wires dangerously slung from power boxes; roads were unpaved and along with sewerage, prone to flooding during the SA winter. In fact, not much has changed and they are still unsafe places to live.Infant mortality is high as also is alcoholism and drugs.
In short, the infrastructure to provide for a decent home and a quality of life just wasn’t there. But earlier from the evictions from D6, the move into the townships started shortly after World War 2. Before this period, family life for most blacks and some coloureds involved working for employers away from their families living in hostels. In an example of earlier globalisation the war changed all this with huge demands for labour causing a corresponding demand for houses. As we have seen the SA government didn’t prioritise the welfare of blacks or coloureds and most found themselves living in rapidly-expanding townships.
The population of these townships has accelerated from 150,000 in 1950 to over 390,000 in 2018 – hardly social progress by any standards.On the other hand, there are some well-constructed dwellings, houses made from timber and brick, and with owners on a middle-income scale, but the basic rule of law which supports land tenure, provision of service contracts and fair taxation is absent; the key phrase in township jargon is informal settlements and this could be anything involving sub-lets, land-grabs and corruption. Some 20% of township residents are at this lower end of the informal settlement scale and consequently more likely to be victims of crime.
Capetown itself is a beautiful city and very photogenic, but as any seafarer will attest it has never been a safe city to go off wandering alone. As our friends from District Six told us:” it’s ok, but don’t forget that most South Africans have a history of resolving disputes through violent means – just make sure you exercise common sense.”But returning to the Pendennis Castle, by this time in the port of Durban, I watched the gold train arrive at the wharf. Union Castle ships loaded gold bound for the UK from the Witwatersrand goldfields every five weeks and on every occasion it was quite a spectacle to see the bullion being loaded by black stevedores. They were always supervised and guarded by armed South African Police with dogs and sjamboks – vicious leather whips which, incidentally, were a police mainstay used against rioters. However I counted at least 300 boxes of bullion transferred to the vessel and, at the 1974 rate of US$135 an ounce, estimated each 56 pound box was worth at least a quarter of a million bucks.Just one box, I thought would provide some support for the destitute townships I’d seen down the coast.
But of course, it wasn’t going to happen. The government dug their heels in on social reform and it wasn’t until the Soweto Uprising in 1976 that the world focused on apartheid more seriously.Over ten thousand high school students peacefully protested against the rules which told them they had to take lessons in Afrikaans, not English or their own native languages. The protest turned nasty with riot police and guns culminating in 23 students shot dead. All for the right to a decent education.
I hardly met anyone in SA who was enamoured with the Afrikaans language. Many people made parallels with the use of Latin in the UK – is it really necessary? In the case of lessons being taught in Afrikaans though, the students saw the language as a form of governmental social control.
So there was some change after Soweto but not enough. A national emergency was declared across the country; a UN embargo against certain SA exports was made which further weakened the regime’s power base and eventually Nelson Mandela was released. Finally, the first universal suffrage general elections took place in 1994. The ANC won, paving the way for a new Constitution and Bill of Rights.
Of the apartheid’s legacy though, possibly the biggest social problem is crime. In Capetown the city has only dropped down from 13th to 9th in a table of world murder capitals and the latest statistic is that a person is more likely to be murdered than die in a road accident. In Nyanga township – one of Capetown’s worst – the murder rate of 35.2 per 100,000 people is six times higher than anywhere in the US.Assaults, rapes, robberies and carjacking are now commonplace: one insurance company reportedly refusing to insure VW Citi Golfs, the cars more likely to be stolen. Together with this are ‘social fabric’ crimes which include turf and taxi ‘wars’ some of which are aided by police corruption. On my last visit to SA in 2005, a cab driver explained that the the best thing to do in the situation of a police flag-down is to produce a R100 banknote, not a driving licence. The crime wave is certainly explosive post-apartheid, but of course crime always existed in the townships before then and there are signs that statistics are falling. However in the midst of all this it may surprise the millions of tourists who flock each year to sandy beaches, iconic Table Mountain and serene picturesque winelands that Nyanga and Cape Flats are at ground zero in the crime wave.
So do tourists go there at all? It is equally surprising to find that they do and besides booking through official SA travel websites, there are independent tour operators – all accredited – who will pick up tourists from their hotel in an air-conditioned minibus for a four-hour potted history tour of the townships.Such tourists report all as being totally safe, increasing numbers go year on year, and despite some criticism that this is ‘poverty-tourism’ – a voyeurist tour at people less fortunate – the operators instead see it as a chance to make money through greater international understanding. And a glance at traveller reviews on any SA website, i.e., tripadvisor will confirm the popularity.
I visited Mitchells Plain in 2011 on such an organised tour and as one American guy put it: “why not township tourism? – I’m from California and if it wasn’t for Mickey Mouse and Hollywood, we’d all be less well-off in that state.” Overall, the tour guides report upon the sacrifices made in the past – demonstrations such as Soweto for example – but also the beliefs, attitudes and values in the townships which help the people live. Values such as shared food and child-care are part of this. It would be wrong however to portray township life as some cosy, all-African ideal though. Because after all, most there aspire to a better environment and want to get out. But through no fault of their own are unable to do so.
Just before I left SA in 2011, I reflected upon secondary school education for black people all those years ago and, by chance, was chatting to a white Afrikaans lady who had returned from an teaching assignment in London. I asked her how it was to which she replied that it wasn’t an experience she like to repeat. “Why was that?”, I asked. Her experience in this London secondary school was that too many kids were “uncontrollable and lacking in motivation” and besides there being suspicion of being drugs in school, her further comments were very telling.”In South Africa”, she continued, “kids see education as a way out of poverty, after all in Soweto, some of their forebears were gunned down for that right.”