Pambazuka News is produced by a pan-African community of some 2,600 citizens and organisations - academics, policy makers, social activists, women's organisations, civil society organisations, writers, artists, poets, bloggers, and commentators who together produce insightful, sharp and thoughtful analyses and make it one of the largest and most innovative and influential web forums for social justice in Africa. 
abahlali basemjondolo
Durban’s bedtime stories: Abahlali baseMjondolo's struggle continues
Raj Patel
2009-12-16, Issue 462
cc AbahlaliLooking back on the September attacks on Abahlali baseMjondolo members in Kennedy Road, Durban, Raj Patel profiles the views of key Abahlali activists including S’bu Zikode, Zodwa Nsibande and Mazwi Nzimande. Though strongly disrupted by the African National Congress-led (ANC) attack in September, Abahlali has continued to meet, while the absence of its leaders from the Kennedy Road settlement has illustrated the deficiencies of the ANC.
The right to stay put: Resisting evictions and deportation
Sokari Ekine
2009-10-08, Issue 451
The UN World Habitat Day, the attacks against Durban's Abahlali baseMjondolo, the campaign against Nestlé's buying milk from Robert Mugabe and Muammar al-Gaddafi's deal with Europe are among the topics covered in Sokari Ekine's fortnightly round-up of the African blogosphere for Pambazuka News.
Democracy’s everyday death: South Africa's quiet coup
Nigel Gibson and Raj Patel
2009-10-08, Issue 451
© Abahlali.orgThe assault and killings suffered by Abahlali baseMjondolo members at Kennedy Road represent a quiet 'coup' and an attack on democracy, write Nigel Gibson and Raj Patel in this week's Pambazuka News. At once a reflection of the ANC's (African National Congress) encouragement of thuggery and the disturbing entrance of an ethnic politics 'unthinkable even in apartheid’s darkest days', the incident was the result of a deliberate attack on an autonomous, grassroots movement. With S'bu Zikode – Abahlali's elected chair – now forced into hiding, the intolerance of poor people's desire for representation and the emergence of 'demons of ethnic hatred' threaten the nation's very stability, the authors conclude.
Abahlali baseMjondolo supported all over the world
2009-10-07, Issue 451
© Abahlali.orgIn the wake of the armed African National Congress (ANC) takeover of Kennedy Road, Abahlali baseMjondolo has received support from all over the world.
'A living politics': Resisting gentrification
Abahlali baseMjondolo
2009-10-07, Issue 451
© Abahlali.orgThe members of Abahlali baseMjondolo describe their movement as 'made for us and by us' or, as their elected president S'bu Zikode describes, 'a living politics'. Pointing out the essential irrelevance of the Northern-produced term 'gentrification' to describe their conditions, Abahlali stresss that their situation is markedly different and results from the authorities' 'dehumanising hatred'.
Abahlali baseMjondolo: Reclaiming our dignity and voices
Interview by Sokari Ekine
Mnikelo Ndabankulu, Zodwa Nsibande and David Ntseng
2009-09-24, Issue 449
© Abahlali.orgSokari Ekine recently met with two members of the South African shackdwellers' movement Abahlali baseMjondolo, Mnikelo Ndabankulu, a founding member and spokesperson, and Zodwa Nsibande, the general secretary of the Abahlali Youth League. In their interview they were joined by David Ntseng of the Church Land Programme, an NGO based in KwaZulu-Natal province, which works on land rights issues. They discuss a range of issues from movement building and successes and the 2008 'Slums Act', to the decision not to vote in national elections and combating xenophobia in South Africa. An audio file of this interview [mp3] is also available.
The KwaZulu Natal Slums Act: Bloody legislation against the expropriated
Richard Pithouse
2009-05-14, Issue 432
cc Arne BoellWith South Africa's Constitutional Court today set to hear the efforts of the Abahlali baseMjondolo shackdweller movement to have the KwaZulu Natal Slums Act declared unlawful, Richard Pithouse reflects on the state's routine willingness to evict occupiers of informal housing in contravention of the protection afforded by the country's constitution. Stressing the destruction engendered through forcing people out of their communities, Pithouse discusses the state's flawed assumption that blindly razing settlements without fully accommodating their inhabitants amounts to progress. Highlighting the similarities of the 2007 Slums Act with apartheid-era legislation, the author criticises a technocratic act that regards the poor as the problem rather than the material and political realities they face, and proposes the implementation of measures aimed at privileging the social value of urban land over commercial concerns.
Resisting degradations and divisions
Interviewed by Richard Pithouse
S'bu Zikode
2009-04-30, Issue 430
© Abahlali baseMjondoloIn an interview with S’bu Zikode, Richard Pithouse questions the president of South Africa's Abahlali baseMjondolo shackdwellers’ movement about his understanding of a living politics and the considerable struggles faced by the movement. Zikode, the elected leader of the group, discusses the core importance of looking to ordinary people for political direction and beginning within the needs of your community as part of an inclusive approach which embraces debate and differences of opinion. As an antidote to the South African state's domination, Abahlali, Zikode explains, works to challenge the underlying greed advanced by the state's endeavour to sustain social divisions through empowering people to engage and shape the struggle in a way sensitive to the needs and roles of all.
South Africa: A person cannot be illegal!
Abahlali baseMjondolo
2008-05-22, Issue 373
Abahlali baseMjondolo Statement on the Xenophobic Attacks
South Africa: Mourning unfreedom day
Abahlali baseMjondolo
2008-04-24, Issue 365
Abahlali baseMjondolo, the South African shackdwellers' movement reminds us in this statement and call to action that the structures of apartheid are still thriving in South Africa. On Sunday it will be Freedom Day again. Once again we will be asked to go into stadiums to be told that we are free.