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0:12

I am not happy at all.

0:16

I wish it was possible for our government to do something to make a difference.

0:25

I think it’s important that we have these things as humans so that we can be healthy with our children.

0:33

We went on, like, we want to see this happen, we want to have a new life,

0:38

we want to see that we belong to a society,

0:41

and that we are still in this society

0:43

not that we are just dropped here and nobody is looking out for us.

0:49

Upgrading Lives

0:52

In Cape Town’s Flamingo Crescent and Santini.

01:00

2015

Cape Town, South Africa

01:01

Rocks, rubber bullets, tear gas and stun grenades.

01:06

Police exchange fire with residents of a small informal settlement.

01:13

3.7 million people live in Cape Town.

01:15

Ove a third of the population live in slums or ‘settlements’.

01:28

Nkokheli Ncambele

National Leader

Informal Settlement Network

01:28

Obviously, there are two cities, we can’t run away from that.

01:32

If you go down from Langa you will see, these people don’t have informal settlements,

01:37

but if you come this side, these people are experiencing flooding,

01:42

and it makes me angry, you know.

01:45

I’m sorry to say, it’s the black people who are residing in those settlements,

01:48

and it tells you that, yes, in theory we are free

01:53

but practically we are not free because we are not equal. 

01:58

I’ve been seeing where the people demonstrate on the road,

02:03

and when I asked “Why are people demonstrating?”

02:07

You will find that people need basic services, which is water and sanitation, electricity,

02:13

it’s the key when you are residing in the informal settlements. 

02:36

It is very difficult.

02:38

As you can see, this is a two roomed shack and there are 8 or 9 people living in it.

02:45

Grace Lebakeng

02:45

At night, we can’t go out because it’s dangerous.

02:49

There are criminals.

02:50

We have a bucket that we use to pee.

02:58

Grace and her mother Veronika live in Santini, one of many settlements lacking basic services.

03:09

There are 150 people excluding the children living here

03:13

and there are only seven toilets.

03:15

So, if I had my own toilet right by my door life would be better.

03:23

Another challenge that we come across is that we don’t have an electricity supply here.

03:27

For us to have electricity, we have to connect to houses nearby.

03:31

It would be nice if I had fresh tap water and electricity so I could do what I want when I want.

03:32

Veronica Lebakeng

Community leader,

Santini

03:39

Now, I have to go far to get water and sometimes I have to leave the baby alone while he is asleep.

03:49

Our children are always sick because it’s dirty and we don’t have dustbins.

03:55

My dream is to have a big house where all of us can be together as a family.

04:05

And have the necessary services and get a good job so that I can support my family.

04:11

In South Africa, it is a constitutional right for all citizens to have access to basic services.

04:18

It’s not acceptable.

04:20

We have so much to do still close the gap between the poor and the rich.

04:27

The city is every day, constantly, rolling out services as far best they can.

04:29

Levona Powell

Regional Co-ordinator,

City of Cape Town

04:33

Sometimes the land owners do not allow the city to provide on privately owned land,

04:38

and so that is challenging.

04:40

But if we want to look at the future and we want to really close the gap,

04:45

it is for us to empower people.

04:56

I get up at quarter to four in the morning,

04:58

take my trolley, go to the station,

05:02

and there I stay until half past eight, quarter to nine,

05:07

get home about nine,

05:09

have my breakfast, take my tablets, go and sleep,

05:09

Marie Matthews

Community leader,

Flamingo Crescent

05:12

get up and see, “Am I making supper tonight?

05:17

Doepie, are you eating tonight?”

05:19

“No, I’m finished.” Then I don’t cook.

05:21

So, that is my day job.

05:23

“Auntie” Marie live in a small industrial estate called Flamingo Crescent and was integral to bringing basic services to her community.

05:34

You couldn’t find a better person.

05:36

It’s unbelievable, the energy that she’s got.

05:38

A woman for the community,

05:41

she will stay up so people can knock at two o’clock in the morning with a problem.

05:42

Patrick “Doepie” Edward

President,

Flamingo Crescent

05:47

I told her, “You’re the police, you’re the magistrate, you’re the doctor,

05:49

you’re the community leader, what more?”

05:57

Flamingo Crescent

Pre-upgrade, 2014

05:59

When I came here there was no Flamingo here.

06:02

It was just an open field.

06:04

Then law enforcement brought the people here, so that they could stay here

06:08

until they got alternative places for them to go to.

06:10

So it was going to be for three months,

06:13

and the three months became nine years.

06:17

There was nothing here.

06:18

We used to have the bucket system to go to the toilet:

06:22

dig a big hole and everybody goes there, and then when it’s full we would close it up, make another hole,

06:27

and it was like a pigsty because everybody used to come and mess an do whatever they felt like doing.

06:34

So, we came together and we started to talk,

06:37

“Look at this place! Isn’t there anything that we can do for the community here?”

06:43

So that’s why we came across ISN, and then we started to see things a little bit better.

06:51

The Informal Settlement Network (ISN) is a community leadership organization that engages government to improve the lives of the urban poor.

07:00

Santini

07:02

We met with ISN, who introduced us to a process called “reblocking”.

07:10

This means that the ground is levelled and space is made so they can install a tap and toilet for each home.

07:19

Once we start the process, we need to start profiling those settlements,

07:23

we need to start enumerating.

07:26

Enumeration is firstly when you count how many people are in the settlement.

07:31

Secondly, you go house to house and count how many people are in each household.

07:41

Once the community take the lead on the upgrading, definitely you will need the partners,

07:46

and the key partner in this case is the city,

07:49

because the city is the one who has all the resources.

07:56

The housing challenge for the city is huge.

07:59

They’re only busy with 1990 at the moment.

08:02

So people that registered in 1990, they are now about to get that housing opportunity.

08:07

Some people wait and they never receive the opportunity.

08:11

When we look at our settlements,

08:12

how do we deal with that?

08:15

We look at, how can we upgrade where they are?

08:18

Flamingo Crescent

08:19

My mother was waiting for 28 years on a waiting list.

08:23

Mark Solomons

Community Leader,

Flamingo Crescent

08:23

I had a talk with my mother before she closed her eyes and I told her “I want to put you in a better place.”

08:28

So when she closed her eyes I still went on with this upgrading of the informal settlement.

08:34

If there are no houses, it’s important to have your place upgraded,

08:39

because that’s the only way out,

08:40

and that’s the only way to keep your dignity so that you stay in a stable place.

08:47

When we started working with Flamingo they had one tap for water,

08:51

some of them had to walk far to get to the water point,

08:54

they didn’t have electricity, we had lots of fires there.

08:59

We had two fires in our informal settlement.

09:02

The first fire took half of the informal settlement

09:04

and the second fire took a two-year-old kid.

09:09

The fire started, everybody had to throw water, and how long does it take to put a fire out?

09:14

When there’s only two taps in the informal settlement,

09:19

and the tap is running slow.

09:24

We didn’t ask, we told them what we wanted:

09:27

electricity, first thing,

09:30

water, second thing.

09:32

Then we started drawing our own plans, and how we wanted it.

09:37

What is nice, they looked at the safety of themselves,

09:40

and then they wanted a cluster form of how they could have a communal type of block,

09:45

where people can look onto people’s doors and actually look out for one another as a community.

09:53

I can tell you, it was difficult to go in because of the density.

09:59

You must understand, there was a lot of crime,

10:03

robbing people, even killings were happening there.

10:08

Why is it safer? Because there’s more space.

10:11

There are a lot of lights, so you can see at night time.

10:16

And now it’s like, “You’re my neighbor, I have to watch over your door and you have to watch over my door.”

10:22

So that’s how the bond of friendship and communication has become in the informal settlement.

10:28

It’s what upgrading brings – it brings security.

10:33

While the city of Cape Town commits to providing infrastructure, the community is asked to contribute 20% towards the cost of individual structures.

10:40

Over 90% of people in Flamingo are unemployed.

10:43

Then we said, “OK, look, now it’s contribution time.”

10:48

Then the people were saying, “Other people get things for nothing, why must we pay?”

10:53

In the beginning the people didn’t have trust in us as committee members.

10:58

They would say, “You’ll eat my money up, you want to buy your new BMW,

11:02

you want to build your big house with our money.”

11:04

And I was saying, “If we want to have a better life, we have to pay.

11:08

You can’t go into the shop and take bread and say you don’t have to pay for it,

11:13

because then it’s stealing.”

11:16

And the people decided, OK, they are going to contribute,

11:20

and then the city put us off for a year,

11:24

so everybody was crying for their money back because it’s never going to happen,

11:28

and I said, “No, wait! It’s going to happen.

11:33

Why lose the faith?”

11:37

Santini

11:42

You wouldn’t have found the church here today because on Thursday it should have been pulled down for rebuilding.

11:47

But there was a problem.

11:52

That is why the project has had to stop.

11:55

Santini started last year, and the city was saying, “The project is going to start, it’s going to start”,

12:01

but there was this conflict between community members.

12:06

I would be very happy with the reblocking

12:08

but some people don’t want it because they say that they will take away their houses.

12:12

So we found out that the project is not going to start now because we need to sort out these issues.

12:21

After years of development and setbacks, construction eventually began in Flamingo Crescent in 2014.

12:28

It wasn’t easy, but everything doesn’t come easy.

12:33

We waited years and years and nothing happened, until we changed the people’s mindset.

12:39

It’s like they say, true love travels on a gravel road

12:43

so we travelled this gravel road, now it’s running smooth.

12:46

It’s not that smooth, but it’s coming to it.

12:52

Maybe in five years’ time we will go back to the government

12:55

and ask them, “Can’t we build brick houses where we are staying?”

13:00

and maybe they’ll give us it.

13:07

In the process of upgrading, residents are taken to visit those who have successfully upgraded to learn and share experiences.

13:21

Welcome to Flamingo.

13:22

Come, let’s go!

13:24

So each one has their own toilet. Each one has their own tap.

13:28

It’s now no longer like a shack, it’s more like a home.

13:31

This is my house.

13:33

Ah, it’s beautiful!

13:35

I didn’t clean up here because I’ve been waiting for you for the whole morning.

13:38

Ah, don’t apologise!

13:43

This is my toilet and this side is the shower.

13:47

I need my house exactly like this.

13:50

I love it too much.

13:51

I’m happy for drinking water.

13:53

I can turn on the tap myself, in my own house,

13:56

I don’t have to take a bucket a long distance to get water

14:00

and I like it, I’m standing up from my chair and going to my toilet and I can close it.

14:07

It’s not informal anymore, it’s formal.

14:09

It’s a formal settlement because we’ve got our street names,

14:12

they deliver our letters, we’ve got our own wheelie bins, what more do we want?

14:16

I still have to do a lot of thigs but it doesn’t matter,

14:20

As long as you are in your own place and you feel, this is home now,

14:24

I can settle down, then you’ll find it’s going to be alright.

14:28

Don’t cry!

14:30

I’m not crying but I’m happy.

14:35

I don’t know what to say now,

14:37

because I feel now, if I could, I would take this house and it is in my settlement now, not tomorrow.

14:48

The development of Santini has come to a standstill, but most of the residents hope that the ‘upgrade’ will go ahead.

14:56

It looks beautiful, they look like brick houses.

14:59

So I have a good image of our settlement when it is done.

15:06

We don’t want luxury, we just want to be comfortable.

15:10

The luxury can come afterwards if there is,

15:13

but just to be able to live one day at a time will also do fine

15:18

because, should the lord should come tomorrow, you’ll know you’ve done that today,

15:22

you know what you want out of life, so if you do have a chance, take it.

15:29

900 million people live in informal settlements worldwide with limited access to basic services.

15:33

Flamingo Crescent sets a precedent for global slum redevelopment.

15:39

PRODUCER/DIRECTOR

Nicky Milne

EDITOR
Timothy Moss

15:42

CAMERA

Tim Chevallier

DRONE CAMERA

Johnny Miller

15:45

PRODUCTION COORDINATOR

Joss Lean

ASSOCIATE PRODUCER

Claudio Accheri

15:48

SPECIAL THANKS

Auntie Marie, Veronica, Grace, Mark, Melanie and Terence and all the communities of Flamingo Crescent and Santini

CORC/South African SDI Alliance

The City of Cape Town

Informal Settlement Network

15:51

EXECUTIVE PRODUCER

Liz Mermin

PLACE EDITOR

Paola Totaro

THOMSON REUTER FOUNDATION EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Belinda Goldsmith

15:55

THOMSON REUTERS FOUNDATION

15:57

Place

place.trust.org