South Africa: Police Attempt Illegal Ban of unFreedom Day

southern africa | repression / prisoners | non-anarchist press Tuesday April 28, 2009 14:44 by Abahlali baseMjondolo - AbM abahlalibasemjondolo at telkomsa dot net

Today Abahlali baseMjondolo plans to mourn unFreedom Day. We have done this for the last four years. See: http://abahlali.org/node/5040

However the police have descended on to Kennedy Road settlement in large numbers and are attempting to ban our meeting. They are claiming that we did not apply for a permit to stage a gathering.

The first point to make here is that it was the old apartheid law that required people to apply for permits before staging a protest. The post-apartheid law makes no mention of a permit. It simply states that people wanting to organise a protest must inform the authorities before hand. In February 2006 the notoriously authoritian City Manager of Durban, Mike Sutcliffe, banned an Abahlali baseMjondolo march on the grounds that he had denied us a permit. The police were then sent to attack the people and many were severely beaten. We went to the High Court and we won an interdict against Sutcliffe. It was Sutcliffe and his police, and not us, who were breaking the law. The court recognised that in a democracy we have the right to gather and to protest and that neither Sutcliffe nor the police can take that right away from us. See: http://abahlali.org/node/820

But the second and more important point to make is that unFreedom Day is not a protest. It is simply a meeting that happens inside the Kennedy Road settlement. The Regulation of Gatherings Act makes it 100% clear that it only regulates gatherings in public spaces like roads. It does not regulate gatherings held in buildings. If that was the case we would have to ask the state to approve every single meeting that we hold! And we hold many meetings each week. It is therefore completely clear that any attempt by the police to use the Regulation of Gatherings Act to ban unFreedom Day will be 100% illegal. Once again it is the police that are the criminals.

Our movement was constantly subject to unlawful oppression from the police and municipal officials from 2005 until 2007. The illegal attacks on our basic democratic rights stopped in November 2007 after the police brutally attacked a peaceful protest without warning. Many church leaders who witnessed this attack signed a statement condeming the criminality and brutality of the police. After that we were allowed to protest and gather freely as the post-apartheid law allows. See: http://abahlali.org/node/2508

Once this oppression of our movement stopped we were able to enter into negotiations with the eThekwini Municiaplity and just over a year later, in February 2009, we signed a memorandum that agreed that they would provide services to 14 settlements and upgrade three settlements *where they are*. We thought that we were beginning to move forward in Durban. However our comrades in the Landless People's Movement in Johannesburg and the Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign in Durban continued to face unlawful police oppression.

But now we are faced with a return to state criminality in Durban and a return to attempts to use the police to ban us from exercising our most basic democratic rights. We will resist this oppression. We will do what we can to confront it on the ground although this is always difficult with a police force as violent and cruel as hours. We are also looking for a lawyer so that we can rush to court and interdict the police against any attempt to ban our meeting. We ask all media to rush to the scene so that they can witness first hand the fact that, once again, *THERE IS NO DEMOCRACY FOR THE POOR IN DURBAN.* We are allowed to vote for the political parties of our choice but when we try to create the politics if our choice, a politics of the poor, for the poor and by the poor - we are confronted with the police.

*There are two things that journalists need to be aware of when speaking to the police:*

*1. The police are routinely dishonest in their communication with the media.* If they attack a peaceful protest they will claim that they were being stoned. If they shoot someone in the back with live ammunition they will claim that they shot the person in the stomach with a rubber bullet. The truth always comes out in the end because there are many witnesses to these public events and they are often filmed. But by that time media interest in the story has waned or disappeared entirely. It is therefore absolutely necessary to seek independent confirmation of all claims made by the police.

*2. The police and officials are often entirely unaware of the changes to the law after apartheid.* Over the years Abahlali baseMjondolo has very often found that the police, as well as local government officials - even as high up as the city manager of Durban, are entirely unaware of the post-apartheid law especially as it relates to evictions and the right to gather freely. They continue to operate on the basis of apartheid laws. Therefore it is absolutely necessary to seek independent expert confirmation of the understanding of the law held by the police and government officials.

*For up to the minute updates from Kennedy Road and Abahlali baseMjondolo's attempts to resist this blatantly unlawful attack on our basic democratic rights contact Zodwa Nsibande on 082 924 8268.*

* For independent top level expertise on the Regulation of Gatherings Act contact the Director of the Freedom of Expression Institute Dr. Jane Duncan on 082 786 3600.*