Housing Crisis in South Africa: Shack Dwellers, Giving a Voice to the Down Below Underclass
Abstract
Ideally, all human beings would prefer to sleep in a house with a roof over their heads. Poverty, hunger, and disease have come to define and differentiate millions of people globally. The homeless, shack, slum, and ghetto dwellers living in informal settlements are trapped in the vicious circle of poverty, landlessness, and dispossession. This article has three aims. First, to highlight that the right to housing is a fundamental right of citizens that must not be abused. Second, to highlight class divisions in society, empowered and disempowered, haves and have not. Third, to invite governments to play a more proactive role towards its constitutional responsibilities providing shelter to all citizens. In South Africa, we cannot talk about shelter without first looking at the historical injustices relating to the allocation or forced acquisition of land legitimized by the Apartheid oppressive regimes. The ownership of land and houses remained in the hands of the privileged few at the expense of the majority left with nothing to call home. The author calls for an urgent intervention into this generational poverty and disempowerment. With over 30 years of democracy in South Africa, many black South Africans remain dispossessed, voiceless, and often ignored by successive governments.
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