The ANC has been in power forever, but hostel life remains unchanged — Merafe residents

From our Disenfranchised series, see also: We live like peasants in our own country – tales from the forgotten people of SA

As you walk into the Merafe Hostel, a pungent smell hangs in the air. It’s a cocktail of goat, droppings and sewage. The roads are rutted. Young people idly hang about the hostel blocks.

“They are damaged goods, both the boys and the girls that you see here. This is the reason why we have high crime rates in this area. This is why we have high levels of HIV infection. There are no jobs, so the girls engage in sexual intercourse to make money and the guys do robberies to put food on the table,” said John Mthembu.

Mthembu has lived at the hostel since 1971 when he came to Gauteng from his family home in Nquthu in KwaZulu-Natal. He can’t remember any significant development taking place there.

“We don’t even have basic facilities like a community hall so we cannot hold proper meetings and community gatherings,” said Mthembu.

Streams of sewage run down the streets of Merafe Hostel, litter is ever-present, bricks from the buildings are loose, making a perfect home for rats and there is a general sense of squalor. Merafe Hostel residents blamed the ANC for the awful state of the hostel.

“The ANC does not care about hostel dwellers because they still harbour grudges from the apartheid era. A lot of bad which happened then is still blamed on Zulus, on us. So the ANC looks after its own people in the townships and neglects hostel dwellers,” said Mthembu.

“You ask yourself why do we normally see strange diseases here. It’s because we live here with animals. We are prone to strange sicknesses caused by the infestation of rats and dirt,” an induna (hostel official) who asked not to be named said.

The hostel walls have holes, home to huge rats. The sanitation system is also in ruins with many burst or leaking pipes which have been in the same state for years. Photo: Bheki Simelane

Large trees hanging over the hostel are an accident waiting to happen.

“I have tried many times to get the city to cut these trees because they are a danger to both children and adults. Nobody bothered even to come,” said the induna.

Asked why he would not reveal his identity, the induna said it would get him in trouble. A resident who felt the same simply said:

“Unlike other areas, it doesn’t matter who you are. Here, you talk, you get shot”.

The neglect which reveals itself in the crumbling, holed walls on the outside, is mirrored inside the rooms.

Residents say in 2017 there was a period when the hostel, only the hostel, had no electricity. Upon reporting the issue several times, young people became fed up and started looting nearby stores, including a Pick n Pay store.

“Immediately after the looting and ensuing chaos electricity was restored, because that is the language they understand,” said Mthembu.

While there is water at the hostel, burst pipes are a common feature. In some houses wastewater leaving the house does so through a hole dug at the base of the walls.

Residents feel hostel dwellers are deliberately sidelined as there was no urgency in resolving their issues.

A section of the communal kitchen which John Mthembu shares with tenants. Others stay with their whole families in the little space. Photo: Bheki Simelane

“The ruling party looks at an area to see if their people live there, and if their own are not residents, they neglect that area,” said the induna.

Hostels were designed as single-sex units for migrant labourers during apartheid and were seen as predominantly IFP-aligned as their occupants were mostly from KwaZulu-Natal.

“If any of the residents told you they were leading miserable lives, it’s because they are,” said the induna. “The government should fix all the hostels, but there is no hope of that because these buildings have been standing like this for many years. The only time there will be change is when a new government is in power, because the current government has failed.”

“I can tell you that things were far better during apartheid. Even though white people tormented us, there was plenty work. Then the ANC brought us agents and outsourcing, which continues to make us poorer,” Mveshe Mvelase said.

“The ANC has been in power forever, but hostel life remains unchanged. One just hopes that if a new government comes into power they do not also make empty promises,” said the induna.

“It’s a discouraging place to live in. The youth are discouraged to the point where there is really no competition for education. Our children are like the walking dead because of drugs,” Solomon Dlamini said.

Dlamini said the current political leaders were as daring as they came. “Where do they get the audacity to set foot in an area knowing very well that they have never done anything for that community? And yet empty promise after empty promise, they keep coming because they are dealing with chumps. They have no shame.”

The induna told Daily Maverick that most people at the hostel were committed to casting their votes despite the obvious neglect.

“I will vote, what can I do? I will vote and suffer like everybody else here,” said Mthembu.

“I don’t want to point fingers, but the ANC has been in power for very long but have failed to improve hostel dwellers’ lives,” said Dlamini.

“This place speaks for itself. It screams neglect from a long way away,” said another resident.

As the residents made their way around the hostel pointing out evidence of neglect, a police van from the Moroka Police Station sped in.

“I wonder who is in trouble today?” asked Dlamini.

Asked if police vans were a common sight in the hostel, Dlamini nodded and said the crime was indeed on another level.

It is not until one sets foot in the Merafe Hostel that one realises how much confidence people have lost in formal politics.

“The IFP lives. I’ll vote IFP; other than that I would simply abstain because there is no point. We are not blind. There is simply no intention of developing the hostel because that would mean improving the lives of the dreaded Zulus,” another resident said.

Many Merafe Hostel youth said they had no business voting because politics has been made to appeal to youth other than themselves.

“I vote for beer,” said one.

Pleading for attention in the form of development, many Merafe residents said they were South African and deserved every benefit of being citizens. DM