Table 5 shows that families that bought property in Alexandra came from various socio-economic backgrounds. The fact that they managed to purchase property does not necessarily mean that they were all better resourced materially, rather that some of them were resourceful and creative. Their creative strategies would include pooling together resources by family members such as siblings and parents and in some cases would families would jointly purchase property. For example, this happened in the families of tata Andile, mama Mihloti and mama Zodwa. Interestingly in two cases, resources from rural areas were used to purchase property. Ntate Sechaba, whose father was a building contractor, refers to livestock which the family owned before coming to Alexandra. Ntate Sechaba explains that when his community was forcefully removed from the rural lands that they occupied they were forced to move and work in white owned farms. In these farms there were restrictions on the numbers of livestock that their families could keep; as a result they sold a large number of their stock. The second case is interesting in that Rapula explains how his grandmother, a domestic worker, managed to purchase her property for £80 in cash. Rapula states that it was through money from his great grandfather‟s sale of cattle that the money was raised.
Table 5 Occupations of Bommastandi families
Family Names of
respondents
Occupation of parents where known
Occupation of respondents
Family 1 Nthabiseng Unknown Retired nursing sister
Tshepo Unknown Retired lab technician
Thabang Mother is a retired nursing Self employed, trailer
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Family 2 Mihloti Farm labourer The husband was a
painter
Family 3 Temba Labourer Worked for PUTCO bus
company as a conductor, also a professional boxer Family 4 Andile Worked for a Mining House Worked as an ambulance
driver for AHC Nomvula Worked for a mining House Retired factory worker
*Bontle Unknown Unknown Family 10 Khensani Unknown but grandfather A handy man
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Family 11 Moipone Father was a sports
organizer, mother a nurse
She is a retired nursing sister
*Tiisetso
Family 12 Sechaba Father co-owned a building contract and ran a shop as well
A retired teacher
Family 13 Rapula Grandmother was a
domestic worker
Handyman
Family 14 Hunadi Father was a domestic
worker who later owned businesses including shops and he was a coal merchant
Retired teacher
Family 15 Leanne Father owned a bicycle
shop and her mother was a teacher
Retired factory worker
Family 16 Nhlanhla Father was a black smith Runs a plumbing business
Family 18 Mmaphefo Unknown Retired factory worker
Family 19 Mosidi Unknown Used to do art work
Family 20 Elise Unknown Retired factory worker
Family 21 Mokgadi Unknown Hawker
21 Families 33 Respondents
The information above not only highlights that being a property owner in Alexandra may not necessarily always be equated being landed in the Western sense as such as people were not a cohesive socio-economic group. Rather, it indicates that the “private property” owned by some of bommastandi there were a myriad of access rights which were based on contribution of resources for purchase of such properties.
58 1.10. Chapter outline
Chapter 1
This chapter argues that with a limited representation of the life experiences of bommastandi in academia an opportunity of understanding other facets of private property ownership is lost. Adopting a methodological approach that helps to pries open bommastandi‟s understanding of private property opens up such an opportunity.
Chapter 2
In this chapter I introduce the concept of mmastandi and link it to owning freehold property in Alexandra and other Johannesburg Townships where Africans could purchase property. I also introduce issues of identity and practices of bommastandi (property owners). Using the present to look at the past reveals the complexities of being part of a cohort of Africans who owned private property which are more particularly emphasised by the current processes of land claims and restitution.
Chapter 3
In Chapter 2 I argued that categorisation of property ownership into private, communal and sovereign regimes is not very useful analytically. I asserted that the regimes approach propagates the essentialist view of identity which is problematic. In this chapter I further complicated and contested the essentialist understandings of African identities as fixed. I argued that the settlement of bommastandi in a place that was geographically outside the reserves (later named homelands) threatened the state‟s desired separation of Africans into ethnic groupings. The settlement resulted in a socio-cultural infusion among such groups of people including other non African groupings such as Indian, “coloured” and white people and this led to construction of new ways of life. This challenges and further complicates the notion of a fixed African identity as rural, communal and not urbanising.
I also highlighted the contradictions of racial dichotomisation of space which are illustrated in the spatial, temporal and racial histories of Alexandra. I argued that despite the strong legalised approach to space and race the illegitimacy of such legislation still resulted in the rupture in the governance of the disenchanted. However, such contradictions were used to define the identity of bommastandi.
59 Chapter 4
In Chapter 4 I illustrated how the presentation of Alexandra as the highest priority problem township captured succinctly the notion of legal – spatial discontinuity that Alexandra represented. Most importantly I illustrated how the spatial dichotomisation of Alexandra had unintended results. I argued that the peculiarity of Alexandra‟s spatial location was increasingly exacerbated by the government adoption of policies and spatial legislation that promoted its immunity. Instead of alleviating the challenges that government faced due to the peculiarity of Alexandra Township, these policies entrenched this very anomaly and validated the freehold position of Alexandra bommastandi in a settlement that was non-rural and non- prescribed while simultaneously not falling under any municipal control.
Chapter 5
In this chapter I examined the implications of the introduction of the Peri-Urban Areas Health Board (PUAHB) in Alexandra and how this impacted on the private property ownership regime that thus far had been operational in Alexandra. I illustrated how influx control and related policies linked Alexandra to other places such as Soweto and the homelands which became receptacles of some of the people who were removed from it and how these impacted on the life of bommastandi in Alexandra. In this chapter I also examined the introduction of the idea of the hostel city, building hostels and the response to occupation of hostels by both Alexandra residents and other interested parties and the impact of these developments on private property ownership. The chapter focused on the formation of the Alexandra Liaison Committee (ALC), which acted as the mouthpiece of Alexandrans in fighting expropriations both during execution of the hostel city plans and beyond.
Chapter 6
In Chapter 6 I explored several key moments in the 1970s and 1980s, a period during which the government was under enormous pressure to change its apartheid policies due to intensive political resistance. I argued that this was also one of the most complex periods in the history of Alexandra. It was the period of the save Alexandra campaign and the reprieve of Alexandra, the third proclamation and two urban renewal plans (1980 and 1986). But it was
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also a period of rent boycotts in urban areas, the ANC‟s call for “ungovernability”, the political reforms which were inadequate as there was a call for a total political change, the scrapping of influx control among others, the civics movement. I also illustrated that this was a property ownership turnaround period when an announcement was made in 1988, that properties were available for sale in Alexandra. In this section I explored challenges that resulted from what I referred to as a “period of repurchasing”.
Chapter 7
In this chapter I provided a general outline of developments in Alexandra from 1990 to 2004.
The earlier part of this period was characterised by violence and I specifically linked it to the effects it had on property rights. Significantly, this is a period in which new ways of relating to property by both former bommastandi and their erstwhile tenants were evident. I illustrated that residues of developments from the past in the current Alexandra are not only discernible in its physical landscape. For example, there is evidence of expropriation in the lives of women who were moved from their properties but were never provided with alternative accommodation since they still lived in shacks at the time of the interviews.
Evidence of the violent period of the early 1990s is still discernible in the lives of women who were left without homes, and were still living in office buildings. But also, hostels which pioneered the hostel city notion are still standing, while the private developer homes of the 1980s are also noticeable. In addition to all these historical structures there are new developments and new housing areas such as River Park, Tsutsumani, and East Bank among others. The past of Alexandra is traceable in the present. Also I examined how the restitution that bommastandi are currently grappling with affected the memories of pain that attach to their property life stories in general.
I also highlighted how the adoption of mmastandi as an analytical tool implores us to rethink not only private property ownership but what it meant to live in an urban area and own property in the space that was increasingly shrinking for Africans. I also highlight the significance of the moment of establishment of Alexandra Township as a black freehold when the two Boer republics and the two British colonies were merged into one but more significantly the implication of the passing of the Native Land Act.
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1.11 Conclusion
In this chapter I have argued that the exceptional history and geography of Alexandra makes it a crucial area of study. It is such experiences of families of property owners who lived in this exceptional space that played a significant role in shaping the understanding of private property ownership. The chapter underlines how the spatial legislation simultaneously threatened, enabled and redefined access to property by “natives” in Alexandra. It further highlights that although Alexandra shares some experiences with other South African urban freehold townships its peculiar history sets it apart from them.
I also introduce in the chapter the concept of mmastandi and explore how it can be used as a lens to understand private property ownership. The concept is linked to owning freehold property in Alexandra and other Johannesburg Townships where Africans could purchase property. But this section also introduces issues of identity and practices of bommastandi (property owners). Using the present to look at the past reveals the complexities of being part of a cohort of Africans who owned private property which are more particularly emphasised by the current processes of land claims and restitution.
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