OP-ED: Squatting on the margins – farmworkers find themselves in housing policy No Man’s Land By Margareet Visser
Horizontal spreads of unplanned squats and shanty towns, unsightly dumps of humans and waste… gangs and paramilitaries rule and there is no access to clean water or sanitation….” Bar perhaps the paramilitaries, this vivid description of urban slums by’s Ian Sansom could just as well fit the ubiquitous squatter towns that have become part of the rural landscape.
Several decades ago, when influx control still restricted the free movement and migration of most South Africans and farmers vied with mining bosses over scarce labour, farmers used on-farm housing to secure and control their supply of labour. However, given the current surplus of low-skilled labour and high value of agricultural land, this strategy no longer makes sense.
Gauging from NGO and trade union reports, ESTA has not stopped farmers from evicting people living on farms – often without court orders, as required by law. The growth in rural squatter towns partly bears testimony to this trend as farmers often induce workers to leave the farm by offering them a once-off cash payment together with some building materials to construct a shack in an informal settlement.
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