LA NOUVELLE COUTUME URBAINE ÉVOLUTION COMPARÉE

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LA NOUVELLE COUTUME URBAINE
ÉVOLUTION COMPARÉE DES FILIÈRES COUTUMIÈRES DE
LA GESTION FONCIÈRE URBAINE DANS LES PAYS
D’AFRIQUE SUBSAHARIENNE
VOLUME II
NEUF ÉTUDES DE CAS
AFRIQUE DU SUD
BENIN
CAMEROUN
GHANA
KENYA
Recherche réalisée dans le cadre et avec l’appui conjoint du
PRUD, Programme de recherche urbaine pour le développement
Action concertée incitative du Fonds de solidarité prioritaire du
Ministère des Affaires Étrangères, Conduite par le GEMDEV et l’ISTED
et du
Department for International Cooperation (DFID), Royaume-Uni.
Responsables scientifiques:
Alain Durand-Lasserve, CNRS, Laboratoire SEDET, Université de Paris VII
Michael Mattingly, Development Planning Unit, University College, Londres
Thomas Mogale, Graduate School of Public and Development Management, University of
Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Afrique du Sud.
Assistants de recherche :
Gaële Goastellec
Rasmus Precht
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LA NOUVELLE COUTUME URBAINE
ÉVOLUTION COMPARÉE DES FILIÈRES COUTUMIÈRES DE
LA GESTION FONCIÈRE URBAINE DANS LES PAYS
D’AFRIQUE SUBSAHARIENNE
LE CAS DE MANDELA VILLAGE,
SOUTH AFRICA
Auteur : Benoît Allanic
Recherche réalisée dans le cadre et avec l’appui conjoint du
PRUD, Programme de recherche urbaine pour le développement
Action concertée incitative du Fonds de solidarité prioritaire du
Ministère des Affaires Etrangères, Conduite par le GEMDEV et l’ISTED
et du
Department for International Cooperation (DFID), Royaume-Uni.
Document de travail : ne pas diffuser et ne pas citer sans l'autorisation du PRUD
Responsables scientifiques:
Alain Durand-Lasserve, CNRS, Laboratoire SEDET, Université de Paris VII
Michael Mattingly, Development Planning Unit, University College, Londres
Thomas Mogale, Graduate School of Public and Development Management, University of
Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Afrique du Sud.
Assistants de recherche :
Benoît Allanic
Gaële Goastellec
Rasmus Precht
Cette étude de cas constitue l’une des 9 études réalisées dans le cadre du programme de recherche
dans les pays suivants : Afrique du Sud (Gauteng & North West Province, Mpumalanga, Durban
Metropolita Area), Bénin (Cotonou & Porto Novo), Cameroon (Yaoundé) , Ghana (Kumasi) ,
Kenya (Nairobi) , Namibie (Windheok), Sénégal (Dakar), Tanzanie (Dar es Salaam) et Ouganda
(Kampala).
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SOUTH AFRICAN CASE STUDY: MANDELA VILLAGE
(GAUTENG PROVINCE, SOUTH AFRICA)
Benoît Allanic and Gary Nyundu
Progress Report, June 2003
Mandela Village (about 1,500 households) is a peri-urban informal settlement established in 1990
in breakaway from the AmaNdebele ba Lebelo tribal authority and located 40 km north of Pretoria
on both sides of the N1 freeway.
Although the ground is still tribally-owned, the government has supported extensive infrastructural
development. The ‘detribalised’ community has retained the advantages of what is usually
associated with the traditional land delivery system, i.e. easy and cheap access to land and bigger
stands than normal urban standards. These residential qualities reinforced by public service delivery
have triggered an ever-escalating and unstoppable phenomenon of self-funded house construction
and upgrade. The creation and development of Mandela Village, now incorporated into Tshwane
metropolitan area, has combined various customary, informal and formal practices and produced a
land delivery system which seem more attractive to low-income groups than public land & housing
delivery via the RDP housing schemes.
In the apartheid years, the land (Leeuwkraal farm) was falling within the South African borders
with the owners living in the former Bophuthatswana and left vacant. Most squatters who invaded
the land had lived in the surrounding areas, either as tenants or sharers wanting to move out of
overcrowded family dwellings. The invasion was encouraged by some younger members of the
Kekana Royal Executive Council (KREC) who sold occupancy rights to squatters without the
permission of the tribal authority. In 1992 the ANC and SANCO established branches in Mandela
Village and took over the land allocation. In 1993 the Mandela Village Development Forum was
established and the first community development initiatives were completed. The community
through its representatives undertook extensive negotiations with the landowners aimed at buying
the land and obtaining individual tenure. The tribal authority has never relinquished its ownership
rights but has accepted the permanence of the residents who acknowlegde the tribe’s ownership of
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the land but refuse to accept its authority. In 1995 the Municipal Demarcation Board integrated
Mandela Village into Hammanskraal Local Area Commitee (HLAC) under the Eastern Services
Council. Since December 2000, Mandela Village together with bigger trust and tenancy settlements
such as Stinkwater, Winterveld, Ga-Mokone has been incoporated into the new metropolitan area of
Tshwane (ex-Pretoria).
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An hybrid land delivery system
The Mandela Village community has sought and obtained emancipation from the Kekana tribe and
contributed to the emergence of an hybrid land delivery system combining customary, formal and
informal aspects in what is described by many residents as a ‘semi-rural location’.
Service delivery has been much faster than in the neighbourhing tribal areas of Majaneng,
Marokolong, Ramotse despite the uncertainties arising out of the land ownership situation. This
seems to confirm that public authorities are better equiped to work in areas not controlled by tribal
authorities in which the level of services has usually remained stagnant.
Objectives
This case study extends and expands extensive research fieldwork conducted in neighbouring
settlements in the Odi-Moretele region (former Bophuthatswana). It consists of an household survey
(60 questionnaires), a housing upgrade survey (3 blocks) and key-informants’ interviews. Fieldwork
is still underway.
The research has been designed to:
- define what neo-customary means in the South African context;
- establish how neo-customary systems emerge (factors and mechanisms), work, change and
adapt;
- determine whether the neo-customary system offers a viable alternative to formal land
delivery systems, especially in peri-urban areas and former homelands;
- analyse the government responses to neo-customary practices, including Tshwane
metropolitan council and its position on plot sizes;
- identify the interactions between neo-customary and democratically-constituted local
government; the government responses to customary claims; and public interventions in
neo-customary systems i.e. service delivery, tenure upgrading, etc;
- how an informal land market has developed in the area as people in Mandela Village have
sold ‘their’ properties to newcomers and moved to more recent but unserviced informal
settlements such as Kekana Gardens and Kanana.
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