July 16, 2002
By Thomas Thale
ALEXANDRA, the site of a multi-million rand presidential development initiative, is to be promoted as a model of sustainable development during the forthcoming World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD).
The president launched the Alexandra Renewal Project (ARP) in his 2001 State of the Nation address, committing R1,3-billion over a seven-year period for the massive upgrade of the historic, densely populated township in the northeast of Johannesburg.
Xoliswa Mkhalali, ARP liaison manager, says that the ARP will use Alexandra's close proximity to Sandton to attract visitors to the township.
New flats going up in the Reconstruction Area of Alexandra
"For the duration of the summit, we will build a village under canvas to showcase the Alex development and talent" in the township, says Lix Miller, the ARP event manager. The village will be based at the Altrek Centre, a major sporting complex in the township which has offices, ablution facilities, a soccer pitch and a cricket oval. The exhibition will include pictures and videos depicting life in Alexandra. The canvas exhibition centre will occupy about 100 square metres.
Established in 1912, Alexandra is one of the earliest urban black settlements in Jo'burg, predating even Soweto. It was in Alexandra that many early migrants lost their pastoral innocence and surrendered to the temptation of the urban milieu, albeit a squalid one.
The ARP is a massive project which entails improving living conditions and upgrading human capacity in the township. The project includes about 130 programmes, some related to environmental development, others to the development of human skills and still others dedicated to upgrading housing in the township. All over the township, new structures are going up as shacks and vegetation are cleared to make way for the development.
The centre will serve as a gateway into the township, Miller says. Local artists will be invited to sell their arts and crafts from an exhibition to be set up there. The centre will also be a site of major cultural events, with local groups staging performances at the venue for the duration of the Summit.
The area surrounding the cricket oval has been earmarked for the development of an international forest for sustainable development. Some 10 000 indigenous trees will be planted in the township over Arbour Week, beginning on 1 September. High profile delegates, including heads of states, will be invited to participate in the campaign. Food and Trees for Africa and the Department of Agriculture, Conservation, Environment and Land Affairs have donated the trees to be planted.
In the 1950s, Alexandra was home to prominent political activists, among them one Nelson Mandela. The house in which he stayed for three years before he moved to Orlando West stands derelict along 7th avenue, with its plaster peeling off. It is to be restored and converted into a museum as part of the ARP, Mkhalali reveals.
The township also gave birth to legendary gangsters like the Msomi gang and the Spoilers - notorious groups which inspired fear among locals. In his novels, Mongane Serote, an ANC MP and a prominent South African author who grew up in Alexandra, invokes the township paradoxically as a harsh environment to which he is irrevocably attached. Serote provides one of the abiding images of Alexandra as a cruel mother whose children are strongly bonded to it.
Alexandra is one of the few urban areas where black people could own land under 99-year freehold title. This concession led to the area being overcrowded by people who found it relatively easy to settle there. This unplanned influx put pressure on social infrastructure. Many landlords profited by sub-letting their yards to people desperate for land. It is this legacy of social, environmental and economic degeneration that the ARP seeks to reverse.
In 1990, the township was the scene of internecine violence which polarised relations between hostel dwellers and township residents. Under the ARP, the hostels are being upgraded into single and family units.
The ARP has also provided an impetus for the development of housing in Alexandra. People who were dislocated by the 1990 violence have now been resettled in a new section called River Park. Some of the people who were removed from the banks of the Jukskei River last year have been housed in the newly established Extension 8.
For a map of Alexandra, visit the Alexandra Renewal Project.
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