Still no home, four years after Operation Murambatsvina

Hundreds of Zimbabwean families displaced by the government's Operation Murambatsvina (Drive out Filth) in 2005 are still awaiting alternative accommodation.

They were told at the time to return to their rural villages, but many, including the descendants of immigrants, had nowhere to go and were forced into government-sanctioned resettlement camps on the outskirts of urban centres with no source of employment and still languish there.

The campaign, carried out in the winter of 2005, was aimed at clearing slums and flushing out criminals, but left more than 700,000 people not only homeless but often also without a livelihood.

"We were assured this was a transit camp," said Obert Pedzai, who was forced to relocate to Sidojiwe Flats, built in the 1960s for single male workers in the industrial area of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second city. "Government officials explained our stay would be temporary while proper houses are built for us."

Pedzai's lodging in the poor working-class suburb of Nketa was razed during the government-sponsored demolition exercise. He sent his family home to rural Nyajena, about 450 kilometres away in Masvingo Province, in southeastern Zimbabwe, hoping to bring them back when conditions improved. "It is now almost four years and little has changed."

The family he shared his room with in Sidojiwe Flats for three and a half years were fortunate to have been included among the 12 beneficiaries of a municipal housing scheme and they left two months ago.

From afar, Sidojiwe Flats appear habitable, with tiny kitchen gardens spread around the main structure. A closer look exposes the crumbling facilities of a dilapidated building.

Most of the windows have been covered with cardboard and plastic sheets to give some protection from the weather to the more than 150 families crammed two to a room in the three-storey block.

Barefoot children chase each other along the grimy, narrow corridors past the doorless communal bathrooms, where there is no running water or electricity. Residents have to fetch water from a neighbouring apartment block.

Monica Mlauzi, 78, a widow, has spent the past four years holed up in Sidojiwe. A piece of cloth serves as a partition in the room she shares with another family. "We are still here living in these horrible conditions without hope of ever getting serious attention from the authorities. We feel abandoned," she said, struggling to light a fire from a clutch of twigs in a brazier perched on top of the derelict stove in the communal kitchen.

"We are no longer sure of the selection criteria [for the allocation of new houses]," said Fidelis Nyamadzawo, a member of the displaced residents' committee.

The clearance operation brought international condemnation; in response the government launched Operation Garikai/Hlalani Kuhle (Operation Have a Good Life) and committed itself to rebuilding homes and vending stalls.

We are still here living in these horrible conditions without hope of ever getting serious attention from the authorities. We feel abandoned.

But its scheme to put up 200,000 houses has become mired in controversy and accusations of graft in the allocation of the small number of units built so far in various towns and cities. "It appears those that are well-connected get first preference," Nyamadzawo alleged.

The elderly in Sidojiwe find it difficult to cope with the harsh living conditions. "None of us get any assistance from the Department of Social Welfare," said Barbra Ndhlovu, 75. "We live from hand to mouth and often go without food, and without hope of the authorities coming to intervene."

Occasionally, charitable church organisations lend a hand. Last November, a church organisation assisted 60 families with five blankets each. "People have become sceptical about registering for assistance because they have often been let down by organisations that request their names but never return to assist," said Nyamadzawo.

Expensive assistance

A church organisation recently offered to build houses for the residents on condition that each beneficiary provide a toilet unit and plumbing material, and labour during construction. 

A toilet seat alone costs Z$120 million (US$46), while the cistern costs Z$100 million (US$38) - a figure well beyond the reach of most of the homeless families. "Only four people took up the offer," said Nyamadzawo. "Most of us, including elderly pensioners, can never dream of coming up with such a huge amount."

Bulawayo Council officials admit it is "unsanitary" to live in Sidojiwe, and explain that it accommodated the families in the three apartment blocks as a last resort, on "humanitarian grounds", when their homes were flattened. Spokesman Pathisa Nyathi explained that the council had been in the process of decommissioning the flats when Operation Murambatsvina was launched.

He said the council had hoped to allocate houses built under a `Millennium Housing Scheme' to the families. The scheme was to have provided at least 1,000 houses and should have been implemented in 2001, but was affected by the rocketing cost of building materials after the economic crisis began in 2000.

Zimbabwe is in the midst of an economic meltdown: it has the world's highest inflation rate, officially cited at 8,000 percent but estimated at 25,000 percent by independent economists.

According to Nyathi, "There is no indication that these families will be leaving soon because building costs are prohibitive."

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