These are some of the stories we brought you in 2022. Expect more to follow in 2023.
This has been an eventful year and Elitsha has been at the forefront of bringing you community, national and international news this year.
In January, Food and Allied Workers Union members at Clover went on a national strike against factory closures, wage cuts and job losses.
In February, unemployed youth marched to parliament to deliver an “alternative budget speech that is against austerity measures.”
On Human Rights Day, South Africans and foreign nationals marched against xenophobia calling for the arrest of violent xenophobes.
The residents of New Monwabisi Park told Police Minister Bheki Cele about how the lack of services contributes to crime in the area.
On Easter weekend, residents of Joe Slovo informal settlement were woken by a fire that ravaged the area, destroying over 300 structures and leaving many homeless.
We visited the Komati power station in Middleburg in May this year and spoke to the workers who complained that they were not adequately consulted about the switch from coal power to clean energy.
The National Union of Metalworkers Union (Numsa) went ahead with their congress, which was held in Cape Town, despite the fact that the union was deeply divided. The congress re-affirmed the status quo in leadership.
In August we visited Marikana township where relatives of the slain workers and survivors of the massacre in 2012 reside. We found the residents still living in squalid conditions that they vowed to continue to fight.
Informal traders resisted forced removal by the City of Johannesburg as it was implementing “Operation Buya Mthetho”.
A war between factions of Zama-Zamas in the West Rand of Johannesburg prompted the community of Bosmont to call for the deployment of the army to quell the violence.
Radio Zibonele in Khayelitsha was instructed to close down by Icasa after it failed to renew its licence. After the intervention of the communications minister, the radio station was granted a special and temporary licence by the regulatory body, which expired on the 16th of October this year.
We also carried a story about how the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions is facing collapse due to political divisions causing strife in the trade union federation. The story followed an interview by the federation’s secretary, Japhet Moyo, with the SABC where he superficially absolved the ZANU PF government of having contributed to the collapse of Zimbabwe’s economy.
Public sector unions in South Africa went on strike after the government unilaterally implemented a 3% wage increase whereas the unions were – and still are – demanding 10%.
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