Nkanini People expend their community

Nkanini people are hoping to expend their little community.  The community was founded by few community members who were renting at the backyards of the school crescent and Snake Valley and others were staying with their families in the hostels.

It hasn’t been easy for these community members since at the beginning they had no electricity and no running water because Stellenbosch municipality wanted them gone. One of the residents who started this small community Josephsaid it wasn’t easy building this community because the odds were against them. “We had to fight with the municipality and the neighboring communities because they both wanted us gone, but we fought as we are still fighting even today”, said Joseph.

The community has grown a lot in the past few years and now they are hoping to make it bigger.  Younger people are seeking independence and they see Nkanini as their stepping stone to a bigger house and perhaps see it as a waiting room to a bigger RDP house.

This past weekend the Kayamandi community woken by the noise of zinks and hummers, people building and others expanding their homes. The crowed moved to start building under the police station where Paarl police officers claimed that it belong to a private owner not to the Cape Winelands District.

Municipality came and demolished them but the community members who were building said they will not give up because similar situation happened before when the first Nkanini dwellers build the first houses that made what we call Nkanini today.

The mayor office said the community agreed to have a meeting with them to resolve this issue.

The area is one of the areas in the Western Cape who were against 2014 elections because of the tribulations they are facing. The person who spark the insanity is still unknown.