Slovo Park - An Established Community: 2010

Slovo Park at a Glance

Slovo Park is situated in a politically and socially sensitive stretch of land south of Soweto. The community has been known by national government as Nancefield, by local council as Olifantsvlei and in the last five years as Slovo Park – named in honour of South Africa’s first minister of housing and former Umkhonto we Sizwe General, Joe Slovo.

The forced changing of identity reflects an on-going struggle faced by the leadership of Slovo Park to gain recognition as a legitimate settlement to access governmental support. This battle has been fought through constant shifts in governmental policy, power and promises for the community of Slovo Park. Their only tactics comprising of service delivery protest, painstaking formal requests for upgrade and currently a lawsuit against the City of Johannesburg.

Currently the community of Slovo Park with its development partners are strategizing this key social and political move.

THIS SITE SERVES AS A PORTAL FOR THE COMMUNITY OF SLOVO PARK & THE VARIOUS DEVELOPMENT PARTNERS TO SHARE THE JOURNEY OF RE-DEVELOPMENT.

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Christmas presents and a party at the hall

Thank you to all the sponsors, from within the Slovo park community as well the few from outside, involved in donating christmas presents and clothes for the children.

Many people wanted to contribute but could not donate anything we needed during our construction process, all the additional donations were handed out on the 16th.

I am happy to report that the paving has been completed and there are extra bricks to allow additional areas to be paved.

It seems the true function of the postbox is destined to be a DJ booth.

Saturday, November 27, 2010

Before&After

Thursday, November 25, 2010

Summary: Panoramas over 6 weeks

We would like for you to have an overall view of how we progressed over the six weeks of construction. Please see the panoramas below taken at one week intervals.

Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4

Week 5

Week 6

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Day 35: Launch Party and Handover

The morning kicked of early with everyone participating in cleaning and preparing the site for all the activities happening today.

The lecturers and examiners from UP were introduced to the community members that were always willing to help the students. The community were thanked for opening their community and homes for the students, and let the students learn through participation.

After the lectureres left, the community meeting started.

A view of the whole site while the meeting is happening.

Views of the outdoor meeting space.

The post box being used as a serving counter.

After the meeting the celebration kicked off with some dancing.

...even the children joined in.

A celebatory bottle of champagne was shared by all. Well done!

The serving kiosk was converted into a DJ booth.

People brought their barbeques and participated in the festivities.

THANK YOU SLOVO PARK!!!!

Friday, November 19, 2010

Day 34: The last day...

On our last official day of working together all the paving bricks were used to do the paving, even the broken pieces to create beautiful patterns.

To celebrate this day a group photo was taken of everyone that came to help reach our six week goal. Tomorrow many visitors will arrive to see what we achieved in six weeks, and the UP students will handover the new community meeting space to the community.