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.


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Monday, November 1, 2010

Day 18:Parrallel Work:Steelwork and Priming

The project is picking up momentum, and work is happening in parrallel to meet the deadline. Today the wall continued to be built , after finding scaffolding,the post boxes were sanded and primed, the existing community hall was primed, the steelwork has begun, the concrete is on its way, as are the pavers.

The steel framed screens were fitted to the structure and some adjustments needed to be made. Shakes suggested alternative fixing methods,by using a simple bullet hinge instead of the fixing method we had drawn up. His solution is simpler to make and be repeated if necessary. The joints between members are also much more sleek. We will see what it looks like tomorrow.
Trying to communicate with drawings was helpful, I drew in section and Shakes drew in elevation to explain what he meant. I had gotten it all wrong, but everybody was eventually on the same page.Trying to start the actual welding took some time.A generator with sufficient power was difficult to find, eventually one was found and it promises to be a good productive day tomorrow morning.