Design capital fails to prioritise undoing apartheid design Design and innovation is an everyday activity of the people of Cape Town, who because of the structural neglect of apartheid had to find innovative solutions to their challenges. These innovations ranged from the backyard informal housing in all council rented stock , to hanging between trains due to the cronic levels of overcrowding. ON the cape Flats its called common sense or “maak n plan”. When working people heard about design capital that would be applied to Cape Town, they thought that it was going to be real creative plans to undo the legasy of planned apartheid disadvantage. Sadly this does not appear to be the case , as the focus is on just packaging the variety of things that already largely exist in the City, in a yellow bag. The City of Cape Town fairly early in their term of administration realised that they do not have any overarching vision to present to the people of the city of Cape Town . So they bought a vision that they could present to the people, at around R40 million from an international agency . The added advantage of this vision of design Capital, was that it could give consultants an opportunity to make a fortune from the city and reinforce an old subtext of Cape Town . The subtext is that don’t worry, clever, mainly white people will use fancy words to address your problems, but only in your head. The reality from this gimmick however is that not one house has been built from the design capital notion . There has been no redress in the sense that resources are shifted from those who benefited from apartheid to those who suffered under apartheid, in a manner that tries to level the playing field for greater social cohesion . So all the City really does is rename existing projects that were in place, as design capital projects and the consultants pocket R40 Million . They then advertise this broadly from the R50 Million rand advertising budget , and this spin of facts role out to tell the people their lives are better when in fact, very little had changed for working families of the Cape Flats . Lets consider a few examples where design principles could have been applied , not from a consultant , but from basic common sense . Uitsig is a sub economic area where I live close to the UWC , it is known for having the highest TB rates internationally and of late the highest shooting rates from gangsters. National Government has given millions of rand from the community upgrade programme to improve the circumstances of this community, whilst upgrading the rental housing stock . This should have meant upgrading the houses , and upgrading the community by moving out illegal shebeens and closing drug houses , all of which is common knowledge . It should have meant installing solar Hot Water cylinders instead of the cylinders inside the houses . IT should have meant putting in adequate ventilation in the houses to ensure that the TB pandemic is addressed , but this was not done . It should also have meant building the toilets in a manner that it does not encroach on the kitchen and accommodates the back yarders sanitation needs as well , But this was not done , in spite of it requiring minimal additional cost . It should further have considered providing basic service to backyarders from the R2.5 milion rand set aside for this across the city . Children could also have been provided with safe play spaces that the community could protect . None of these things were done in spite of request from the community, because consultants would not have benefited financially from the process. The MyCity buss was rolled out to the wealthier areas in Milnerton and Sea Point first , with dedicated lanes to reduce their traveling time . When My City was finally rolled out into the Mitchells Plain Khayalitsha corridor , it was inadequate and had no dedicated buss routes put in place on the corridors . Basic design[ common knowledge ] would have dictated that there is a greater need on the cape flats for public transport , because there people do not have private cars as an alternative . So Cape Flats people spend more time traveling to their destination , meaning they have less time to spend with their families, due to them working longer hours . So the wealthier communities who work shorter hours , travel more efficiently to work and get home earlier , so have half of their day to spend with their families and communities . Its no wonder that working class communities have more family and societal problems . But the design gurus do not consider this as it does not make a consultant rich and it does not improve the prospects of the wealthy . In this example design misses an important area to undo the legasy of apartheid , more by design than by chance. The business prospects for black business are still significantly undermined ,because it cannot disturb the apartheid generational advantage of the apartheid beneficiaries . So black businesses are systematically undermined and precluded from business opportunities by the old boys club . Nothing is done through design to change the way in which bussineses are provided opportunities , that preferences blacks and undoes the apartheid legasy . The City of Cape Town now has the highest levels of income inequality growth since 1994 , when it was already less unequal than the other cities , because of the historical application of apartheid . It has the highest levels of drug abuse and gangsterism and the greatest loss of hope in town ships amongst young people . Many of the schools in townships do not have basic needs , whilst those Schools in the shadows of table Mountain has every fascility, to give them a vastly superior educational experience. These things listed above are all a direct consequence of Apartheid planning , surely they must be undone with democratic planning, as a priority. This is however not considered a priority issue, because it does not benefit design gurus and does not improve the circumstances of the wealthy elites in the Society. Design capital has in the main been reduced to rebranding old projects as design capital projects eg the ARV clubs was a suggestion and project from Doctors without borders in 2006 . Suddenly it is presented as a design Capital project, and a key innovation from the Provincial Government. The nearly R100 [ R40 WDC and R50 for advertising] million linked to this great gimmick called Design Capital, could have gone a long way in undoing the design and legasy of apartheid generational advantages. It could have given our Working family kids functional computers in all schools , and proper toilet facilities. As people of the cape Flats we are not opposed to design and innovation , our survival depends on it, but we call it common sense and duplicating best practices elsewhere. We want to see the priority of design undoing the legasy of the previous apartheid design . We want to see design advancing the promise of the Constitution, of the promotion of equality and social justice for all. We don’t want to be told that the rivers flow to the sea because of design Capital , we know its always been that way. Tony Ehrenreich Cosatu Secretary
Posted on: Mon, 08 Sep 2014 11:45:41 +0000
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