Mother City gives audiences an opportunity to walk in the shoes of the oppressed and dispossessed
Mother City offered audiences an opportunity to walk in the shoes of the oppressed and dispossessed.
The Nelson Mandela Foundation and the 26th Encounters South African International Documentary Festival hosted the screening of Mother City on June 28.
“Mother City has been selected as our opening film, as it represents the heart of documentary filmmaking. It speaks to the power of film in exposing the arduous journey so many in this world must embark on to effect change. It is also a universally powerful story of the triumph of the collective,” said Encounters festival director Mandisa Zitha.
The festival is renowned for its commitment to showcasing diverse voices, insightful perspectives, and compelling narratives.
Mother City, directed by Miki Redelinghuys and Pearlie Joubert, led a line-up of local, African, and international films that made waves or garnered critical acclaim at festivals worldwide.
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The festival took place at venues in Cape Town and Johannesburg last month.
The film offered audiences an opportunity to walk in the shoes of the oppressed and dispossessed, to understand the real struggle for people needing homes closer to work, education, and recreation and not being banished to the outskirts of urban areas.
It grappled with the right to access and the fairness of being able to actively participate in an urban economy. It laid bare the struggles of people who are often vilified and ‘othered’ for trying to rightfully claim a space to live with their families.
Activist and protagonist of Mother City Nkosikhona Swartbooi said welcoming the crew into his life when shooting the film was quite an experience.
“The first thing I told Miki was my biggest gripe with the protest environment which was the extractive nature of academia in terms of people’s struggles. A lot of researchers, lawyers, and professionals came to the movement space and extracted whatever they required to tick a box so that their careers would take off and help the cause.”
Swartbooi added that he was lucky at Ndifuna Ukwazi Legal Centre where some lawyers were willing to join in the cause and be as dedicated as the movement was.
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He explained, “It took the lawyers getting involved in the cause with us to give them my attention. I would not have given them my attention if they had not come when we occupied those buildings but they stood outside and defended the occupation and brought essentials, food and water required. Their involvement and form of support which was not popular at the time is what made us form relationships and made me open my home to film deep and dark parts of my activism in the community.”
PhD candidate and former executive director of Ndifuna Ukwazi Legal Centre Mandisa Shandu explained that the core struggle for urban land justice in Cape Town was at least two-fold.
“It was about what we see in this film – the active fight to unlock parts of the land as a way of calling for the distribution of land and a way of responding to a worsening land crisis as urban populations increase. There is no plan to address that aside from people occupying informal settlements which we know is not sustainable nor a dignified way of living.”
Shandu added that she and other protestors had to provoke new ways of accessing the city by advancing or broadening access to land.
“The other part of it that the film does not go into depth about but speaks to is resisting violent evictions, which are a big part of the protests. What if people do not have alternative solutions after being evicted – what do they do? In some instances, they have chosen to occupy but a big part of the story is to gain support whether it is legally correct when they are faced with evictions which inspire them to be involved in protests.”
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Attorney at Ndifuna Ukwazi Legal Centre, Dr Jonty Cogger concluded that the latest update about the matter in the film was that the centre was in the process of appealing to the Constitutional Court after the city and province appealed to the Supreme Court of Appeal to overturn the High Court victory to halt the sale of the property and ordered the province and the City of Cape Town to address the legacy of apartheid spatial planning in Cape Town.
