Young Mom Support is a social support group for young and teenage moms in Fish Hoek. We recently held our first meeting for Hout Bay moms at Hout Bay Secondary School. Some former learners from the school attended with their children. We hope to attract more of Hout Bay’s young mothers to our next meetings and would appreciate any help you could provide in spreading the word.
Young Mom Support aims to provide a safe, non-judgemental and encouraging environment for young and teenage mothers to socialise, meet other mothers with similar priorities and speak of the every day parenting issues they deal with. Young moms are often ostracised and excluded from participating in parenting groups and this can lead to isolation and loneliness.
Our moms come from diverse socio-economic, cultural, educational and family backgrounds – their needs and stories are as individual as they are. What they all have in common is the drive, will and desire to be good parents to their children. We believe that a mother who is proud of her parenting will do a better job than a mother who believes society’s negative, stereotypical assumptions about her.
Planning Minister Trevor Manuel is seething with anger about the distribution of a pamphlet that claims he has urged voters not to vote ANC in the local government elections.
Taking time from his door-to-door campaigning in the impoverished Hangberg informal settlement overlooking the spectacular surrounds of Hout Bay, he had plenty to say about the distribution of the pamphlet, headlined “Trevor Manuel is telling South Africans not to vote in South Africa”.
Manuel said ANC members had reported seeing the pamphlet distributed in various parts of the country. “We asked around and we have found that it has been distributed by people dressed in blue in different places,” he said.
Manuel received a hero’s welcome from ANC community members in Hangberg, where many people are still traumatised by their violent clashes with police who moved into the area in September to demolish illegally built shacks.
The move to demolish the shacks was ordered by the DA, which had wanted to clear the firebreak on the mountain. Some residents say Cape Town mayor Dan Plato is no longer welcome in the area and the incident has proved to be further electioneering ammunition for the ANC.
Among the people who waited for two hours for Manuel to arrive in Hangberg was 35-year-old Aurial Cloete, who lost her left eye in the clashes, when police fired shots to control the crowd. “I was standing there on the hill when the shooting started,” she said, pulling off her sunglasses to reveal a sewn-up hole in the place where her eye should be.
“I ran into my flat and was looking out when a sharpshooter shot me in the passage.”Anger against the DA is still rife in the area and many residents complained that they had been offered no counselling. Some said they had voted for the DA, but the police shootings had changed their minds. ANC members in Hangberg said they had not seen the pamphlet about Manuel, although some said they had heard about it. The ANC brought charges of crimen injuria and fraud against the DA this week for the pamphlet.
The DA denied printing and distributing the two-page A4 document. However, it said it stood by most of the content, which was the wording of a statement first sent out in March by DA national spokesperson Lindiwe Mazibuko, quoting what she claimed were some of Manuel’s assessments of government service delivery weaknesses.
“In a desperate attempt to do absolutely anything to avoid talking about service delivery, the ANC’s electoral campaign has resorted to what can only be described as spectacular nonsense by trying to get an interdict to stop a pamphlet the DA has nothing to do with and which mirrors a statement released by the party to the entire country two months ago,” Mazibuko responded this week.
In the DA statement it said Manuel’s “latest attack on the ANC government’s service delivery record is the fourth such incident in three months”.
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THE NATIONAL Water Affairs Department says it is determined to protect water sources, especially wetlands, and has requested the developer of the Beach Club at Hout Bay to produce a wetland specialist’s report within 14 days, among other documents.
This follows its action last week when it gave the developer 48 hours to explain why it should not issue a directive to stop all further infilling of a disputed wetland area, remove all the fill already dumped and levelled, and rehabilitate the site to its natural state.
The developer of this controversial housing estate in the coastal dunes on the western bank of the Disa River, Really Useful Investments (Pty) Ltd, continues to insist that all the infilling work is being done legally in terms of an environmental plan approved by the provincial government.
However, the 50-year flood level is now strongly disputed by the Hout Bay & Llandudno Environment Conservation Group, which had earlier made an unsuccessful bid in the Western Cape High Court to stop the developer’s earthmoving operation which it said included infilling of part of the wetlands linked to the estuary.
“Blue Scorpion” Thando Stimela, a compliance, monitoring and enforcement official at Water Affairs’ regional head office in Bellville, confirmed yesterday that the developer had responded to the department’s 48-hour demand, and had asked it not to issue a directive. However, the department had not been satisfied with the response, partly because some documentation was lacking.
After a discussion with the developer’s legal team, the developer had been given 14 days to supply the construction phase environmental management plan, as well as a wetland specialist’s report which included a delineation of the wetland. Also, the department had requested a diagram to be drawn up by a professional engineer, showing the 1:50-year flood line in the area.
“The reason we want this is because we want to satisfy ourselves about their EMP (environmental management plan),” Stimela said.
The City of Cape Town is working with the department to investigate an alleged failure by the Beach Club developer to comply with its order, issued last month in terms of the stormwater management by-law. This was to stop all further infilling in the disputed wetland area in the Disa River estuary, and to remove all fill already placed within the 1:100-year flood line.
City media manager Kylie Hatton confirmed “non-compliance with the stormwater notice”, and said its further efforts in this regard were being co-ordinated with the national Water Affairs Department.
@DolceanBanana (mijou beller ) being sued by some hungry lawyer for using “dolceandbanana” name for our fashion jewellery made in Houtbay cape town.