The Forge would like to express heartfelt condolences to the family of Lindokuhle Mnguni, recently tragically deceased Chairperson of Abahlali baseMjondolo branch, eKhanana Commune, a land occupation in Cato Manor, Durban.

The residents of eKhanana have over the past few years created a food sovereignty project: in early 2020 they began a home-based free-range poultry farm, breeding mainly traditional chickens, which they raise and sell. In the eKhanana Commune they also have a vegetable garden where they cultivate spinach, cabbages, beans and beetroot. Some of the seeds that were used during the initial stages of planting the vegetable garden were donated by Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra, MST (Landless Workers’ Movement), a social movement in Brazil. 

In 2019 a communal tuck shop was set up, but this useful facility was later destroyed. At the tuck shop they had sold fried chips, amagwinya (vetkoek/fat cake), cold drinks, sugar, canned fish, canned beans, tea bags, biscuits, and other basic requirements. 

The community also have a hall, which is used for meetings and other communal gatherings, and also houses a political school which is named in honour of the psychiatrist and political philosopher Frantz Fanon, author of Black Skin, White Masks and The Wretched of the Earth. 

Harassment and violent attacks have never been far from the community. Several leaders of eKhanana have been in and out of jail, sometimes for months at a time, falsely accused of bogus crimes. On 8 March 2022 Ayanda Ngila, Deputy Chairperson of the eKhanana Commune, was brutally murdered.  On 5 May 2022 Nokuthula Mabaso, Chairperson of the eKhanana Women’s League, was also brutally murdered at eKhanana: she was shot seven times – four bullets into her back – in front of her children. During the early hours of Saturday morning, 20 August 2022, Lindokuhle Mnguni was shot several times and killed at eKhanana Commune. 

Born in Durban eNtuzuma, Lindokuhle Mnguni grew up in Bulwer, KwaZulu-Natal and went to junior and senior primary school there. He came back to Durban around 2008 to attend high school. 

Lindokuhle Mnguni, born on 19April 1994, a few days before the 1994 general elections, belonged to the so-called born free generation – ironically however he died fighting for land and a home.