On Saturday, 19 July 2025, 61 activists from 18 civil society organisations resolved that the City of Joburg and the Directorate of Heritage, Arts and Culture has no commitment to the city’s people, and especially its working class history and its cultural development. In particular and at stake here is the right of working people to access art, culture, heritage and public spaces.
The organisations agreed to launch a joint campaign, and not to leave the defence of the WMC as a heritage site to Khanya College. The meeting’s decisions provide the basis for a united campaign to mobilise civil society and the public as follows:
- the need to defend and maintain the Workers Museum and both, East and West Cottages, as public spaces and heritage sites for the working class and the general public;
- to set up a Working Group to mobilise fraternal organisations and civil society to support the petition and the campaign; to host a joint Women’s Day Celebration on 9 August at the WMC; and
- that after the period of initial consultation, organisations and civil society together with Khanya College, will hand over constituencies’ responses, to the City of Joburg as per agreement with them, in September 2025.
DEMANDS to the City of Joburg include:
Some participants had used the Museum a month ago; and after a payment of R1500 for its use, there was no electricity and water; and toilets were not available for use. Participants were taken to use the West Cottage toilets, those cared for by Khanya College. The East Cottage is already occupied by the City as administrative offices, and this is a contravention of the status of the WMC as a heritage site. After some discussion on the generally poor maintenance of the City and the WM, the meeting decided on the following campaign demands:
- that the Workers Museum and both East and West Cottages be used as a public space and heritage site for the working class and the public;
- that Khanya College be the guardian of the WMC space for the working class;
- that the City of Joburg retains responsibility for the overall structural and related maintenance of the WMC; and.
- that the CoJ enters into an agreement with Khanya College to give effect to these demands.
The meeting decided to circulate a Campaign Petition to Defend the WMC to communities, fraternal organisations, activists and the public. The meeting called on all fraternal organisations and the public to support the struggle of working people to the right to public spaces and to sign the petition immediately to halt the eviction of Khanya College from the WM Cottages now, and in the future; and for the Cottages to be retained for culture and heritage.
Joburg City Mismanagement
In the negotiations with the City of Joburg on their planned eviction of Khanya College from the Workers Museum West Cottage, the ‘reason’ given to Khanya College is that the fire that took place in the Civic Centre in Rissik Street in September 2023 displaced thousands of municipal employees. Nearly 2 years later, the fire has still not being fixed, a reflection of the city’s general mismanagement. The West Cottage will house only about 8 administrative staff at the most, and will not solve the city’s problem for offices. The displacement of its employees has more than likely impacted on the City’s service delivery, which up to now has already been poor!
In addition, as early as 2019 the CoJ was given due notice that the electrical transformers in the building needed maintenance. The CoJ’s neglect resulted in the fire. Instead of taking responsibility and accountability for its actions, the CoJ is choosing to make historically disadvantaged youth, communities and the public pay for their mismanagement.
The planned eviction of Khanya College is shortsighted and is just another example of the CoJ’s continued mismanagement of the inner-city.
- Reports indicate at least one hundred (100) dilapidated city-owned buildings require repairs.
- The Commission of Inquiry into the fire that resulted in 76 people’s deaths on 80 Albert Street in August 2023, the apartheid Pass Record Office, found the CoJ negligent and responsible for the fire. The city’s response was to blame NGOs and foreign nationals. This building was vacant since 2017, amidst calls for it to be a heritage site.
- The City Library was closed for 4 years before public protests contributed to its reopening in May this year.
- Lilian Ngoyi Street has been closed for two years due to the city failing to repair the site, amidst rumours of corruption and mismanagement.
- This is besides the ongoing potholes and lack of services in the decaying inner city where the poor live and work.
Yet when the city has the chance to protect public spaces used by its citizens it chooses to punish them further. This uncaring and unaccountable approach can no longer be tolerated.
