Khanya College faces eviction: A threat to Johannesburg's last public space for the working class

IOL News

4 days ago

An audience sits in a darkened room covered in blankets at the Workers Museum in Newtown, Johannesburg. The City of Johannesburg plans to evict Khanya College from the historic Workers Museum Cottage to make way for administrative offices.
Image: Boxer Ngwenya / Independent Newspapers
The historic Khanya College could soon be forced to stop operating as the City of Johannesburg is planning to evict the institution from the Workers Museum Cottage.
According to Khanya, the city wants to turn the cottage into an administrative office.
The college said this decision threatens the closure of the city's last remaining public space that serves working people and communities in Johannesburg.
On the other hand, the city said the agreement ended more than a year ago.
The metro said this agreement was that Khanya College would use and occupy a particular building, in East Cottage, for a period of three years from 2021 to 2024.
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Khanya College was established in 1986, when the apartheid system was starting to unravel.
It allowed students who were classified as 'black' by apartheid legislation the chance to gain access to universities classified as 'white'.
Its history as a college that opened the doors of white universities to black students during apartheid holds three key lessons for higher education in South Africa today. These relate to empowering students through an African and global curriculum, encouraging critical thinking, and transforming universities and society.
Today, the college has become a non-profit organisation rather than a formal college, with the primary goal of assisting the working-class and poor communities to respond to the challenges posed by the forces of economic and political globalisation.
In 2006, Khanya, together with society organisations, successfully campaigned to save the workers' compound from demolition, and it was transformed into the Workers Museum.
The museum is a rare public space that honours the lives and struggles of migrant black workers under apartheid capitalism.
The college said given the depth and volume of its educational and cultural work with communities at the museum, in 2021, the City of Johannesburg gave it the East Cottage of the museum for use.
The college said the space was a vibrant hub for communities and workers from across the city's townships, for debates and cultural engagements.
This includes poetry, theatre, music, book launches, art exhibitions, seminars, and study groups.
'The Workers Museum cottages were never meant to be office space, and a form of living part of Joburg's social memory, a site for cultural work that challenges inequality, promotes community dialogue, and keeps working class history alive. Khanya College believes that the proposed eviction reflects a disregard for working-class public spaces and cultural life,' the institution said.
City of Johannesburg spokesperson, Nthatisi Modingoane, said as the agreement ended in 2024, Khanya College was requested to vacate the cottage.
Modingoane said consultations were held with the college and other stakeholders, and the college was offered alternative spaces for hosting meetings and programmes.
'Unfortunately, they turned them down. The city is still committed to accommodating the programmes that Khanya indicated would be affected by vacating the one cottage they use,' he said.
Modingoane added that the city remains committed to the ongoing preservation of the Workers Museum Complex, including the black municipal compound and the associated cottages.
'Based around the historic compound dating from 1913, the Workers Museum will continue to operate as a public facility, with the original dormitories and exhibitions showing the harsh conditions faced by black migrant workers.
'Together with the main compound, the workers' cottages will be maintained, conserved, and sustainably used, in keeping with their heritage character and status,' Modingoane said.
Meanwhile, the Khanya director, Dr Maria van Driel, said the college had a meeting with 18 organisations on July 19, and it was agreed that the space belongs to the working class and, therefore, Khanya needs to fight for the space.
'Therefore, suggestions were made that we need to work out an events programme for all the events that will take place at the cottages, do a petition and statement, and open the space for organisations who wish to use the space through Khanya, which currently acts as its custodian,' she said.
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