South Africa’s Post-Apartheid Failure in Shantytowns

Cecily Ghall speaks with pride about the neat, whitewashed two-room shack she built in an acquaintance’s backyard using scrap wooden planks and asbestos plates. It’s warm and -- important in the midst of a wet South African winter -- dry, she says. But it isn’t hers.

Ghall, 47, has waited for a government-provided home since 2008, when she and her daughter Deonie, then 13, moved to Kurland Village, a predominantly mixed-race settlement of about 2,000 residents. Less than 10 miles (16 kilometers) away is Plettenberg Bay, a seaside resort where homes selling for more than 15 million rand ($1.5 million) are common.