The story of three activists

The funding will go towards bringing together three amazing women activists with a writing coach so as to share their story of holding a mining company responsible for polluting their only water source leading to the death of community cattle and sickness in the village. The funding will also PAY them for developing this story rather than expecting them to do this for free.  

The common practice is for researchers to take the work of local activists and publish these as case studies. We want to reverse this trend by finding the funds to enable Mmathapelo, Eustine and Tokelo to tell their own story and for them to get the financial benefit for their story rather than professionals. 

This chapter will focus on  research done by the Sekhukhune Environmental Justice Alliance (SEJA) (Thobejane et al, 2018) during the Changing Practice course, a course for community-based activists in South Africa.. Three young female activists researched why cattle have been dying in their village. They prove that this is due to   pollution by a local mine. Their story shows how they  mobilise support amongst their community to oppose the mine, how they engage with local authorities and ultimately, how they can secure compensation for the dead cattle from the mining company. The chapter shows what we can learn about social movement action from the SEJA research. It also points to the missed opportunities of how professional researchers could have worked in solidarity with SEJA’s research by providing  knowledge that could have strengthened SEJA’s action. The chapter concludes with Mmathapelo, Eustine and Tokelo motivating young academic scholars to consider how they can work in solidarity with community activists.