Amazon’s Cape Town base divides indigenous tribes

A drum beats, the dance begins, and a chant is hoisted into the air. Cars roar past ten metres away on a busy road, drivers ignorant of the spiritual ceremony going place in the heart of a bustling South African metropolis.

Francisco Mackenzie, head of the Khoi village of Cochoqua, speaks about old beliefs and struggles five centuries ago against foreign invaders. He gestures to Table Mountain’s renowned skyline, then to a neighbouring construction site.

“This is where we gather to honour our forefathers and the great spirit creator, as well as to rekindle our nation’s bonds.” That was the site of the first resistance battle. “However, money is always insulting to environment, customs, and culture,” he explained.

The money in dispute is the prospective revenues from a 15-hectare (37-acre) plot in Cape Town’s Observatory neighbourhood that is being developed into a complex with houses, stores, a hotel, a conference centre, and enterprises. Amazon, which aims to base its expanding activities in Africa there, will be by far the most significant tenant at the £200 million project.

Cranes and bulldozers are currently idle. Earlier this month, a Cape Town court upheld a March order that halted construction on the enormous complex until more talks with heritage groups representing some Indigenous tribes took place.

“It’s another vindication,” said Tauriq Jenkins, an activist and Goringhaicona Khoena council member, as the event began. “It will [help] refute the falsehoods and misinformation spread against our assertions.” It is a triumph for the Sn and Khoi, our legacy and ecology, and restorative justice.”

The tale of the development, however, is less straightforward than it appears, pitting competing views of South Africa’s future against one another and provoking a bitter conflict within the communities of the Khoi and Sn peoples, the country’s original occupants.