In 2014, a blue plaque was unveiled on Adam Asvat's Pageview home. Lucille Davie, one of Joburg's legendary journalists was there and compiled the following report (originally published in the Saturday Star on 3 May 2014) . Click here to view more of Davie's work.
They tore up the roads. They cut off the water and electricity. They made sand mounds on the sports field so that the community couldn’t play soccer or cricket any more.
“They” were the department of community development, the apartheid government’s euphemism for dislocation and relocation if you weren’t white. First they relocated people from Sophiatown, and demolished their homes, then they moved to Pageview, where they did the same thing, except they were up against a determined bunch of diehards.
I was in Pageview on Sunday for the unveiling of a heritage plaque outside the home of Adam Asvat and his wife Khadija. Asvat, soft-spoken and unassuming, had been the driving force behind the Save Pageview Association back in the 1970s and 80s.
Home of Adam Asvat Blue Plaque (The Heritage Portal)
Although thousands were moved from Pageview, he and 66 other residents in the suburb simply refused to move. They persisted with their campaign for close to 20 years, until their eviction orders...
