Living with Slums Our World

Our World. This week we travelled to Manila, to explore whether some

aspects of slum dwelling contained a key to urban living in the future.

1 billion people live in slums. Some would like to clear them.

was another 150 families here. Others say slums are vital to the

modern city. And slum dwellers themselves have begun to set up

their own agenda. We will fight if necessary. I am in the Philippines

to ask a question unthinkable 100 years ago. Do we have to learn to

live with slums? This is the rice belt of the

Philippines. It is lush, calm, idyllic. But more than one million

people per year are leaving it. Poverty, climate change and a

population boom are pushing people off the land. The places they end

up in look like this. Manila is the most densely populated city on

earth. Half of its 16 million population live in slums. They want

change. They always look down on us. They always refer to us as the

eyesore of the society. This is the Estero de San Miguel. It is 600

metres long. 600 families live on either side. Although it looks

utterly temporary, it is decades old, and so is the poverty of those

who live here. Mina, who has made her home in the slum, is about to

show me how people survive here. Although I have been in places like

this before, they were not the kind of places people actually lived in.

It is like a mine. Yes. Just a tunnel, a dark tunnel. And people

live in it. The tunnel, less than four feet wide is the centre of

their world. This is the queue for the bathroom. This is the

playground. This is the public space. And as for the private

space... Hello? There is very little. So this is where you live?

Three adults, a teenager and a child live here. It is clean but

the sleeping arrangements are cramped. Would you sleep upstairs?

We sleep down here. You sleep on the floor? Husband and wife sleep

there. For some people, slums are one stage on the route out of

poverty. Most people are trapped. 20 years. You have been here 20

years in this house? Yes. And if nothing changes, the next

generation will have 20 years of their own to look forward to. As I

get further into the Estero de San Miguel, it is like seeing the worst

of 18th-century Europe. Why does this survive alongside skyscrapers?

That really is the question I am here to answer. When the Industrial

Revolution led to places like this being cleared within a generation,

why is it that globalisation seems content to try and just tinker with

this? As I am about to learn, the answer is not simple. The 19th

century city functioned better once the slums were cleared. Today,

without slum dwellers, many cities in the developing world could not

function at all. They are the ones to clean your house, drive your car,

work in your garden, man your store. If these people leave the city, the

city will die. The how hot does it get in summer? In a slum called

Payatas, right next to a mountain of garbage, I come to meet Father

Norberto. He has worked here 20 years and thinks the slums are

important. In an age of scarce resources, there are lessons for

all of us. You don't have to have more to be a human being. To really

live. Because of the imbalance between having and not having been

so vast, people help each other survive. Not only physically, but

how do you manage your time, how do you manage yourself? Everywhere you

go in Payatas, you see people organising things. Even a water

fight has unwritten rules. They have had 20 years of doing for

things for themselves, so it is an intensely social space. But by

night, Payatas becomes edgy. The police here struggle to deal with

prostitution, domestic violence and armed robbery. The Filipino

government has decided to act. 500,000 slum dwellers are to be

moved back to the countryside and these homes will be demolished.

really can't live well if you smell sewage right? How can you live

well? Attention! The day this water is clean, I will give you all ice-

cream. Meet Gina Lopez. She is on a mission to clear Manila's water

slums and bring the rivers back to life. Her charity, the River

Warriors, recruits local people to clear slums, lay drains and patrol

the place to maintain order. What will this pipe do? It will direct

the effluent that would have gone into the creek into a sewage

effluent plant. So there will be no more effluent in the creek? No more.

And you cannot do that if people's homes come right to the edge?

Security around Gina is tight because she is part of a powerful

business family. They own the energy company, the main TV station,

large chunks of downtown Manila. She takes a traditional view on

slum clearance. There is a theory among some policymakers in the

world that we have to just live with slums. We have to accept them.

No, I don't agree with that at all. Why does anyone have to live like

that? If anyone does, there is a web of lies. It brings down the

rest of the community. I don't think any city can fulfil its

potential if there are slums and people living like that. But there

is a problem. The clearance is compulsory. While they are being

cleared, some people are coming back because cities are where the

jobs are. We are seeing a giant piece of social engineering. It is

as if somebody came along with a big scalpel and cut away the homes

of hundreds of people. The problem is not what is left because, it is

getting greener. The problem is In Gina's helicopter and with the

chief of staff, I am seeing the place the slum dwellers have been

moved to. It is 30 minutes as the helicopter flies, but four hours by

road. Here density is not a problem. The problem is there is no mains

electricity, no prospect of ever getting any, and there are no jobs.

The market traders have time to Ruben has been with us for some

time. He has been with us for some Paul Mason from BBC. How are you?

Well, thank you. I notice you have your name on your doorstep. That is

you. Can I come in? Thank you. Ruben came here straight from the

slum. He likes it, the house is bright and solid. But there is

still a problem. Despite the problems the

authorities in Manila are determined to clear 500,000 people

back to the countryside. No minister has time to speak to me. I

have managed to speak to the civil servant who runs the clearance

policy. If we house all of them here it will cost 500 billion pesos,

one-third of the government budget. That is not available right now.

The government is trying to persuade people to resettle on the

land. If they do not, the implication is clear. There are

certain conditions... It is really non-negotiable. Then you will use

force to get them out? We have a process for doing eviction. Under

our urban development and housing act. There is a process for

implementing evictions. That is something we need to follow by the

law. But it involves force? It involves sending the police in and

removing them? Yes. Next on the list for clearance is the slum I

first visited. Mina has invited me It is amazing. We're on a bridge.

It is about a yard wide. People have built their shanties on either

side of this canal. It's only six feet wide in parts. I love the

people in this place, but how on earth do they survive? This is the

ability of the Filipinos to be adaptive. We are very adaptive.

longer I stay in San Miguel, the longer my revulsion for the way

people have to live gives way to my narration for how they do it. --

admiration. Is that your bedroom? The tunnel itself is full of

surprises. How is the shop going? How is business? Graduated from

college? Which college? Technological Institute. What did

you study? Business administration. This is doing my head in. I studied

economics. I am talking to a business graduate who lives in this.

Do you not find that strange? What do you say to the people who

want to clear it out? They want to demolish us here. Please don't do

that. The gist of it: We have invested all of our money here, we

like it here, it is all we know. You have lived here since birth?

Congratulations to you. Many people could not do this. Good luck with

I am interested - these guys in the uniforms, who are they? They are

the local police officers and councillors.They also live here.

Who recruits them? Me. You recruit them? How many have you got? I have

20 local police. And they have all got sticks? One of their main jobs

is to protect the slum against arson. Places resisting demolition

have a strange habit of being burned to the ground. This is water.

I am in the middle of a three foot wide canal. What is this? It is a

computer shop. A computer shop here? Yes, sir. I have got eight

screens. Somebody is on Facebook, somebody is playing poker. Is

anybody doing any homework from school? You are? HR... This lady is

applying for a job. I'm gradually understanding how this settlement

is liveable for people. Been the space of 100 metres, I've met three

graduates, several candidates for the police force and the dot com

revolution. With so much invested in this place, it is no wonder they

do not want to leave. What would happen if they start to tear it

down? We will barricade, we will fight. This is what we want. We

will fight for our freedom. We will fight for our community. We will

fight this one. We will fight if With demolition imminent, the slum

dwellers are looking for answers and on these high-technology

screens they think they may have found one. Zoning and formalised

urban planning, it has fragmented our society We need to accept that,

This is a world famous architect who has built skyscrapers, mosques

Now he has come up with a rebuild solution for this slum. It is based

on the way the squatters themselves This is the three-and-a-half metres

set back... Even you are stealing a bit of space the same way as the

slum dwellers? Yes, they have time sharing and location, location,

location. They locate their place of residence near their place of

work, near public schools for their children. We can learn from them.

You live upstairs, you work downstairs. This is a pedestrian

That is quite an optimistic vision compared to what it looks like now.

Correct? The slum-dwellers support the

scheme and the plans are ready but the government says it is too

expensive. Would it not be better just to clear it, however painful

it is for them? Would it not be better to clear it and then start

again? You do not want to? It is uprooting them from the community.

Also social problems. They are not assured of jobs. That is the

approach, the fate of 6,000 people Long before dawn, the allyways

People board the famous buses to begin the search for the $2 or $3

We used to think these places would disappear as the world develops.

Instead they have grown. Clearing them, even with the best