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DA escalates BCM Farm 924 evictions to SAHRC

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Dear MyPE

The Democratic Alliance is calling on the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) to investigate the manner in which residents, who illegally invaded land owned by the Buffalo City Metropolitan Municipality (BCMM), were removed.

On Monday 27 July residents who illegally invaded Farm 924 Greydell, owned by the Buffalo City Metropolitan Municipality (BCMM), were awoken by bulldozers demolishing their newly built housing structures. Some of the structures demolished were brick and tiled roof houses at an estimated cost of more than R100 000 per house, while others were informal corrugated iron shacks.

I have written to the SAHRC and requested they urgently investigate this matter with the same enthusiasm they have applied elsewhere in the country.

While the DA will never condone the illegal invasion of land (and the subsequent illegal water and electricity connections that result), the lacklustre approach of the ANC-led BCMM in not dealing with illegal land invasions and the slow delivery of RDP housing have enabled the illegal occupation of this land.

Populist calls to occupy land by reckless political parties under the cover of expropriation without compensation are also to blame.

The DA has constantly raised the issue of the illegal occupation of the Public Works owned land called Bhongweni in Council meetings since 2014. Farm 924 is adjacent to Bhongweni. At no stage in the last 6 years has BCMM or Public Works acted against those invaders, many of whom are public servants who have built brick structures.

The SAHRC must now investigate the actions of the BCMM during Covid-19 lockdown level three to determine whether their actions were lawful

I have also written to DA Member of Parliament, Samantha Graham-Maré (MP), who will bring the situation to the attention Ministers of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (CoGTA), Nkosazana-Dlamini-Zuma, and Public Works, Patricia de Lille.

The DA will take the fight of illegal land occupations in the BCM Municipality to a national level while working to ensure that the human rights of our people are protected.

Regards

Cllr Sue Bentley
BCM Municipality

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