MyPE

Community Business Directory, Event Listings, News and Views from Gqeberha, Nelson Mandela Bay

Manipulated housing list leads to suffering

By

DA Oversight BCM
Fynbos area Temporary Housing Site

Dear MyPE

Today, 7 January 2019, I conducted an oversight inspection at an illegally occupied housing development and a temporary housing site in the Buffalo City Metro.

I was joined by Makashule Gana, DA Team One South Africa Spokesperson for Basic Services, Solly Malatsi, DA Team One South Africa Campaign Spokesperson, Kevin Mileham, EC Premier Campaign Spokesperson for Basic Services, and Mlindi Nhanha, EC Premier Campaign Spokesperson.

We inspected the housing project in Vergenoeg (Ward 10) where RDP houses are being illegally occupied.

The illegal occupants believe the wrong beneficiaries received these houses. Some have been waiting for almost twenty years for their houses, even after following all the correct procedures and being added to the beneficiary list.

Because of this illegal occupation, the development is incomplete and therefore people live without basic services such as water, electricity and sanitation. Some of these houses don ‘t even have ceilings.

I also inspected a temporary housing site in the Fynbos area, where residents live under terrible conditions.

The temporary structures were put in place by the Municipality and were supposed to be in use for no more than six months.

Many people have been occupying these dangerous structures for years and have to make use of communal sanitation facilities.

DA Councillors in BCM have initiated a forensic audit of the municipality’s housing beneficiary list. We believe the housing list is being manipulated and that people are purposefully being removed and their names replaced with those of people from outside the area.

The lack of credible housing lists is common across the country and creates a situation where the people who are supposed to be the rightful beneficiaries of houses are pushed out.

It is heart-breaking to see people, who have applied for houses by following all the right channels, wait more than 20 years for houses. These residents have to see people from outside the area, who don’t meet the minimum requirements, move in.

The DA will never condone illegal behavior, but we can understand that the residents are frustrated and that they feel cheated by the failing ANC. The failing ANC government is making use of state resources to favour comrades and friends and this leads to poor people being pushed out of the system.

Only a DA government will manage the honest and efficient delivery of adequate housing, water, electricity and sanitation and, in so doing, build One South Africa for All.

Regards

Nqaba Bhanga
DA EC Premier Candidate

The following two tabs change content below.

Port Elizabethan

This author is a 'catch-all' for occasional articles and letters written to MyPE. The Author of each article can be found in the signature at the bottom of each individual article.