Returning from the Eastern Cape after spending about a year recuperating from an illness, a Khayelitsha resident found he was barred from moving into an RDP house to which he is the legal beneficiary.
Phikolomzi Tyose, 37, said his house, a unit in the Mzimhlophe Housing project, was completed in May this year while he was still recuperating in the Eastern Cape and he asked a friend of his, Bongani Magatyana, to get his keys and look after the house following its completion.
However, while he was still in the Eastern Cape in July, he received a call from Magatyana telling him that people claiming to be from Sanco, had forced him out of the house and taken the keys.
“While I was in Eastern Cape I got a call from Bongani … saying community members, including leaders, are demanding the keys of my house because I did not follow their procedure.
“When I got here they (community leaders) refused to give me my keys. I have to ask friends for a place to stay even though I have a house,” said Tyose.
Magatyana said a group “of about 100 people” came to the house while he was busy painting it and demanded the keys.
He said the group accused Tyose of not following residents’ procedure.
“They said he (Tyose) was supposed to tell them if I was going to move into the house. But what I did not understand is that Tyose informed some of the people about me. He told them that I was going to keep his house while he was away.”
A resident who did not want to give her name said the Sanco task team was “terrorising the area”.
Some of us are still waiting for our houses to be built because they stopped the project. This house belongs to Tyose but I don’t know why they kept his keys.”
Sanco branch chairperson Monde Macheliso denied Sanco had anything to do with the matter.
“What these people are doing has nothing to do with Sanco, but we will fight this corruption,” said Macheliso.
The task team committee member, Ncediswa Krwece, who is accused of holding Tyose’s keys said she had nothing to do with the keys, which were held by “community members”.
“Community members took the keys not me. I was not even there when the keys were taken. Tyose must stop disrespecting me or I will beat him, I’m tired of being accused by him. For the last time I know nothing about the keys,” said Krwece.
Sanco Peninsula Regional Deputy Secretary Bongikhaya Qhama said people were using Sanco’s name “to do their dirty things”.
“We cannot allow that,” he said.
Qhama said there was prove that the house belongs to Tyose and he suspected that the people who confiscated his keys were planning to sell the house.
Human Settlement MEC Bonginkosi Madikizela’s spokesperson, Bruce Oom, said there were allegations of fraud where people were selling houses that did not belong to them, but proof was needed.
Oom said the matter will be investigated.
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