Fire leaves 50 people homeless in Khayelitsha

At least 50 people have been left homeless after a fire destroyed their dwellings at the Site C informal settlement in Khayelitsha, Cape Town this morning.

A total of 30 structures were razed. Disaster Management spokesperson, Wilfred Solomons-Johannes, says their officials are on site to assist the affected people with meals, blankets and clothing.

The cause of the fire is being investigated. No one was injured in the fire.

- SABC

NHFC applies to have Sea Kay liquidate

The National Housing Finance Corporation (NHFC) has applied for the liquidation of Sea Kay Holdings and one of its wholly owned subsidiaries.

However, Pieter van der Schyf, an executive director and acting chairman of Sea Kay, confirmed yesterday that it was opposing the application because it had legal opinion that the actions instituted by the NHFC were factually and legally flawed. The listed mass affordable housing construction company had a reasonable prospect of successfully defeating the application.

Delca Maluleke, an NHFC spokeswoman, confirmed yesterday it had launched an application for the liquidation of Sea Kay Engineering Services and Sea Kay Holdings. She said the NHFC expected the application to be heard in April.

Van der Schyf said the application was related to a loan agreement between the NHFC and Sea Kay Engineering to the value of R128 million to finance low-cost housing.

He said Sea Kay Holdings had signed surety for the loan. The current amount outstanding on the loan was R108m. To date, Sea Kay had paid back R56m, including interest.

Van der Schyf said Sea Kay's board was positive the matter could be resolved.

He said that through the 16 contracts the government had entered into with Sea Kay, the different housing departments owed the company far more in outstanding payments than the alleged NHFC liability.


Sea Kay is the biggest single entity delivering housing products nationally within the Human Settlements Department's housing programme.

The NHFC is the housing finance arm within the department that provides funding to companies to deliver on government housing contracts.

"The step (to apply for liquidation) was taken after every effort to accommodate Sea Kay Engineering Services was made and also exhausting every opportunity to remedy the situation," Maluleke said.

Maluleke added that the NHFC, as a development finance institution, had an obligation to make funding available to low- and middle-income households.

"For the NHFC to continue doing this at scale and on a sustainable basis, it is imperative that money owed to the corporation is repaid."

Sea Kay has experienced severe cash flow problems since last year because of delayed and late payments by the government. This included more than R100m owed to it by the Gauteng Housing Department and about R133m in the Western Cape.

Van der Schyf said substantial progress had been made in resolving its payment dispute in the Western Cape and a speedy solution was expected. It was also negotiating with the Gauteng department..

- Business Report

Cape keeps mum on plan for homeless people

City of Cape Town officials say they have a "constitutional" World Cup plan for street children and homeless people which will ensure they are treated with respect and dignity.

They have rejected claims that law-enforcement officers are rounding up vagrants and dumping them on the city's outskirts.

But details of the "2010 Street People Readiness Plan", operational between May and July, would only be "unveiled" in about three weeks.

This emerged after a city press briefing yesterday where the police's provincial commander of visible policing, Robbie Roberts, said: "We are not going to arrest everybody and put them in a cell to get them off the street. We are not allowed to do it, and we won't do it."

Pam Naidoo, the city's 2010 operations project co-ordinator, said World Cup-specific plans dealing with street people, child safety and substance abuse prevention would be unveiled next month, but she had been asked "to keep the details quiet for now". She said incidents of "anti-social behaviour" would be managed in a "humane and dignified manner".

They were responding to questions from journalists after allegations that South African host cities would "clean up" their streets by arresting homeless people.

Lesley de Reuk, the city's 2010 director of operations, said they had recently been approached by an international news agency and asked when the "concentration camps" for homeless people would be completed.

Speaking to the Cape Times later, Sea Point ward councillor JP Smith rejected allegations by non-profit organisation Mylife that the city council had rounded up about 200 street people and moved them to Blikkiesdorp as "offensive".

He said the city had, after years of negotiations, allocated a number of houses in temporary relocation areas such as Blikkiesdorp to people who wanted to move.

He said two batches of about 80 people had, after three years of counselling, agreed to move from Sea Point to Blikkiesdorp. Smith said the street people had to move voluntarily.

Mayoral committee member for social development Grant Pascoe said: "The city has never rounded up people, it won't round up people and there are no plans to do it in the future."

He said the city council would work with its partners, organisations dealing with homeless people, to deal with the problem.

He said the city's 2010 Street People Readiness plan was based on the constitution and called for street people to be treated with respect and dignity.

- Cape Times

Squatters costing WC taxpayers R83 000/day - MEC

The Western Cape government says a group of squatters is costing taxpayers R83 000 daily.

Housing MEC Bonginkosi Madikizela has applied for a court order to evict 63 families from a temporary relocation area in Delft.

The site is earmarked for a housing development which will form part of the N2 Gateway Project.

The MEC says while the battle between government and the families continues, they have to pay a construction company, despite it not being able to access the site.

“Now we cannot allow a situation where two hundred families are denied access to their houses by sixty three people who do not qualify,” says Madikizela.

- Eyewitness News

Western Cape not best for service delivery'

The City of Cape Town came under attack as angry Khayelitsha residents, living in informal settlements, vented their anger over the lack of service delivery in their areas on Monday.

Hundreds packed the OR Tambo Hall where a parliamentary ad hoc committee heard their complaints. The parliamentarians had left their offices to hear first-hand the service delivery issues residents grappled with.

As expected the parliamentarians received a barrage of complaints.

'No water equals Death Penalty'
"We dispute that the Western Cape is the best province when it comes to service delivery and (Premier) Helen Zille should never have received that Best Mayor Award," an angry resident told the delegation led by Stone Sizani.

Some residents complained about poorly constructed houses and toilets while others said they were homeless and did not have toilets at all.

A woman from Ebugxwayibeni in Khayelitsha said not one of the 61 people who lived in the informal settlement had a tap.

Nomzamo Stofile, chairperson of Sanele Back Yarders, an organisation representing more than 2 000 residents living in backyards, said they had been promised land but none had been delivered.

She told the parliamentary delegation that they had followed all government channels and were desperate for houses.

The delegation also heard startling findings of research conducted by Environmental Monitoring Group, an NGO working on social justice and environmental research. Its leader, Jessica Wilson, said research done in August 2008 showed that many municipalities in the Western Cape were not coping with their mandates. Their policies and strategies were not based on the needs of the people on the ground.

The Black Sash also submitted a report it conducted on social grants.

Residents reported concerns about the shortage of water and areas with no electricity. Unemployment and crime were also serious worries for residents.

"No water equals Death Penalty," read a placard held up by one resident.

The public hearings launched a week-long programme by Parliament's ad hoc committee on co-ordinated oversight on service delivery, aimed at finding out more about progress on service delivery.

The hearings followed the National Assembly's resolution to establish the committee to conduct oversight visits on service delivery under the theme "Working together to ensure the delivery of quality services to communities".

Members of the committee were drawn from portfolio committees on Human Settlements, Energy, Social Development, Health, Water and Environmental Affairs, Basic Education, Transport, and Rural Development and Land Reform.

There were similar hearings in the Eastern Cape and Mpumalanga yesterday.

- Cape Times

Deft families face eviction

The Western Cape housing MEC says he is to apply for an eviction order against 63 families living in a temporary relocation area (TRA) at Delft on the Cape Flats.

MEC Bonginkosi Madikizela said the families were holding up the development of new housing that formed part of the N2 Gateway project.

"After exhaustive consultation and negotiation, and as a last resort, I have... instituted proceedings to apply for an eviction order from the Western Cape High Court," he said in a statement.

The application would be heard on March 5.

Madikizela said construction of about 200 units of state-assisted housing was being delayed by the 63 households.

This meant the rightful beneficiaries of the units to be built on the land, who far outnumbered the people holding up the development, were being prejudiced.

He also said the province risked a bill of R83,000 a day for the contractor's standing time.

There were originally 1 800 households on the land. All the others had moved voluntarily to an alternative TRA.

The 63 had been offered alternative TRAs between 500 and 700 meters from the current area, with electricity.

Madikizela said the 63 appeared to be trying to force the department to allocate them permanent low-cost housing.

Unfortunately none of them qualified for so-called breaking new ground state give-away houses.
- Sapa

How the Western Cape will be run – Helen Zille

Speaker, besides making the Western Cape the national benchmark for good governance, we want to make the Western Cape the place in South Africa to do business. Attracting and retaining our capital and skills is essential for growth, which in turn is essential to create sustainable jobs.

This goal is captured in another of our strategic objectives: maximising economic growth, job creation and sustainability.

Provincial governments, and national governments for that matter, do not grow the economy or create jobs. Businesses do that. But governments can provide an enabling environment, or a disabling environment, which either encourages or discourages growth.

We intend to do the former.

There are limits to what provincial governments can do in this regard. We cannot, for example, change the inflexible labour legislation that severely inhibits job creation.

However, there are a number of innovations we can make which will create the kind of enabling environment that allows businesses, entrepreneurs and job-seekers to succeed.

Agriculture, which brings in 40% of all export revenue and employs 200,000 people, is integral to maximizing economic growth and creating jobs in the province.

We will help shield farmers and farm workers from the negative impact of climate change by investigating ways to mitigate its effects. Over the next five years, we aim to increase agricultural production through research and financial support to farmers and assisting farmers to access domestic and international markets. To encourage more people to take up farming, we will continue to offer training and financial support to students who study agriculture. This sector is of cardinal importance to the welfare of our people...

...We are currently reviewing the regulatory environment and the cost of doing business in the province. Our aim is to cut red tape by 20% in the next five years to encourage more companies to do business in the province. Dr Johann Rupert, at his inauguration as chancellor of Stellenbosch University last night, spoke about his experience of being able to set up a company in less than 3 weeks in some parts of the world. Those are the places we must learn to compete with if we want to attract investment. ..

...Speaker another area where we face severe financial and other constraints is housing. As part of our strategic objective plan to develop integrated human settlements we are looking at a number of innovative ways to provide more people with access to shelter and basic services than ever before.

There are number of constraints to housing delivery in the province. I will list them briefly. One is that demand drastically outstrips supply. The current backlog of 500,000 households is growing year-on-year due to in-migration and barriers to delivery.

Another is that onerous planning legislation is hampering delivery to the point of paralysis in some cases.

We are also constrained by a lack of funding for housing from the national government and a scarcity of well-located housing land in the province.

If we carry on like this, the housing backlog will double in the next thirty years.

Since we have been in office, we have cultivated good relations with the City of Cape Town and the national Department of Housing - the lack of which have compromised delivery in the past.

All three spheres of government are working together to re-conceptualise the next phase of the N2 Gateway in a way that avoids the previous policy mistakes we in the City of Cape Town warned about. This co-operation cannot happen if the national government cuts off funding for the project, and seeks to pass on the cost to the ratepayers of the City.

We are also working with the City and the national Housing Development Agency (HDA) on an integrated plan to develop Joe Slovo phase 2 which will not require mass evictions, despite the court order that was obtained for this purpose by the previous government.

But this improvement in intergovernmental relations will only take us so far. The truth is that the current main mode of housing delivery simply cannot address the current and future need for housing in the
province.

Speaker, as I said at the beginning of my address, we believe in expanding opportunities to as many people as possible and allowing them to take responsibility for maximising those opportunities.

This shapes our approach to housing just as it does every other policy area. When resources are as scarce as ours are, it is fairer to do something for many rather than a lot for very few. The latter approach encourages abuse and corruption and leaves most people with nothing.

We will therefore increase our focus on the provision of serviced sites.

We are introducing a municipal database support programme to ensure that accurate data is captured onto the national Housing Subsidy System for verification. This will enable us to develop a standardised, transparent and fair selection process of beneficiaries to be applied across the province.

As I mentioned earlier, besides the financial constraints on housing delivery, there is a scarcity of well-located land for housing. New housing developments tend to be built away from economic opportunities and social amenities, reinforcing the impact of apartheid-era spatial planning.

To tackle this, we are lobbying national departments and state owned enterprises to make land available for human settlement development in our province. We are also developing clear guidelines which set out the minimum densities for low-cost and GAP housing projects.

Speaker, we simply have to build upwards if we are to prevent more urban sprawl and bring people closer to economic opportunities. By 2014, we aim to triple the average density of housing projects on well-located land to 90 units per hectare. This is also crucial to secure the viability of public transport systems.

There are a number of other components to our strategic plan for housing, which I will leave for the Minister to announce in his budget vote.

I will say one thing about the onerous red tape and planning legislation that can stall housing projects for years. Many of the regulations, such as the Environmental (and other) Impact Assessments, fall under national legislation which is why I have presented them as part of a package to President Zuma requesting their review.

Others, such as the Land Use Planning Ordinance, are provincial laws. We are currently in the process of reviewing all provincial spatial planning legislation with the aim of consolidating all of it into one Act that simplifies and clarifies roles and responsibilities regarding land use planning.

We are also seriously exploring the viability of alternative building materials and methods for house construction. Some of these alternatives are much cheaper than conventional brick and mortar to build and maintain. They are also more environmentally sustainable. (Click this statement to see more)

By 2014, we aim to increase the percentage of units built using energy-efficient methods and materials, from 10% to 40%.

This brings me to another of our ten strategic objectives: optimising resource efficiency and sustainability.

We know that if we are to compete globally, we need to make more efficient use of our resources.

As more and more people migrate to the Western Cape, so our carbon footprint increases. Currently, 95% of the energy generated in the province is generated by burning fossil fuels. If we do nothing, greenhouse gas emissions will increase by 20% in the next decade.

We cannot go on like this. We have to take proactive steps to improve the quality of the air we breathe.

I have already mentioned our commitment to green low cost housing programmes. This will form part of a broader renewable energy programme including the harnessing of wind and solar power as well as generating energy from alternative sources such as sewerage sludge, biogas and agricultural waste.

Climate change and in-migration to the province mean that there is less water for more people. So, as part of our commitment to resource sustainability, we are making water management a special focus area.

We are currently in the development phase of a provincial integrated water resource management plan which will improve catchment management and make the province more water efficient through the recycling and reuse of wastewater.

Speaker, all of the policy programmes and interventions I have mentioned today contribute to the final strategic objective of poverty reduction and alleviation.

This is our single biggest challenge and underpins all we do. Let me summarise our approach.

To alleviate poverty in the short term:

We must provide as many people as we can with basic services, access to clean water, sanitation and electricity. We must find a range of ways to deliver sustainable housing opportunities.

We must encourage entrepreneurship and self-sustainable income-generating projects that give people the opportunity to break the cycle of dependency on the state.

We must increase access to quality healthcare and antiretroviral medication.

We must ensure that the funds directed to our social partners are used to improve people's lives.

To reduce poverty in the long term:

We must create an enabling environment for job-creating economic growth and ensure the skills we produce are matched to the needs of the economy.

This includes combating social ills such as crime, which scares off investors, and substance abuse, which renders many people irresponsible and unemployable.

We must fight corruption which makes poor people poorer...

... Within five years we will have tangible results to show for our efforts. We will be much closer to creating the open, opportunity society that the people of the Western Cape voted for.

I have no doubt we will make mistakes along the way. When we do, you can be sure they will be pointed out to us. When we genuinely err, we will admit it, take remedial action and plot a new course.

But we will, at all times, be honest with the citizens of the Western Cape. If we do not meet the targets we have set for ourselves, we won't try and spin the statistics, shift the goal posts or blame others.

We understand that integrity is the most powerful asset of any government. And we know that once the people of this province lose faith in you, your days are numbered.

This is how it should be. The politicians should be scared of the people, not the other way around.

This is why the Western Cape is at the vanguard of democracy in South Africa. It is why this province, under this government, will one day be a beacon of hope for every South African.

- PoliticsWeb

Cape Town sewage fire under control

A fire burning since Wednesday in matted vegetation at the Athlone sewage plant was under control, the City of Cape Town said on Thursday afternoon.

The fire had burned in and around ten disused sewage pans, where the plant growth and sludge was up to a metre thick.

It had now been contained to a smaller area in the pans.

Chief fire officer Ian Schnetler said that extinguishing fires such as this was very labour intensive. "Crews have to utilise front-end loaders to gain access and extinguish the burning mass metre by metre," he said.

There was no threat to buildings, but the smoke generated by the thick sludge and vegetation was a hazard.

It was expected that it would take several days to extinguish the blaze completely.

- Sapa

Housing judgment 'could see municipalities go broke'

The financial stability of the City of Cape Town could be jeopardised by a recent High Court judgement that makes municipalities responsible for providing rent or accommodation to illegal squatters, Mayco member for finance Ian Neilson has revealed.

The full implications of a landmark ruling earlier this month by Johannesburg High Court Judge Brian Spilg are still unclear, but both Cape Town and the City of Johannesburg - the two metros facing the brunt of urbanisation - are worried.

Gabu Tugwana, Johannesburg director of communications, told the Cape Argus yesterday that the city intended to take the matter all the way to the Constitutional Court, as there was "not any municipality in any part of the world" able to spend the kind of money proposed in the ruling.

The matter concerns about 80 squatters who illegally occupied a private property in Berea, Joburg and who face eviction because the landlord wants to develop the site.

Judge Spilg ordered this month that the property be vacated no later than March 31, when the squatters become the responsibility of the City of Johannesburg, which will have to provide them either with temporary accommodation, or pay each occupier or household head R850 to rent elsewhere.

Meanwhile, development company Blue Moonlight Properties 39 would also be entitled to market-related rental - paid for by the city - to cover the cost of the squatters' occupation of the property.

Judge Spilg's written judgment was not available yesterday, but the reasons for his decision were expected to be delivered today.

While the precedent created by his judgment is likely to be welcomed by both illegal occupants and property owners who have struggled in the past to evict squatters, cash-strapped local authorities and ratepayers could be faced with a heavy additional financial burden.

Although the precedent is only binding on courts in Gauteng, it would in future have national consequences if not overturned on appeal.

Tugwana said that although the city respected the legal system and would not want to undermine it, if municipalities were forced to subsidise their fast-growing populations, they would "go broke".

The principle of the matter was also cause for concern, he said, in that the city's housing policy was used to allocate housing, but the ruling now allowed for people to invade unoccupied buildings and thereafter demand city housing, effectively jumping to the top of the housing list.

Neilson agreed that it was a concern that the ruling could encourage illegal squatting.

It was also a concern that the City of Cape Town would not be able to plan adequately, and implement a "decent housing policy" if it was forced to "simply respond to legal actions".

It was "worrying" that the city could be forced to pay for situations where people had acted illegally, he said.

"In the end we might have to look at the way we operate ... we might have to act in a way to secure ourselves financially," he said.

- IOLProperty

Zuma pledges to assist poor with housing - A new Bloemfontein!

New opportunities for business to be part of the economic transformation agenda were offered by President Jacob Zuma last night in a proposal that private banks become intricately involved in a R1 billion housing-for-the-poor plan while releasing thousands of hectares of state land for this purpose.

The president also proposed a separate electricity agency that would buy from independent power producers (IPPs) and end Eskom's monopoly on power purchases.

In a business-friendly opening of parliament speech - his second - he called on business and private citizens to become involved in assisting the poor and marginalised. Zuma was also candid about the government's failure to provide permanent job opportunities.

He acknowledged that during the recession about 900 000 jobs were lost. "Many of those who lost their jobs were the breadwinners in poor families."

He argued, however, that his pledge in his last State of the Nation speech to provide 500 000 job opportunities had almost been met. "We are pleased to announce that by the end of December, we had created more than 480 000 public works job opportunities, which is 97 percent (sic) of the target."...

- Business Report

...Voicing concern over the many South Africans who earned above the threshold for housing grants but could gain bank loans to build houses, he said they would be supported by a R1bn "guarantee fund" where the government would underwrite loans to lower income families.

He said the state would garner about 600 000 hectares - about the size of Bloemfontein - for low-income "and affordable" housing.

Decrease in Cape Town shack fires

CAPE TOWN - Cape Town’s fire and rescue service recorded fewer fire incidents in informal settlements in 2009 compared to previous years, the City said on Tuesday.

This was despite an increase in the number of shacks, which made it difficult for rescue services to access the areas quickly, it said.

The city’s fire chief, Ian Schnetler, said the number of responses in informal settlements decreased over the last year by 193 incidents and the number of affected shacks decreased by 832.

A total of 3780 shacks, out of approximately 84,000, were affected by fire in 2009, he said.

“If one takes into context the number of dwelling units affected in 2005, which was recorded at 8864, then the city has gone a long way in reducing this by more than half over the last four years,” said Schnetler.

The city’s rescue service received seven new fire engines with 4x4 capabilities late last year, which would help reach cramped informal settlements and mountainous areas, he said.

The main causes of these fires were said to be illegal use of electricity, heating and cooking devices malfunctioning and lighting of building materials.

The city said it was educating people on the danger of fires, and its disaster risk management department had distributed awareness pamphlets to the affected areas prior to the fire season.

The distribution of pamphlets was started by the department in October 2008.

These provided tips on how to reduce the risk of a fire starting.

Restriction on the making of open air fires had also been made across the Western Cape, due to extraordinary fire hazards, the municipality said.

- Sapa - The Citizen

Gug's Gogos lockup your daughters, your grandaughters...

According to the ANC, he (sic Big Daddy Zuma) "will on Monday do a walkabout greeting people in Guguletu township"...

- Times live

Sorry to hear of your fate...
Sorry I was caught...
Sorry came too late...

Comrades I want to love you...
together we can make unity...
nevermind your shack...
Big Daddy is back...

hold that...: Zuma calls off Gugs visit at last minute

A planned walkabout by President Jacob Zuma in Gugulethu was abruptly cancelled on Monday, but the ANC denied the reason was because of threatened protests linked to Zuma's sexual conduct.

As the ANC and the Presidency battled to take back control of a media agenda derailed by Zuma's acknowledgement that he had fathered a child by the daughter of a close comrade, Cope announced it intended to table a motion of no confidence in the president and would garner support for the motion from other opposition parties.

Zuma spent most of the day in an ANC national working committee (NWC) meeting at Parliament, where lengthy discussions took place with the provincial task team in charge of rebuilding the party's shattered machinery in the Western Cape.

A well-placed source said fears that Zuma's walkabout would be met by protesters organised by the DA, Cope and Genderlinks had prompted the cancellation. The ANC denied this, but conflicting reasons were given for the decision.

Zuma's aide in the ANC presidency, Zizi Kodwa, said the visit could not go ahead because of the clash with the NWC meeting.

ANC national spokesman Jackson Mthembu blamed it on a "problem of miscommunication" by party officials.

Asked about the threat of protests Mthembu said "nothing of the sort" had forced their hand.

Genderlinks' Colleen Lowe Morna laughed at suggestions that her organisation was involved in planning protests with the DA and Cope.

"We don't even have an office in Cape Town," she said.

DA and Cope Western Cape officials could not be reached for comment.

- Read More Cape Times

Every 5 homes to get enclosed toilet to share

Families in informal settlements will have to share a toilet with four other families - unless they are able to prove that they have the means to build walls around those toilets that are being offered to individual families.

The decision comes in the wake of a furore over reports that Khayelitsha residents were having to use unscreened toilets in public areas.

The revelation generated a national outcry.

Mayoral committee member for housing Shehaam Sims said the latest measure was an unfortunate but necessary move.

City officials were accused of human rights violations for failing to provide walls for temporary toilets in Makhaza, Khayelitsha.

There were subsequent calls by the ANC Youth League for the SA Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) to take action against the council.

Sims said the accusation had been based on misinformation about the nature of the agreement between the council and community.

According to Sims, one toilet had been erected for every five families in Makhaza by November 2007. Sims said this was the national standard for informal settlement upgrades.

The council had opted to stretch its budget after the community requested a toilet for each family.

This was permitted because the community had agreed to build the outer structures themselves, said Sims.

She said the current ANC councillor in Makhaza's Ward 95 had taken part in the meeting at which this agreement was made.

According to Sims, 1 265 of the 1 316 beneficiaries had received unenclosed toilets by July 2009 and had built their own structures to cover them.

The remaining 51 families, who received their toilets in December, had failed to do so, she said.

"Then along comes the ANC Youth League, which decides to make a huge spill out of it without establishing the facts," Sims said.

She said the council had now decided to revert to the 5:1 ratio that would provide one toilet for five families.

This was presented to ANC chief whip Peter Gabriel, who offered this option to residents.

Sims said 356 beneficiaries out of 540 who attended the meeting with Gabriel had signed a petition against the proposal.

Sims said it was a pity that only residents who could prove they could afford to build the structures would be able to get toilets on a one-per-family basis.

She said the council would provide the details of the petition to the SAHRC.

- Cape Argus

Zille thwarts ANC's illegal land grab

Western Cape premier Helen Zille has thwarted attempts by the former ANC ­provincial administration to illegally transfer 1400ha of provincial land to the national government.

Worth R500-million, the prime land was quietly transferred to the new Housing Development Agency the day before elections last year. Zille accused the ANC of asset-stripping and took legal advice to recover the land.

Zille told the Mail & Guardian this week that she had found a clause in an original land availability agreement allowing her to cancel the transfer with a month's notice.

"We have all 1400ha back after the illegal and unconstitutional attempt by the previous administration to transfer the land to the national ­government in the days before the 2009 election," she said.

Included in the transfer was land promised to land claimants in Constantia, who have waited more than 15 years to return to the area from which they were evicted under apartheid. It was also feared that housing delivery would be slowed by a legal row.

It is understood that the Democratic Alliance-run provincial and Cape Town governments did not want to provoke Human Settlements Minister Tokyo Sexwale by crowing about the recovery of the land.

Some land recovered by the province is earmarked for an expansion of the N2 Gateway housing project, launched amid fanfare by former housing minister Lindiwe Sisulu. The Western Cape government, the Cape Town council and the national government are discussing working together to rescue the project.

Residents have complained of structural defects and independent forensic auditors found that the national housing department robbed the project of agreed funding.

The DA-led city administration claimed that Sisulu, who is now defence minister, locked it out of the Gateway project.

Sisulu and Sexwale crossed swords last November after he told Parliament that the housing department under Sisulu spent R22-million on theatre productions.

As housing minister, Sisulu and Western Cape MEC for public works Marius Fransman signed an agreement transferring the Western Cape land to the Housing Development Agency. The land was then signed over by former public works minister Kholeka Mqulwana to Taffy Adler, the agency's chief executive.

The development agency was set up to replace the now technically insolvent government housing agent, Thubelisha Homes.

Zille had given Sexwale the province's legal opinion that the transfer was illegal and he pledged to take the matter to Cabinet. "I never heard from him again, so I presume it got stuck in the national Cabinet."

Zille then found the loophole and acted on it. "The properties had not been transferred in terms of the transfer agreement and the land reverted to us," she said.

Cape Town mayor Dan Plato confirmed that Sexwale had called him to ask the city to work with the province and the national government on the Gateway project.

Spokesperson Chris Vick said Sexwale would not comment.

- M&G

D6 makes progress

After several delays brought about by stringent and complex processes that had to be followed in procuring suitably qualified service providers, the Regional Land Claims Commission on Thursday reported that it was at an advanced stage of the business and spatial planning work needed for the redevelopment of District Six and the restitution of land claimants. According to Beverely Jansen, Regional Land Claims Commissioner for the Western Cape, they were preparing a development framework to form the basis of a comprehensive business plan.

This business plan was initiated in the first quarter of 2009 but could not continue without a completed development framework being in place. "We aim to complete the development framework and business plan by July 2010 after engaging in a public participation process commencing in April 2010, which will seek to achieve stakeholder approval," Jansen said in a joint statement signed by the City of Cape Town, Provincial Government and the District Six Beneficiary and Redevelopment Trust.

According to Jansen, the Claims Commission has spent the last two years appointing service providers who are skilled in planning developments of the kind that needed in District Six. They include professionals such as urban planners, architects and engineers, who will do the planning and urban design of the site, and also property economists and sociologists, who will ensure the financial viability of the project, while at the same time catering for the needs of the returning community.

Return

Some 1,200 former District Six land claimants will return to District Six, together with Land Reform Beneficiaries from valid land claims in other parts of the Metro region, and, in line with the site's status as an N2 Gateway Project, persons drawn according to transparent criteria from the housing waiting list.

Approximately 5,000 dwelling units will be built in the District, supported by significant medium rise commercial developments, which will be used to cross-subsidize the costs of the construction of claimant homes and social housing not covered by grant funding and beneficiary contributions. Public facilities and public spaces for recreational purposes to support a fairly large returning community form an integral part of the development proposals for District Six.

"A key informant of the business plan is a profile of the community. This requires that we engage with the community and ask them questions with regard to family size, income and their particular needs. However, there is a very limited amount of time and a relatively large returning community. We have also borne in mind that the claimants are tired of filling in forms and submitting documents. That is why we will only ask some 500 beneficiaries to participate."

She said in accordance with good practice, "We have decided that we should take a snap-shot of the community and profile only them as a representative sample of the entire returning community. We will use this information and then draw inferences about the remaining claimants. Names will be selected at random with the sample weighted according to the geographic location where most of the community is presently concentrated."

Community input

Jansen said once they have a fairly complete draft of the business plan and development framework, the community will be called on to give further input. This will involve presentations in a similar vein to that conducted in 2006. Once that process is complete, the final draft of the business plan and development framework will be prepared and an implementation plan will be devised for the roll out of the redevelopment.

"This will be a complex process given that the redevelopment of District Six is a multi-billion rand project. The RLCC, City of Cape Town and the Provincial Government and the District Six Trust have undertaken to ensure that the redevelopment is driven by a viable and efficient process. The two spheres of government have also undertaken to work in partnership with the RLCC to fast track all planning, subsidy and property transfer processes that they are responsible for," the statement said.

"As with any large housing project, these processes are complicated and take time, but we will work together to ensure they move as quickly as possible. This is a critical phase in the redevelopment of District Six and its finalization will trigger what we all have been waiting for so patiently, the building of houses for the returning community. We therefore appeal to the community to co-operate fully and enthusiastically," Jansen concluded.

- The Voice of the Cape

Room for a new view

The N2 project shows that government has still not cracked housing policy

Government's flagship housing project - the N2 Gateway in Cape Town, which piloted government-owned rental housing - has been a disaster. "Social housing", as it is known, was supposed to be a "ground-breaking" approach, introducing government-owned rental housing, but payment arrears are mounting into millions of rand and the flats are not repaired or maintained.

In addition to the 705 rental flats, the project provides for the construction of 22,000 units (mostly stand-alone houses) at seven different sites in the city. The project is behind schedule by more than three years and is still a long way from being completed. Financing for the project has not been fully secured, and big questions remain over which part of government will foot the bill or make the "top-ups" that are likely to be needed.

But human settlements minister Tokyo Sexwale says although the project was ambitiously conceived - it was supposed to be completed by June 2006 - his predecessor Lindiwe Sisulu was "brave" and "right to have a vision". He told parliament's portfolio committee on housing last week that the N2 Gateway cannot be allowed to fail.

Sexwale is going to need more money (to finish the project) and a lot of guts (to get tough with tenants who for years have got away with not paying rent).

The Gateway project was born in a politically charged environment in 2005, when both the City of Cape Town and the province were, like national government, run by the ANC. But when the ANC lost control of the city in February 2006, it ensured that the DA-run city was kicked off the project. It did not want the DA to be able to take credit for what was expected to be the biggest delivery of housing in SA.

Since housing is the city's hottest political issue - there are 300,000 families living in backyards and another 100 000 in stand-alone shacks - the delivery of housing is intricately tied to politics.

The flagship rental units, at Joe Slovo 1 (named after the original informal settlement) and situated along the N2 near Langa, were intended by Sisulu to introduce a new kind of housing. Instead of sprawling settlements of Reconstruction & Development Programme (RDP) houses, the idea was to build more attractive and densely clustered two-storey flats. Because these are more expensive, the plan was to recover part of the cost through rents. It was estimated the units would cost twice a subsided RDP house (around R80,000).

But the policy didn't fit the reality. Construction costs came out far higher - at around R140,000/unit. Although tenants were screened to ensure they could afford the rent, some never paid and the rest stopped paying early on. At present, Sexwale told parliament, only 5% of rent is being collected. Many of the original tenants have sublet their flats or moved out, and it seems government has little idea of who is actually living there. Maintenance and repairs were supposed to be done out of funds collected from rent, so little has been done.

All this was made worse by the agency that Sisulu appointed to run the project, Thubelisha Homes, which went bankrupt and is now in the final stages of being wound up.

What are the lessons from Gateway?

The first is that a "proper" housing company was not appointed to administer the flats at Joe Slovo 1. Human settlements chief director Julie Bayat told parliament that the Housing Development Agency (HDA), run by highly experienced social housing pioneer Taffy Adler, is on the brink of taking charge of the development. A "normalisation plan" is being discussed, including setting appropriate rental levels.

The second lesson is that the rental option, which Sisulu was convinced was what people wanted, might not be as attractive as government officials and politicians believed. Tenants for Joe Slovo 1 were selected according to their ability to pay. They had to be able to afford between R500 and R1,050 per month. Research also showed that many had been paying rent anyway, in backyards.

But it was soon clear the new tenants could not or would not pay rentals for government housing. Government had also promised that rentals would be kept low - an ANC MEC at the time, Richard Dyantyi, is on record as saying the charge would be R165 - and so, once in, tenants objected to rents to which they had initially agreed. In addition, poor workmanship meant that the flats soon began to leak and fall into disrepair.

Sexwale and his agent, the HDA, will have to turn this around. Sexwale seems to believe that the rentals are unrealistically high, but they are set on the basis of cost recovery. "Some tenants are people who saw the gap. Others couldn't pay. The problem is the state of the economy."

There are other problems. While there has been some construction of stand-alone houses at Delft and New Rest, the rest of the Gateway project is "being re-planned, taking into consideration the lessons learned from previous phases", says Anthony Hazell from the provincial ministry of housing.

The biggest re-planning is taking place at what remains of the Joe Slovo settlement, now called Joe Slovo 3. To upgrade Joe Slovo 3, which is densely packed with shacks, some households would have had to move away and settle in Delft, some distance from Cape Town. The Joe Slovo residents took their objection to removal to court. Though they lost, the constitutional court ordered that government would need to negotiate with them on resettlement.

WHAT IT MEANS: Flats are logical but expensive; DA is wary of a drain on the city's budget

That process has resulted in an agreement to abandon the stand-alone model originally planned for the area, in favour of two-storey flats. Given the pressure on land in Cape Town, densification is the logical solution. Cape Town has only 600,000 formal houses. Ian Neilson, deputy mayor, points out that if all 300,000 homeless families had stand-alone houses, the area covered by Cape Town would need to grow by 50%.

Sexwale has invited the city back into the N2 project, and says he looks forward to working with the DA administration and premier Helen Zille. The political rapprochement has a pragmatic function: when it comes to funding the "top-ups" the first place national government will look will be the City of Cape Town.

Neilson says while the city wants to re-enter the project, it is "treading cautiously" and is wary of its budget being sucked into the N2 project.

But building flats at Joe Slovo 3, even smaller ones, will take the city and the provincial and national departments back to the problem at Joe Slovo 1: flats are more expensive and the individual housing subsidy will not be enough.

The Gateway experience shows that government is a long way from cracking the housing problem. Sisulu's "Breaking New Ground" policy, which Sexwale has embraced and rebranded as being not about housing but about "human settlements", has not delivered answers.

- Financial Mail

Warning against N2 project

The City of Cape Town should "walk away" from the N2 Gateway project if national government does not commit funds to finish the development.

This is the warning from the city's chief financial officer, Mike Richardson, who has urged the council to be "extremely circumspect" about committing to any further involvement in the controversial housing project.

The N2 Gateway was initially managed by all three levels of government, but when the DA took over the City of Cape Town in 2006, cracks in the three-tier partnership emerged.

The city council was removed from the controversial pilot project that year and Thubelisha Homes was appointed as developer.

The national government wanted to build 22 000 housing units. By April 2009, only 11 ,37 of the first phase's 15,000 units were complete.

Human Settlements Minister Tokyo Sexwale has said it would cost in excess of R1,5-billion to finish the project.

There was no business plan when the city was removed four years ago. But the province, eager to wrap up the first phase, has drafted a new business plan that could require city resources and funds.

Housing MEC Bonginkosi Madikizela said yesterday the province wanted the city to "take centre stage" as the developer for the second phase.

But the city is firm that it will not allocate funds or resources to the province's business plan for the first phase and will only consider future phases of the project at a later date.

The mayoral committee yesterday rejected the business plan. Richardson said the city's housing subsidy allocation for the next five years was fully committed and there should be "absolutely no presumption" of available funds.

But Madikizela said the national government had already committed R480-million that could be used for any housing projects, including bulk services and the N2 Gateway.

Although referred to as "N2 Gateway", many of the housing projects in phase one were in areas that fell under the city's jurisdiction.

The city was obliged to provide services.

City executive director of housing Hans Smit said the plan assumed the city would provide funding, and accept responsibility for project outcomes such as managing clinics, rental stock and other community facilities.

Director of roads and stormwater Henry du Plessis said houses were built in Delft Symphony without city approval and the design of engineering services on the project did not comply with city specifications.

Smit said all non-compliant work done on the project to date had to be rectified before the business plan could be approved.

The city would only get involved if additional funding was allocated from external sources for the next five years.

- Cape Times

Cooperative governance Service delivery protests hearing

The Cooperative Governance Department briefed members of Parliament at public hearings on the issue on Tuesday.

The hearings were aimed at giving MPs insight into the problems on the ground and what had being done to address them.

Cooperative Governance Deputy Director-General Yusuf Patel informed parliamentarians analysis showed the bulk of service delivery protests were taking place in Gauteng, Mpumalanga and the Western Cape.

Patel said the reasons for the protests vary from a growing demand for infrastructure and housing to rising electricity costs.

The department’s turn-around strategy, which aims to speed up and improve service delivery, was also outlined.

Patel said there were five priority areas which needed to be addressed to ensure adequate municipal services were delivered, including clean governance and strengthening accountability.

- Eyewitness News

Human Settlements - Where dignity is a luxury

A deluge of public outrage has since been directed at the governing DA following a complaint by the ANC Youth League.

It is certainly not egregious or opportunistic to claim - as they and many others have - that such treatment is reminiscent of apartheid, and inherently contrary to the rights to dignity, health and safety enshrined in our Constitution.

What has been overlooked, however, is that these rights are denied to millions in South Africa on a daily basis.

This incident has provided a stark example of the daily plight of people living in poor, working-class informal settlements, but an example that has come as a shock only to those who do not live there.

The protracted absence of the basic services that many of us take for granted and the failure to acknowledge this deficit has resulted in the normalisation of suffering, and the routine violation of basic human rights.

It is worth pointing out that this particular section of Makhaza is not one of the worst informal areas in Khayelitsha - a sprawling and densely populated remnant of segregation where at least 57% of people live in shacks, 80% without access to water in their homes, 35% with no immediate access to flush/chemical toilets, and 24% without access to electricity.

Despite being unquestionably impoverished, Makhaza has roads and is not as densely populated as other areas.

These material conditions might seem relatively insignificant when confronted with the inhumanity of open toilets, but they form part of a broad range of infrastructural barriers that have direct bearing on the quality of life of residents.

You will not find the informal settlement of RR Section on a map, despite it being directly alongside the N2 highway wedged between Cape Town International Airport and Somerset West.

On some maps it is marked as marshland, which is fairly accurate - apart from the fact that it is home to thousands. It is covered in shacks, no more than a metre apart in some areas, possesses no roads and very few lights. The absence of roads prevents fire response teams from extinguishing the frequent fires commonly caused by the use of gas and fuelled by an abundance of flammable material.

Ambulances, too, are often unable to provide medical care to residents, and police unable to protect, as homes are inaccessible and poorly marked. This labyrinth of indignity and sorrow is the day-to-day reality of life for innumerable people not just in RR, but in poor informal settlements around the country.

One of the greatest community concerns - as illustrated by the Makhaza saga - is that of clean and safe sanitation. There are too few clean and functioning toilets and safe water sources, drainage is inadequate, and refuse collection irregular.

As a result, waterborne diseases and parasites - including gastroenteritis, worms and diarrhoea - are rampant. Getting to and using toilets - one of the most unspoken of human rights - can be life threatening.

Residents are often forced to walk long distances down unlit "pathways" that wind between shacks, through back yards and sometimes across busy roads; and are frequently robbed, hit by cars, beaten and raped. In many cases residents choose the alternative of relieving themselves on the outskirts of the community, increasing their vulnerability to crime and exposure to disease for both themselves and their communities.

There are two interlinked lessons we must learn from Makhaza. Firstly, we have a duty to hold the incumbent city and provincial government accountable in ensuring that norms and standards are maintained.

The Water Services Act (108 of 2007) notes how everyone has the right to "basic sanitation - the prescribed minimum standard of services necessary for the safe, hygienic, and adequate collection, removal, disposal or purification of human excreta, domestic waste-water and sewage, from households including informal households".

Moreover, it states that the municipality or local council is responsible for ensuring access to water services: that local government has failed to take responsibility for this incident must be strongly condemned.

We must, however, also acknowledge that this is not an isolated case and certainly not limited to the DA's term of government. It should not be used as ammunition for mudslinging, but rather as an opportunity to initiate dialogue and action on an issue that has been neglected for too long.

We must call on the City of Cape Town to publicise and educate around its Water Services Development Plan as compelled by law, as well as other plans relating to the provision of other essential services. There is too much confusion surrounding the development of informal settlements.

The second lesson is that of the need for adequate communication and consultation around service delivery. Many people in Makhaza were not aware of the arrangement to build more toilets at the expense of walls and roofs. In fact one elderly woman had no idea she was even receiving a toilet, let alone that she would need to build her own walls around it.

It is not enough to communicate solely with community leaders, especially when it involves the provision of services as essential as toilets. Wide forums need to be established which include government, civil society, and the community. At the same time, the community and civil society have a duty to encourage participation.

We should never learn to accept the everyday indignities and inequalities faced by children, men and women in informal settlements.

- Times LIVE

Housing MEC audits state-subsidised properties

The Western Cape government said on Monday it had no legal recourse against housing recipients who sold their state-subsidised properties.

Housing MEC Bonginkosi Madikizela has been conducting an audit in an attempt to determine how many government houses in the area have been occupied illegally.

Around 90 percent of all properties inspected were either leased or sold by the initial recipients.

Madikizela said although their hands were tied, all was not lost.

“In some instances where a house has been sold before eight years, that house still belongs to us. We will then profile the person who is inside that house. If that person does not qualify to be in that house; they must pay us the money we’ve used to build that house or get out,” said Madikizela.

He added many homes were sold by cash-strapped recipients.

“When people come to Cape Town or George; they do not necessarily come for housing. They are mainly here looking for economic opportunities; they then use the houses we give them to leverage for an income,” said Madikizela.

- Eyewitness News

Sexwale to monitor builders 'via Google Earth'

Thieving or incompetent building contractors who are squandering billions in tax rands will soon have no place to hide - thanks to new mega-sleuth software that will give Human Settlements Minister Tokyo Sexwale a desktop view of all national housing projects.

Sexwale on Thursday said the program, to be launched in April, would, at the click of a mouse, provide him with real-time access to the 7 994 projects happening across South Africa.

Explaining to the Parliamentary Oversight Committee how the program worked, Sexwale said he would be able to click on a location on a map, and would then be able to see all the details of the project's progress.

Details would include information such as the approval processes followed, who adjudicated tender processes and the payments made.

Sexwale said that should he suspect any funny business, he would stop payments.

Taking the hi-tech stakes even further, Google Earth - a program that allows users to zoom in on images of the earth - would be embedded in the program, allowing Sexwale to check up on progress of the various sites.

"With Google you can see the place; it lets me see the houses being built there. We have got to use technology to follow them," Sexwale said of developers and developments.


View the informal human settlements of Cape Town. Click the pic no cost involved

View in Google Earth * View in Google Maps


This was particularly necessary as across the country about 40 000 dwellings needed to be demolished because of contractors having taken the government "for a ride".

"If I know there is a problem, I will send in (head of the Special Investigating Unit) Willie Hofmeyr," said Sexwale.

He promised that this was no idle threat, and that the integrity of the process could be trusted, because Hofmeyr had "taken a number of people to the cleaners" and had even been willing to investigate now-president Jacob Zuma.

Sexwale said those who failed to properly monitor projects, who incorrectly approved developments or who were guilty of nepotism would also be held to account.

"How refreshing is that, Mr Steyn?" he asked the DA's Butch Steyn, who had expressed scepticism.

Sexwale said corruption had resulted in R1.3 billion, or 10 percent of the ministry's budget this year, being lost on fixing uninhabitable structures.

"We could have done other things with that money," Sexwale said.

"There are a few good BEE companies but the majority of companies just took government to the cleaners."

He had high praise for Western Cape Premier Helen Zille, using terms of endearment in describing how they were working together to fast-track housing delivery.

The City of Cape Town, which was kicked off the N2 Gateway project when the DA took over the city from the ANC in 2006, had also been invited back on to the project-management team, Sexwale said.

He said the conditions of "squatters" were "an apocalyptic situation a la Haiti", but that the situation was not the fault of the government.

"Please don't hold us accountable for this... Government did not put them there," Sexwale said.

However, he promised that the government had a plan to get rid of service-delivery bottlenecks, and said when the backlog of 2.1 million homes had been cleared, his department would cease to exist.

"The ministry will end when it is done. We don't need a ministry that gives away free houses," he said.

- Cape Argus

Housing about-turn - move the goal posts please

THE government will not be able to eradicate informal settlements by 2014, and now says everyone living in a shack will have a house by 2020 instead.

Under Lindiwe Sisulu, the Housing Ministry set 2014 as a target to meet the UN Millenium Development Goals.

In an about-turn, Sowetan has been told this will not happen.

“Eradication of informal settlements is itself not a Millennium Development Goal, but the intention captured in that announcement by the then Minister of Housing is related to ensure environmental sustainability,” spokesperson for the Minister of Human Settlements Chris Vick said.

The Department of Human Settlements says there are about 2700 informal settlements in 70 of the biggest municipalities and metros.

“The intention was to eradicate informal settlements by 2014, but at the time information on the magnitude of the challenge presented by informal settlements was not known.

“The previous information was that there were 1066 informal settlements based on the 2001 census. Also the impact of the global meltdown was not taken into account.

“Stats SA has estimated that there were about 1,085,000 households living in informal settlements,” he said.

But he says this figure will not translate into how many RDP houses will have to be built as not all residents in informal settlements qualify for the subsidy.

“It is believed that a substantial number have already benefited elsewhere ,” Vick said.

On average, government programmes deliver 200,000 to 240,000 housing units each year.

“We are also addressing issues of quality to ensure that each housing unit meets the set requirements,” he said.

Between April 1 and December 31 last year, 370 housing projects were registered. “About 1600 projects are currently in progress. These are at various stages of commencement, implementation and completion,” Vick said.

- Sowetan

Shock at misuse of George RDP homes

WESTERN Cape Housing MEC Bonginkosi Madikizela expressed shock at the weekend over the high number of RDP homes sold or rented out by their original owners in the George area.

In many cases the original owners of the homes built with taxpayers’ money have gone back to living in shacks.

Madikizela, who visited Thembalethu in George on Saturday, said records showed that close to 90% of Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) houses built in the George area were not occupied by the original owners in spite of there being a moratorium of eight years on selling the houses.

The MEC was accompanied on his tour of the township by newly appointed acting mayor Mercia Draghoender, municipal manager Cecil Africa, local councillor Charlie Williams and members of the municipal housing department.

Williams cited some of the examples where houses built with government subsidies since the late 1990s had been sold or rented immediately after occupation.

“When successful applicants qualified for these houses, which were then provided free of charge, part of the agreement they signed was that they could not be sold for at least eight years.

“In many cases this clause was ignored and the building sold or rented to others while the intended occupiers then went back to shack-living in the garden,” he said.

According to Williams, many of the houses had also been converted into spaza shops.

Madikizela said that, to his knowledge, only the governments of South Africa and Brazil had attempted to alleviate a chronic housing shortage by building free accommodation for the needy.

“We already have a problem in the Western Cape with an average of 60% of RDP houses illegally sold, occupied or misused but when I learned in November last year that this figure is closer to 90% in the case of George, I decided to review the situation personally,” he said.

The RDP housing programme was started in 1996 and contractors have been paid up to R100000 per unit for their construction.

In some cases the newly built homes have been sold for as little as R1500.

Madikizela carried out a whirlwind tour of four locations in Thembalethu where suspected illegal sale or occupation had taken place. In one home, the windows were blocked up and it had been converted into a general store.

Visibly shocked, Madikizela said he was determined to get to the bottom of the problem.

“These houses were built with taxpayers’ money to provide homes for the needy, not for exploitation and resale. If we find that it is the fault of the former residents, we will ensure that they are removed from any future housing lists.

“If we find that municipal or Department of Housing officials have been guilty of ignoring or condoning the situation, then they will pay the price.”

Problems had also been identified with the location of accurate title deeds and, according to ANC councillor Williams, little had been done to clarify the situation in the last 10 years.

Williams said R400,000 allocated by the George Municipality to resolve the problem at an extra-ordinary council meeting last Thursday was a knee-jerk reaction to the impending ministerial visit at the weekend.

- The Weekend Post