3 September 2003

by Nat Serache

PEACE MABE, the councillor heading the housing portfolio, said she was committed to housing everybody in the foreseeable future, despite the serious challenges faced in this regard.

Mabe said the Mogale City Local Municipality would address the legacy of housing backlogs. The municipality is determined to provide housing to historically disadvantaged communities.

Mabe said the non-availability of land on which to build houses remained one of the major obstacles. The other problem is the reluctance of private landowners in the rural areas to allow the council to build houses for the poor in their neighbourhood.

This problem was also brought highlighted by the head of the Portfolio Committee on Rural Development and Tourism, Sipho Dube. He also complained about the problem of "shack farming" by some landowners. This is an illegal practice whereby people are housed in chicken compounds.

Urban residential areas, such as Kagiso and Munsieville, are already overcrowded as there is no room for expansion. "To overcome this problem, we have embarked on the process of inner city development which involves buying vacant buildings in the central business district, which were initially used for business, and using them for residential purposes," Mabe said.

Mogale City is historically a mining area and, with the minerals becoming depleted and the former mine workers' residences left vacant and unused, the council has resolved to renovate them and use them to accommodate homeless families.

"We have embarked on a hostel renovation programme to relocate homeless residents, or those presently living under unbearable conditions in informal settlements", she said.

The conversion of former mine workers' residences (compounds) to family residential complexes, will obviate the problem experienced in some former mining areas, where former compounds are now used as hiding places for criminals.

Among those targeted for housing were former farm workers evicted from the farms. "The problem we often run into is the reluctance of private land owners, especially farmers, to have the council build houses for the homeless adjacent to their farms," she said.

The problem of informal settlements is exacerbated by a heavy influx of unsuccessful work-seekers from the rural areas and other provinces. Mabe said the council was considering formalising the informal settlements so that people living there could be provided with basic and essential services such as water and electricity.

Mabe complained that the main cause of informal settlements in and around Mogale City is the influx of former farm workers who have been evicted from the farms. Many of these people, some of whom are too old to even consider looking for alternative employment elsewhere, are evicted by farmers, despite the fact that they have lived on these farms all their lives.

The problem of informal settlements was compounded by a heavy influx of desperate work-seekers outside of Mogale City to find jobs. These people invariably find themselves with no choice but to put up shacks. This leads to the escalation from a few shacks to huge settlements, which end up becoming health and fire hazards.

Mabe said that, in such cases, the best option open to the council was to formalise these informal settlements so that they could be provided with services and steps could be taken to minimise the risk of the structures being gutted by runaway fires.

Mabe said that the council foresaw a time when every resident of Mogale City would have a roof over his or her head, with not a single informal settlement in the area.

- Dikgang Tsa Mogale, September 2003