Woodstock Hospital: City urgently following correct legal route to drive social housing
24 February 2021
Statement by the City's Mayoral Committee Member for Human Settlements, Councillor Malusi Booi
The City is urgently following the correct legal route to drive inclusive social housing development at Woodstock Hospital and calls on all roleplayers to support the process.
A court-ordered survey is needed to determine the number of illegal occupants, their identities, monthly income, eligibility for State-subsidised housing, and willingness to vacate the property so that social housing plans are not further delayed.
A deadline for illegal occupants and Ndifuna Ukwazi’s legal advisors to file their intention to oppose the matter, passed on 19 February 2021. A previous attempt to conduct a socio-economic survey was blocked by illegal occupants, as recorded in the minutes of a meeting with Ndifuna Ukwazi Co-Director Jared Rossouw and others at the property.
Only lawful and constitutional means can be used to allocate the estimated 700 social housing units the City intends to build at Woodstock Hospital, and development cannot begin until the illegal occupants vacate the site.
It is hoped that people will move from the property voluntarily. If need be, the City will pursue eviction proceedings subject to lockdown regulations and all due process will be followed.
The matter is urgent as the City is able to proceed with social housing building plan submissions within a short timeframe due to favourable zoning and rights on the property subject to any heritage requirements.
The City has a clear commitment to enabling more affordable housing opportunities, especially the social housing model. The City is currently driving and enabling the construction phases of more than 2 000 affordable housing opportunities in and near urban centres across the metro to develop greater spatial equality in Cape Town. Social housing projects are complex and carry a heavy legal and compliance burden, as those who work with these projects formally would know.
The toxic legacy of Ndifuna Ukwazi’s ‘Reclaim the City’ unlawful occupation campaign has become a major obstacle to social housing at two well-located sites in central Cape Town.
Following government’s announcement of social housing plans for these properties, Ndifuna Ukwazi staged an organised invasion in March 2017, with subsequent calls to “sustain and build” the occupation.
For four years, this illegal act has stalled social housing developments at both the City-owned Woodstock Hospital site and the Helen Bowden property near the V&A Waterfront, owned by the Western Cape Government (WCG).
It was initially claimed to be a ‘symbolic’ occupation, but has spiralled out of control.
In October 2018, the Western Cape High Court granted an order interdicting and restraining Reclaim the City from “inciting persons to enter or be upon the property for the purpose of unlawfully occupying or invading”.
In contempt of this order, the number of unlawful occupiers has increased substantially, along with reports of criminality, rent extortion rackets, violence and mob activity to the detriment of the surrounding community.
RTC is not an “organic movement” as claimed, but an organised building hijacking effort initiated by Ndifuna Ukwazi and other NPOs in the same stable. The purpose was to derail constitutional social housing development and fair allocation of opportunities.
Illegal occupations cannot be equated with activism, and cannot be condoned under any circumstances given that the entire public housing programme hinges on protecting land from unlawful occupation, with projects worth R1,3 billion currently under threat.
The City’s Human Settlements Directorate spent 98% of its Urban Settlements Development Grant capital budget for housing opportunities in the 2019/20 financial year despite the greatly negative Covid-19 and lockdown regulations’ impact on its programmes and operations.
The City goes to great lengths, at great cost, to protect land and cannot afford to have groupings in society who promote illegal occupation of land and buildings or coordinate the invasion thereof in attempts to control housing allocation outside of the law.
All role-players must actively discourage attempts to illegally occupy land. We owe this not only to ourselves as residents of a growing city, but also to future generations who will require land for schools, hospitals, housing, transport infrastructure and community facilities.
Illegal occupation draining Law Enforcement resources
The surrounding community deserves an urgent end to the constant breach of the City’s by-laws and other crime at the Woodstock Hospital site, which has necessitated an increased law enforcement presence in addition to the unsustainable R400 000 security cost each month.
City Law Enforcement resources are being drained as a multiple shift deployment is needed to ensure compliance with by-laws and to guard against criminal activities.
A mobile law enforcement presence has been placed near the property after illegal occupants initially forcefully removed our mobile unit on the City-owned site.
Anonymous tip-offs welcomed:
Residents can give anonymous tip offs if they are aware of illegal activity that is taking place; that has happened or is still to happen. Please call 112 from a cell phone (toll free) and 107 from a landline or 021 480 7700 for emergencies.
End
Published by:
City of Cape Town, Media Office
