About 50 residents from across Nelson Mandela Bay have each chipped in R300 for a bulldozer to clear bushes and erect shacks for a new illegal informal settlement between Despatch and Perseverance.
The group, who hope to have at least 700 new shacks set up within two years, with a school and grocery store, paid a construction company R15,000 to hire the bulldozer so they could build shacks after waiting for years – some decades – for the municipality to build them RDP houses.
So far, more than 20 structures have been built by the land invaders in what is now the metro’s newest informal settlement, which they refer to as “Baywest”.
Margaret Befile, 60, said the residents came from New Brighton, Kwazakhele, Joe Slovo, Veeplaas and Zwide.
Befile said the invasion was mostly for their children as they were teaching them not to rely on the municipality but rather learn to be independent.
“We’re assisting the municipality here. We went to the department of land to inquire who this land belonged to and were told this is farmland belonging to ward 52.
“We went to the department of land in Uitenhage and were told it belongs to the department of agriculture.
“We went to the department of agriculture and were told it belongs to the municipality, and then we went to the deeds office because we have a business plan and an application we want to submit.”
Befile said they wanted the owner of the land to give it over to their children because they planned to build 700 sites, a clinic, a school and a shopping complex.
“We want to meet the municipality halfway. This land has been vacant for more than 50 years, yet the municipality says it has plans for it.
“The municipality doesn’t have the budget to build houses . . . it doesn’t even have money for infrastructure.
“So we’ll meet each other halfway because it’s municipal land.
“In the meantime, we’ll hire contractors to instal infrastructure here and after that we’ll give them the bill.”
On Wednesday, the group of mostly women were putting up poles and marking their plots while men with pangas cleared some remaining bush.
Earlier in 2018, the municipality put all land evictions on hold until a policy on how to deal with the issue is drafted and adopted by the council.
Sonwabo Faku said he plans to build a house for his mother, who lives in his backyard.
Faku said they had about 50 people who contributed R300 each towards the bulldozer.
“We’re building 18x20m² and our roads will be 6m here because we don’t want a situation where others build bigger houses and there are problems.
“We want everyone to live on a decent plot,” he said.
Athethile Prince said he had been waiting for a house since 1996 when he first applied.
“I live in a back room with my family in Kwazakhele. It’s time I stand on my own two feet now,” Prince said.
“We’re not scared of anything because this land has been vacant for many years and the municipality has constantly said it was to bridge the gap between Uitenhage and Port Elizabeth and us building here is doing just that.”
On Wednesday, DA councillor Retief Odendaal wrote to acting city manager Noxolo Nqwazi to express concern at the invasion of municipal land.
He said quite a lot of bush had already been cleared and that he was not aware that the metro planned to develop that the particular piece of land.
In e-mail correspondence The Herald has seen, land invasion officer Mbeko Vanqa said that, following a meeting with the metro police, the municipality would only receive assistance with evictions if the necessary support was available.
The e-mail reads: “The meeting resolved that they will only assist [with] Land Invasion if we have 53 members, as indicated on the previous planning meeting.
“General [Frik] Terblanche made it clear to the meeting that he won’t sign for the operation if Land Invasion [department] cannot have the 53 members to demolish.”
Human settlements assistant director Thembakazi Hlela said for the municipality to demolish the illegal structures, it needed two bulldozers, four trucks and 40 men.
Following a meeting with a joint team that included officials from human settlements, metro police, municipal security and SAPS on Wednesday afternoon, municipal spokesperson Mthubanzi Mniki condemned the land invasion and said illegal occupation of land would not be allowed.
However, Mniki said the metro would look at all possible efforts within the law to make land available for residential, business, religious and recreational purposes.
“Unfortunately, due to the sensitivity of the matter we cannot give details, save to say that going forward pro-active measures to deal with land invasion will be implemented.
“Efforts to avail land and move people from stressed areas will also be fast-tracked.
“Communication with affected communities will also be improved.”
Mniki said the municipality was aware that bulldozers or excavators had been used to clear the invaded areas, and a case had been opened against the owners of the equipment.
On Wednesday afternoon, a machine was still clearing the area of bushes.
Ward 52 councillor Francois Greyling said the area was part of the Swartkops conservancy which was protected because of the indigenous vegetation.
He said the land was not in his ward but adjacent to it.