The West Rand District Municipality is planning a united unimunicipality or UniCity that will include Mogale City, Merafong, Randfontein and Westonaria.
As the chairperson of the Chief Mogale Community Forum, I wish to commend the ANC West Rand region for their information article ANC calling on communities to embrace the metro published in the 13 February edition of the News.
They called me a prophet, some called me a political guru or an analyst, others called me a community leader. A group of overenthusiastic community members showcased their boredom with praise and worship songs as they waited the meeting started.
Chief Mogale Community Forum in conjunction with United Front, which is not a political party, held a general meeting on 28 January were I was assigned to present the Municipal Demarcation Board (MDB) item.
The utterances made me feel humble, honoured and so highly appreciated.
The presentation started by explaining the process of the Ward Delimitation by 2016. The article stimulates that all municipalities on the West Rand are to finalise the audit of land in their respective areas.
This year we are celebrating 60 years of the Freedom Carter whose preamble states very clearly that “South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white, and that no government can justly claim authority unless it is based on the will of all the people …” but why is this not happening?
Anyway, we chose a route that say land ownership must not be based on where one stands with regard to the historical axis of the victor and the vanquished, as was the case under colonialism and apartheid.
In South Africa the land question remains a thorny issue for the basic reason that from the land sprouts all sorts of economic, political and social development opportunities.
We propose the legislative changes as some landowners abuse the “willing buyer, will seller” principle. They are overpricing the land being claimed and making it difficult for government to redress this very important issue facing our people.
As the community we put pressure to the government to put aside an estimated R800 billion would be required to complete the land-restitution programme.
