MODJADJISKLOOF: Toulou to the rescue with RDP houses
Although a land claim was submitted and published in the Government Gazette on May, 24, 2002 for this particular property, it still to this date has not been settled and therefore Toulou remains the legal owner.
Modjadjiskloof businessman settles the land issue with residents following weeks of unrest and loss of income to businesses in town.
The ongoing saga between Mike Toulou, owner of portion 3 of the farm Kort Hannie just outside Modjadiskloof and people living on the said property was settled on Monday.
In an interview with Toulou on Tuesday, he told the LETABA HERALD that when he bought the property in 2008, there was one family consisting of a mother, her daughter and son living there who occupied one of five structures on the property.
He [Toulou] never charged them rent but as time progressed more and more people were identified living on the property, occupying the remaining four structures.
On investigating the situation it was discovered that a total of 25 people were illegally renting the four structures from the mentioned family.
“They [the family] are not allowed to do this as they are not the owners of the property,” Toulou explained.
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“These 25 people were charged rent at R400 per person per month thus generating an illegal income of R10 000 per month for the family,” Toulou continued.
“It was also discovered that a total of 49 stands on my property were demarcated by these people and sold for the amount of R2 500 each after collecting a R500 deposit from the intended buyers,” Toulou further explained.
Another illegal practice that commenced was the delivering of building material onto Toulou’s property and new structures being built.
After obtaining an interdict to prevent these dwellers from building any new structures on the property, it was ignored and after ten days the building of structures continued during night-time.
It was then when Toulou got an eviction order to remove the people from his property which was executed on Friday, November 9.
Although a land claim was submitted and published in the Government Gazette on May, 24, 2002 for this particular property, it still to this date has not been settled and therefore Toulou remains the legal owner.
Read: MODJADJISKLOOF: Residents protest against lack of services
Adding to that, Toulou will hand over the title deeds to the people so they will be the rightful owners of the mentioned properties.
“The house for the original family will feature two bedrooms and two bathrooms,” Toulou said.
Should they choose not to accept this offer, Toulou will build five RDP houses on the farm Kort Hannie for these people to live in but no title deeds will be issued and they will have to pay rent.
At the time of going to press no decision has been made by the people whether to stay on the farm or take up the option of owning their own property in town.
