Illegal occupation of land leads to court order.

MASHISHING – “A totally out of control situation” recently led to a court order after stands were illegally allocated and sold on land belonging to the municipality. The illegal occupation of the property known as the extended portion 39 of farm 31, Townlands of Lydenburg, forced the Thaba Chweu Municipality to acquire a court order after several attempts of negotiations with both the occupiers and the SAPS failed.

According to the court order flyers were handed out to occupiers of the vacant land in Ext 6, informing them that it was an illegal act and they would be removed through the court processes.

The people however tried to torch the vehicle delivering the flyers and became extremely aggressive and hostile towards the municipal representatives and chased the councillors away. It furthermore stated that the legal advisor of the municipality went to the Lydenburg Police Station on December 9 to get the SAPS’s assistance, but was informed by a captain that there was nothing they could do without a court order, despite the fact that the invasion was illegal and constituted property theft.

According to the court order the SAPS refused to open a case. On December 27 the municipality consulted the police again to lay formal criminal charges for a second time, but once again they refused to open a case for criminal investigation.

The property is zoned for residential development but the municipality does not have the financial resources to provide services to the property at this time. The document furthermore stated that the municipality was informed that the invasion of the property had been orchestrated by someone who allegedly allocated and “sold” stands at R150 each.

Steelburger/Lydenburg News was confidentially informed that the accused hailed from Bushbuckridge. The paper managed to meet with the latter and although he denied selling the stands it was confirmed that a joining fee of R500 for each stand had to be paid to the Executive Committee of Mashishing Settlers Association, where the accused served as a spokesperson.

“We don’t expect the people to pay R500 at once, but we allow them to pay it off over time,” the accused said. He added that the cash were then deposited into a bank account the funds of which would be used to pay legal representatives.

This was confirmed by Mr Thokwane Moloto, an attorney of the High Court of South Africa as well as expert in human rights and humanitarian law. But according to Moloto it was an invalid court order due to the fact that it was not issued by a judge and therefor the occupiers could not be removed.

There are currently 1 191 illegal occupants on the land. Moloto will represent them in court on January 14.