Mayor Mpho Parks Tau’s absence at the Rabie Ridge community hall did not go unnoticed by residents who had gathered for a meeting between leaders of informal settlements and the leaders of the province’s housing department.
The mayor, who was scheduled to be at a sod-turning event on 8 June on a plot of land nearby the community hall where the City will be developing the area by building a shopping centre and Reconstruction and Development Programme houses, failed to show up.
The mayor did make an appearance on 10 June for the sod-turning and presented community members with title deeds to the 122 hectares of land where the development will take place. He quickly left the area for Ivory Park to hand out food parcels to the community and officially open the Le Roux bridge in Vorna Valley.
MMC Dan Bovu excused Tau’s absence at the community meeting on 8 June. He said Tau was called away at the last minute to address the Economic Indaba in Woodmead. “Poverty is also a pressing issue in the country and he had to go and address that,” Bovu said.
Community members were not convinced by the MMC. Charles Jones, chairman of the Rabie Ridge Residents Association said this was just another excuse. “We’ve had meetings with them over the past year about the same issues that we were going to raise at this meeting,” he said. “The people of Rabie Ridge are being neglected. Homes are overpopulated and the government needs to be pressured into doing something.”
He said they had not been properly informed of who the beneficiaries of the housing project were going to be, even though the land that was going to be used for the houses was within the township. “In the past 22 years, there hasn’t been even a single RDP house built in our area,” said Jones.
Another community member, Rieta Peterson said 70 percent of the new houses should be allocated to Rabie Ridge residents, as they have not had the opportunity to benefit from housing projects in their neighbouring townships.
Barbara Mashoeu, current chairperson of the Ward 79 committee said this was a matter of the haves and the have-nots. “There are two faces to this problem, there are those that are coming from shacks that have the basic need of housing, while others come from comfortable homes and would like to see the area developed by bringing shopping centres.”
When asked about members of his ward claiming that they were not properly informed about the upcoming development, Mashoeu said this was not the case. “There have been meetings and in those meetings, these issues were discussed.”
Bovu informed the residents that the meeting that would take place at a later date at the same community hall.
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