Mayor Nkosindiphile Xhakaza said the city was losing over R1 million a month due to the non-payment of rent and services.
The City of Ekurhuleni is inhumane and brutal for evicting low-cost housing residents while the matter is still in court, the uMkhonto weSiswe (MK) party claims.
The MK party was commenting after more than 500 low-cost housing residents in Pharoe Park flats in Germiston were evicted for allegedly failing to pay rent and services.
Evictions reflect careless government
The city began evicting residents last week, and it is alleged that the municipality will evict the remaining occupants today.
Sifiso Luthuli, leader of the MK party in the central south region in Germiston, said: “We received calls from community members who were thrown out of their houses and don’t have a place to stay.
“We will continue to assist them with food and accommodation because most of them are women and children.”
He said the eviction was an indication that the government does not care about the rights of the people, especially the poor.
“When the people moved into the flats, they were told that after a few years there would be an option for them to own the flats, but that never happened.”
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Municipality’s unkept promise
Speaking on behalf of the evicted residents, a representative who asked not to be named because she was reportedly being intimidated by the police and the government, said they stopped paying because the municipality had not kept its promise of giving them the option to buy the flats.
When an option to buy the properties did not materialise, residents applied for RDP houses in 2015, but were told they didn’t qualify – because of the flats they were living in.
“We have lived there with my children for 16 years. They forced us out, we lost all our belongings, and we don’t know where to go.
“My children are traumatised, and they are always holding their school bags containing their clothes, thinking that the security officers who evicted them will come and take them away.”
Lease confirms a rent-to-buy option
The Citizen has seen a lease agreement confirming the occupants would be given a chance to buy the flats after four years.
The residents’ urgent application to challenge the eviction was postponed to tomorrow.
City of Ekurhuleni spokesperson Zweli Dlamini did not respond to questions sent to him on Saturday.
Mayor Nkosindiphile Xhakaza said the city was losing more than R1 million a month due to the non-payment of rent and services.
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