Ballito’s Townsend Park not for sale, say residents

The proposed sale of part of Ward 30’s ‘green lung’ at Townsend Park has drawn widespread opposition from Ballito residents.

KwaDukuza municipality (KDM) last week announced the intent to sell 4 000 square metres of land at the park to the Zululand Islamic Society, which plans to build a mosque at the site.

This is understood to be a continuation of the same process that began, and was later delayed, in 2019.

Initial delays were owing to an incorrectly handled public participation process, but that has since been rectified and residents are allowed to lodge their objections to the sale with KDM until December 8.

The area in question is the forested section behind the Scout Hall, informally known as Butterfly Park, with the sale price listed at R3.6-million.

The park has been a bone of contention in the past, both in 2019 and when KDM planned to build a town hall on the site in 2013.

The majority of residents’ opposition at both points was clear, that their primary objection was not to what could be built on the land, but rather that it was up for sale in the first place.

This was echoed in perhaps the first public discussion of the issue this year at the Ward 30 quarterly meeting on Monday night.

Residents expressed their concern at losing an important part of one of the sparse few green belts left in the area, particularly given that the Butterfly Park hosts a wide variety of local fauna and flora.

Speaking at the meeting, Dolphin Coast Residents and Ratepayers Association (Docrra) chairman, Deon Viljoen, indicated the next steps in the objection process.

“We want to be quite clear that our only concern is with the sale of public land. To this end, we have sought legal advice and will be updating the community once we have more clarity. If residents have not already sent their objections, we suggest they wait until we have received the relevant information and can create a template,” said Viljoen.

He also said that Docrra would create and circulate a petition, should the need arise.

Although the mosque being built may not be at the heart of most residents’ objections, there remains a lack of prayer space for the local Islamic community.

They currently have to travel to Shakaskraal, Tongaat or KwaDukuza to pray in a mosque.

Within Ballito there are only individual prayer rooms and one musallah, which is a dedicated prayer space administered by the Ballito Muslim Trust in the Ballito Business Park.

“It only holds about 70 people at a time, which is simply not sufficient to serve our resident community, which we believe is now over 100 people,” said Moulana Bilal, a local Muslim leader.

Given the business park’s status as an economic centre on the North Coast, the musallah also needs to cater for people who work in Ballito, said Ballito Muslim Trust chairman, Musapha Haneef.

To serve this need, the Ballito Muslim Trust bought a section of land in the business park, but they have since been met with their own objections, said Haneef.

“We submitted our plans for a place of assembly to be built on the land, which we believed to be accepted by the municipality. Since then, however, it appears that six of the surrounding businesses objected to the construction, which we do not understand. We simply want to create a fair space for us to be able to pray,” he said.

It was unclear what stage the process had reached at the time of print. KDM withheld comment on both issues, citing ongoing objection processes.

Haneef also indicated they do not have an affiliation with the Zululand Islamic Society and would not utilise a mosque in Townsend Park should it be built.

“We are trying to reflect the real needs of local Muslims in our area, which is why we have sought construction of our own dedicated building.”

If you would like to object to the sale of part of Townsend Park, then you can either write a letter or email the municipality.

Written objections must be addressed and submitted to the Office of the Municipal Manager, 14 Chief Albert Street, KwaDukuza, 4450.

Emails can be sent to municipalmanager@kwadukuza.gov.za

Docrra asked that residents who email their objections should copy admin@docrra.co.za so that they could oversee the process.

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