Flood victims don’t want to work with local councillors

Mamelodi floods victims this week said they don’t want to work with any of their local ward councillors on their relocation process.

“We are not prepared to work with them because they were not supportive all these months we were displaced,” said one of the floods victims’ representatives, Kgaogelo Masemola.

The remarks follow a meeting this week between the flood victims and the Tshwane administration to discuss the relocation.

Over 1 300 people were displaced when 700 shacks were destroyed during a flood at the Eerste Fabrieke informal settlement on
9 December 2019.

The displaced people have since been housed in temporary accommodations until they will be moved to permanent stands.

The meeting was held at the multi-purpose centre in Nellmapius and was attended by newly elected Tshwane mayor Randall Williams on Monday.

Mayor Williams engaged with councillors and local leaders in region 5 and 6 on the planned relocation.

Masemola said the flood victims were excited to have the new mayor at the meeting.

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He said ward councillors were of no help to them in the months following the flood.

“They never had any interaction with us up until we sought help from the Public Protector’s office, the human rights commission and other organisations.

“We are the ones who fought for the relocation process – without their assistance or guidance. Now that they are reinstated, they want to be part and parcel of the relocation process.

“We don’t want to work with them, because they will only bring corruption since they failed to fix our complaint about corruption in the first place.”

He said the flood victims have previously protested and handed over a memorandum to fight corruption to authorities.

Masemola said that many victims of last year’s flood still live on the flood line and should be moved at once before the rainy season starts in earnest.

“We can’t wait for next year to be moved to a safer place. We must all be relocated at once,” said Masemola.

Flood victims also claimed they are still waiting for shack marks.

“We don’t know why it is not done yet,” one told Record.

Donald Diphofa, another flood victim representative, agreed that “we don’t want to be misrepresented by ward councillors in council meetings”.

“If the councillors want to work with us, they must engage us in every meeting. And we want everything in paper,” said Diphofa.

“Our message is clear to all the ward councillors who attended our recent update meeting: we don’t want to work with you.”

Tshwane metro spokesperson Lindela Mashigo urged residents to report any corruption to law enforcement agencies for them to be investigated and possibly prosecuted should there be any wrongdoing.

Regarding the flood victims’ allegations of councillors not being involved in their relocation process, he said it should be noted that “for a period of just over eight months there were no councillors in place until a court ruling last week that instructed their re-instatement”.

Regarding the shack marks, he said that the “relocation is a process and not an event”.

“There are phases in which certain things are done, including shack marks,” he said.

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