Eradication of informal settlements “not soon”

The Gauteng provincial government still has a long way to go in eradicating widespread growing informal settlements, MEC Lebogang Maile said.

Although the department was fast-tracking housing development projects it would take a long time to eradicate informal settlements, he said.

Maile was speaking at the Gauteng executive council giving an update on the implementation of the growing Gauteng together 2030 9GGT strategy.

“We are fast-tracking human settlements projects in Tshwane and throughout the province. But we will never fully eradicate informal settlements [immediately]. That’s why we have a programme in Gauteng to deal directly with these. We have spent about R700-million apart from what the metros are spending on this programme.’’

The department was facing a million backlog in housing allocation.

Maile said some people on the waiting list for housing allocation were part of informal settlements that would be relocated to formal houses while informal settlements would be formalised.

Previously, Tshwane metro reported that the value chain of upgrading the informal settlement for full services took three to 10 years.

The region has more than 800 000 people registered in the national housing needs register.

“Through the housing rapid land release programme [release of unutilised government buildings, abandoned factories, municipal shops or land for urban agriculture to entrepreneurs, etc.) we are attempting to deal with the housing backlog of about a million and growing every year. However, we will never have resources to build a million houses immediately. And that is why we are looking at other options such as social housing and the rapid land release programme to deal with the backlog,’’ Maile said.

Although the department faced several challenges, Maile said he was happy that it was able to spend its budget this year compared to previous years when it failed to fully spend housing grants.

“For the first time this year, we will not lose any money as the department did in the past 10 years in which we have been losing money because of spending patterns. Despite all the challenges, we are making strides. With the additional money, we are likely to surpass targets on the rapid land release programme.’’

Land invasions continued to cause headaches for the provincial government but would only be addressed after lockdown, he said.

On redevelopment and conversion of existing hostels into family units since 2014, which Mamelodi hostels expected to form part of, Maile said about 14 574 housing units were completed thus far in the province.

“The programme is continuing, but it faces some challenges due to policies which expected the hostel communities to move into newly built rental flats, people could not afford these.

“We are also continuing with the revamping of the urban renewal programme which Winterveld is a part of. Contractors were appointed for reticulation and sewer upgrades and work has commenced and is ongoing.

“We are also dealing with the rot in the department. This includes corruption allegations which have hampered the department.’’

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