Govan Mbeki Municipality began registering Charl Cilliers residents who qualify for RDP houses on Wednesday, September 8.
This came after the residents in the area told the municipal housing officials and their councillor that they do not trust the initial list of beneficiaries that was shown to them last month.
Residents received a message to take their identity documents to register for RDP houses at the multi-purpose centre last month.
They were surprised when the officials produced a list on which to check off their names. The residents claim the names of only a few Charl Cilliers residents appeared on that list.
They then decided that the municipal officials should turn back the list for rectification or the registration should be redone.
The community complains
“We held a meeting on Saturday, September 4, and instructed our councillor Ms Smangele Ntuli, to tell the municipality’s housing department to bring back that list so that we could see if it had been rectified. Unfortunately, the list was nowhere to be found and they began to re-register people,” said Mr Jeikob Masiteng a community member.
He questions whether GMM is really registering people for houses or if they are just trying to silence the people.
eMbalenhle residents now also accused councillors and ward committee members of selling RDP houses that are to be built in Charl Cilliers.
According to residents, councillors were supposed to call ward meetings to announce that the process of application is open, but they kept it to themselves and their ward committees.
“We want clarity about the list of those people who were registered on the Charl Cilliers RDP houses beneficiary list because we were not informed when the process began.
“Ward councillors and their ward committees have failed the community because some of us were surprised to hear that there was a registration process for RDP houses at Charl Cilliers,” said Mr Doctor Thanjekwayo.
“We think they sold those houses just like the houses at Ext 22, some of which belongs to the previous councillors.”
Mr Thanjekwayo said the municipality should have advertised the registration process in local newspapers.
He also accused politicians of using RDP houses as election tools.
Ward 14 committee is worried
The Ward 14 committee also wants the Charl Cilliers RDP houses list to be reviewed. They are accusing their councillor, Ms Thandiwe Zulu, of manipulating the list.
These committee members are concerned that the community might believe that they are corrupt because they have been sending them to register for RDP houses and other services.
“Since 2011, we were registering community members for RDP houses at Greenfield in Ext 10. No one we have registered, got a house there in 2016,” said Mr Jabulani Nkosi, a ward committee member.
“We again registered residents who needed RDP houses at Ext 22 but no one on our list benefited because some of those houses were allegedly sold by previous councillors.”
Mr Nkosi said even now not all the people on the current list submitted to the municipality were called to fill in application forms.
“When we asked the housing officials about this, we were told that we were not allowed to see the list because the were already done in our ward.
“We look like criminals in the eyes of our community, some people are accusing us of taking their identity documents to commit crime,” said Mr Nkosi.
The committee members also claimed that when Ms Zulu did give out the application forms, it was stained with blood. She allegedly claimed the blood came from her car because she used it
to rush her son who had been stabbed, to hospital.
Ms Zulu, who is also the MMC for Corporate Services at Govan Mbeki municipality, said she did not know of the list problem in her ward.
“I gave them their forms to hand out to those on the list to complete and return to the municipal housing department. No one told me that they have a problem.
“Forms that I gave to them did not have blood stains. I don’t deny that I told them I was rushing my son to hospital.
“This coming Tuesday, I will have a meeting with them and try to resolve their problem,” said Ms Zulu.
Mr Collen Nkosi, the ward committee chairperson in eMbalenhle, said they are aware of allegations about some ward committees working together with councillors to register outsiders for RDP houses at Charl Cilliers.
“We noted that the list allegedly contains the names of people from other provinces as the beneficiaries. If ward committees members are found to be promoting corruption, they must be punished because we were elected to serve our communities and must not follow some councillors’ corrupt instructions.
“We have reported the matter to the parliamentary constituency where it is receiving the necessary attention,” said Mr Nkosi.
Registration finishes in October
“The Human Settlements Registration of Beneficiaries Programme has 369 stands at the Charl Cilliers Greenfield project and 140 subsidy applications have been received from all wards in Region 3. Another 130 beneficiaries from Charl Cilliers applied for subsidies from September 8,” said Mr Donald Green, acting head of communication at the municipality.
He said the difference will be shared by the vulnerable groups such as the disabled, child-headed families and the elderly taken from the National Housing Needs Register (NHNR).
“The programme is expected to be concluded by mid-October,” Mr Green said.
A previous fight
During a previous RDP beneficiary registration process at Charl Cilliers three years ago, a fight broke out inside multi-purpose centre. The police arrested a man from eMbalenhle for activating a fire extinguisher.
Other residents from eMbalenhle were accusing politicians of wanting to sell those RDP houses that day because the registration process had been attended by some members of the mayoral committee.
Their presence angered residents who wanted to know the reason behind it because only housing department officials are allowed to register people for RDP houses.
