Cape Town - The City of Cape Town is being accused of turning suburbs into slums by ignoring its own by-laws, resulting in a boom of illegal building developments for nefarious activities.
A number of residents’ associations from the northern suburbs have said their pleas for the City to take action have not been heeded, while they watch their homes and suburbs deteriorate into slums with rising crime rates, safety issues, illegal buildings used for brothels, shebeens without liquor licences, shops selling gas without the necessary permits, and more.
Residents and ratepayer organisations such as the Summer Greens Ratepayers’ Association; Sandrift Residents Association; Brooklyn, Ysterplaat and Rugby Residents Association (BYRRA); Milnerton Central Residents Association (MCRA); Tijgerhof Residents Association; Phoenix Ratepayers and Community Forum; and Protect Brooklyn – Each One, Reach One, signed a petition and handed it over to the City.
Residents came out in their numbers at the weekend for a peaceful protest, handing over a signed petition of demands to deputy mayor and spatial planning and environment Mayco member Eddie Andrews to take immediate action on their issues.
The residents submitted a they compiled across their suburbs, comprising more than 160 boarding houses, alleged illegal buildings, properties with construction either concluded or continuing despite stop orders and legal processes initiated by the City, and businesses operating without rezoning (including guest houses), as well as illegal operations of “shebeens”, spaza shops and brothels.
The petition, with more than 500 signatures so far, is titled “Stop the Illegal Buildings – Request for City of Cape Town Intervention”, and called on Andrews to take immediate action as these ongoing issues continued to impact crime figures, community safety, service infrastructure, and negatively impact on property values.
According to Bouwe van den Eems, head of building portfolio and chairperson of the Milnerton Central Residents Association (MCRA), Milnerton Central was up in arms when an unscrupulous operator bought four properties, undertook construction without approved plans and started operating boarding houses.
Since then, a number of other properties were also discovered where boarding houses are being operated, yet despite being reported to the City, the boarding houses continue to operate.
Caroline Marx, director of environmental group RethinkTheStink, added: “Why does the City not fulfil its mandate and enforce the building by-laws by insisting these illegal structures are either removed or rebuilt to comply with the building regulations?
“Developers are often given permission to deviate substantially from the City’s building regulations, and this also adds to the strain on the infrastructure,” Marx said.
“The Potsdam water treatment plant is already crippled under the pressure, with most of the suburbs involved left to deal with sewage spills onto roads on a weekly basis as a result.”
A resident, who wished to remain anonymous due to safety concerns, said they had found it was the same perpetrators (developers) operating across several suburbs, and that they knew how to exploit loopholes in the current enforcement procedures.
“These perpetrators also know building inspectors don’t work over the weekends, public holidays and the annual builders holidays coinciding with the festive season, and hence they build outside of the times when officials can serve these stop orders.”
The resident added that in instances where these matters were reported to the designated City officials, the officials inform the owners who the complainant is, and they are intimidated.
Andrews acknowledged that the City needed to work with the community, and called for an urgent meeting to be arranged with the ratepayers’ associations, with a view to setting up a task team to address the various concerns raised by the residents, and the need for dedicated enforcement with specific outcomes to be implemented.
He added that the City was already pursuing litigation in the Western Cape High Court involving a number of repeat offenders and the elaborate legal processes were viewed as deterrents for future contraventions linked to the same owners.
“The City will continue to strengthen efforts in dealing with repeat offenders as they are identified. A more proactive approach will be followed for identified hot spot areas to discourage unlawful activities.
“As indicated, we will investigate how we can fine-tune a more dedicated approach to address various concerns,” Andrews said.
The City will exercise its options to petition the courts for cessation of unlawful building works or to prevent occupation of unlawful buildings in cases of rapid construction.
Processes leading to compliance may include court orders to demolish unlawful structures, cease unlawful land uses, or orders to regularise unlawful structures or uses.
Brooklyn Neighbourhood chairperson Cheryl Castle said: “This is only the surface of requests that have been ignored, this area has been allowed to regress into a slum, we are not far off from another Hillbrow.”
kristin.engel@inl.co.za