Residents of various areas in the City of Tshwane marched to Tshwane House on Monday morning under the banner of Tshwane Abahlali Dudula organisation.
These residents hailed from areas like Atteridgeville, Olivenhoutbosch, Ga- Ratsebe and Mabopane.
Inspired by the slogan ” No Service, No Vote,” the marching crowd pointed out that if their demands are not met, then they won’t vote in the upcoming elections.
The organisation’s chairperson Kenias Matsana griped over the fact that young and old people’s RDP houses have been sold by corrupt City of Tshwane officials to people who are not beneficiaries of these houses, including foreigners.
“We have old people who have registered for houses as far back as 1996 and 1998 and some of them are disabled now, yet they have still not received their RDP houses,” he said. ” We have youth who stay in shacks and backyards because they don’t have houses, this as their houses are presently occupied by foreigners,” said Matsana.
Co-ordinator of the Alexander Fiyela Movement Felicia Chauke told Tshwane Talks that she and some members of her organisation came to the march to support Tshwane Abahlali Dudula because the demands of the Tshwane Abahlali Dudula movement resonated with those of her organisation as they are issues which happen all over South Africa.
“Now that we are going to elections, we feel that all spheres of government must step up their efforts and pull up their socks because they are failing us as members from disadvantaged communities,” she said.
“All spheres of government, including municipalities have been failing us for 30 years now and if these spheres of government had really done their job there wouldn’t be so many service delivery protest organisations in the country,” she said.
One of the people who was at the march, Isaac Kgosana, complained about the behaviour of Ward 7 Councilor who he accused of being a bully.
Declining to mention the said Councilor’s name, Kgosana said: “When we call our own community meetings the Councilor comes and disrupts them, he is a divisive character and uses threats to force his way through on any issues.”
“We are asking the ANC and the municipality to demarcate our ward into two and give the part that falls under Lotus Gardens to the present Councilor as he prefers Lotus Gardens and doesn’t care about us in Atteridgeville,” lamented Kgosana.
“We want to be given a new Councilor and not a bully who can’t work with the community,” he said.
According to Kgosana, another burning issue is that when there are community projects which need workers in Atteridgeville, the Councillor doesn’t employ local people but instead brings over people from Lotus Gardens where he stays,” said Kgosana.
Meanwhile, it has come to light that there is a project which aims at installing street name plates in Ward19, but the residents of the area are of the opinion that before this project can be implemented, they first want to be provided with RDP houses, tarred roads and storm water drainage systems.
The residents’ demands are as follows: 1. Demarcation of the ward.
2. Corruption in the handing over of RDP houses called Mayoral Houses.
3.More RDP houses.
4 Road and storm water piping system.
5. Service delivery.
6.Commuity refuse bags.
7.Illegal dumping to be stopped.
8. Community Centre.
9. Youth Empowerment Programmes
10. Job outreach programmes.
Responding to the marching residents’ demands, MMC for Human Settlements in the City of Tshwane Ofentse Madzibatela said new RDP houses will be built next year in Atteridgeville Extension 19, in Ga-Tsebe and also in Olivenhoutbosch.
On the issue of illegal dumping, Madzibatela pointed out that this was caused by residents themselves, as they don’t put out their rubbish to be collected by municipal garbage collectors or put out the rubbish bins late after the municipality rubbish collectors have passed.
Addressing the issue of lack of refuse bags, Madzibatela said in the past the municipality used to hand out these bags to residents for free, but this has stopped as residents were abusing the municipality’s generosity by selling off the said bags.
Madzibatela urged those who are indigent in the community to apply for the Poorest of the Poor (POP) programme whereby the municipality will grant them 12 kiloliters of water and 100 watts of electricity every month.
But Madzibatela warned that those who overuse the said water and electricity ration will have to pay for their over-consumption.
On allegations of corruption regarding the allocation of RDP houses which are known as Mayoral Houses in Extension 19 in Atteridgeville, Madzibatela urged those who have evidence in this regard to urgently consult his private assistant (PA) and give him the required information which would lead to an investigation into the matter.
According to the residents, some of these mayoral houses have been occupied by illegal beneficiaries who include foreigners.
Madzibatela pointed out that the investigation will be done expeditiously as the municipality will be formally handing over title deeds to the occupants of those houses next Monday.