Resettle flood victims now

The City of Tshwane must prioritise the relocation of informal settlements residents who were affected by floods at the weekend to avoid the loss of more lives.

One person died and thousands were displaced when their homes were swept away by heavy rains in Mamelodi, east of Pretoria.

Shacks were either swept away or too flooded for occupancy in Eerstefabriek, Willow Farm and Mavuso informal settlements, leaving scores stranded. They are now housed in community halls.

The structures were on a flood line, and this was not the first time the area was hit by floods as over 700 shacks were ravaged in 2019.

Devastated residents on the scene said they had to evacuate their homes as the river bank burst and water flooded their shacks on Friday evening.

Gauteng human settlements MEC Lebogang Maile blamed the housing crisis the province was facing, but also said the Eersterfabriek problem could have been fixed as city administrators had been planning to purchase suitable land already in 2020.

Tshwane mayor Randall Williams’ spokesman, Jordan Griffiths, said the sale was halted because the administrators had tried to use R296m from the city’s utility services development grant to buy the land. He also complained about intense resistance from residents who needed be relocated.

This is the second time some of the residents are losing their homes and property because they were built on uninhabitable land. The government cannot fail these residents a third time.

This time around a human being died and more deaths must be avoided. The relocation of the people must be more urgent now, for the sake of the city and its residents.

Shack dwellers are known for rebuilding in the same areas following a tragedy once the noise has died down, and we call on the city to ensure this does not happen again. Find the funds to pay for the land that was already identified and procure it, the people must move from the halls they are living in to a new and safer area.

Law enforcement officers must also stop or remove new squatters in these areas. Marking it as being dangerous will also help inform people looking for land to settle on that these places are not suitable for inhabitation.

We also call on Eerstefabriek residents not to resist the move, as the area is not safe, and nothing is more important than saving their own lives.