Concourt to rule on case of 12 Mitchells Plain residents

THE Constitutional Court is expected to deliver judgment today on the future of 12 Mitchells Plain residents who face eviction from homes they have been living in for nearly two decades.

The residents purchased the houses through the Cape Town Community Housing Company (CTCHC), a social housing development company wholly owned by the National Housing Finance Corporation, and formed to administer the delivery of houses in the city.

According to court papers, the residents did not pay instalments regularly, for reasons including the instalments were higher than expected; construction was of a poor quality; and the CTCHC had failed, on numerous occasions, to respond to their complaints.

The Mitchells Plain houses were subsequently sold to a third party and the occupants served with eviction notices. “From the beginning there were disputes about the quality of the construction, and the CTCHC’s obligations to repair defects. And the applicants for their part have all paid some instalments over the years, but none of them have kept up to date.

“Despite attempts to negotiate for a solution, the CTCHC eventually took the position that it would seek to sell out the applicants’ homes from under them,” the residents had argued.

In 2015, the CTCHC filed an application with the Registrar of Deeds for the cancellation of Instalment Sale Agreements (ISAs).

In the Western Cape High Court this year, the applicants challenged the cancellation of the ISAs, and also challenged the sale of properties to the S&N Trust. The high court had to determine whether the applicants had been in breach of their payment obligations under the ISAs, and it held that they had been.

An application for leave to appeal was dismissed by the high court, and later by the Supreme Court of Appeal.

The applicants then turned to the Constitutional Court for leave to appeal against the high court’s ruling.

The national Department of Human Settlements and the Women’s Legal Centre Trust were admitted as amicus curiae, and argued that the case needed to be viewed through a gendered and feminist lens as the cancellation of the ISAs would have an adverse impact on women and affect their right to access housing.