Family defies metro order to move from Waterworld site to informal settlement

A family of 14 who live alongside the Waterworld Funpark construction site are refusing to move to temporary structures at an informal settlement near Orange Grove despite being ordered to do so by the Buffalo City Metropolitan Development Agency.

Scharon Koen, 52, said she and her family lived next to the Waterworld Funpark construction site in what she described as a five-bedroom house in Leaches Bay.

“We are not going to a location. We are not going anywhere. It is our right to live here,” she said.

The house was fashioned from a dilapidated ablution block next to the Waterworld construction site, and the family have lived there for 20 years.

“We are taking this matter to court because they cannot expect us to move from our five-bedroom house to a small two-room house that does not even have a toilet,” Koen said.

“We have little children who cannot use pit latrines.

“We are not going to risk our lives and live in a township. Where are we going to bath? There are no bathrooms.”

Koen worked as a caretaker at Waterworld for several years.

“I was rebuilding some of the pools there and my children were doing the slides, gates and fence,” she said.

“We first lived in a tent inside Waterworld. I was working for the previous owners of the place.

“They rented it from the municipality, and when they left to go overseas, my former bosses asked the municipality to give me this house and BCM said if I still looked after Waterworld, I could have it.

“I lived in the house on the site. I was then asked to move out when my employers went back overseas. I lost my job.”

She said the family had not simply moved into the house at Leaches Bay — they had permission from the municipality.

We are not going to a location. We are not going anywhere.

It is our right to live here

“I saw the comments on the Dispatch Facebook page about our story.

“They were ugly.” Rather than moving to an informal settlement, she said, the Buffalo City Development Agency could give the family compensation to fund a departure from East London.

Development Agency spokesperson Oyama Makalima said they had engaged with the family and explained that their dwelling posed a threat to their safety, especially that of the children.

“The metro has instituted a legal process at the East London high court to interdict them from interfering with the Waterworld project as well as to evict them,” he said.

“At this stage, the metro is providing temporary, safe accommodation and a longer-term solution is being looked at.”