Showdown looms over land grab
We will remove illegal ‘Malema Village’ invaders from municipal land – metro
THE hundreds of residents who invaded a piece of land owned by the Nelson Mandela Bay municipality that has been named “Malema Village” by the invaders will be removed. This is according to Nelson Mandela Bay human settlements political head Nqaba Bhanga. He said land grabs would not be tolerated in Nelson Mandela Bay.
“We are going to remove them. It’s illegal to simply occupy municipal land,” Bhanga said.
EFF leader Julius Malema has been vocal in his support of people to invade unoccupied land.
Invasion of land has since happened in various parts of the country.
Residents started marking parcels of the land for themselves with sticks from Saturday, with shacks going up early on Monday on the municipal land situated in Ward 33 between Uitenhage and Chelsea roads.
A number of “Malema Village” residents said they were originally from the surrounding areas of Izinyoka and Govan Mbeki and were tired of waiting for proper housing from the government.
For years the land has been used as a dumping ground, with scores of RDP houses nearby.
When a Herald team visited the area, children were seen running around with tools such as hammers and spades.
A number of people had started to put up their shacks with others still levelling the ground.
Tamara Dingana, 51, a former backyard dweller from Izinyoka, said like other residents she decided to move into the area after waiting years for a house.
Dingana said she was relocated from Veeplaas to Izinyoka in 1993 with government officials promising to build her a house then.
“I have four children and all of us have not had a house. This is the only available land to us and therefore it makes logic to occupy it.”
A 27-year-old woman, who asked not to be named, said the area was named after Malema since he had championed the cause of people without land.
“We are struggling. We do not have decent houses. Our parents have been waiting. We have children of our own but they too do not have a house. We will stay here until the return of Jesus Christ,” she said.
“This place used to be a dumping site but we saw an opportunity when the municipality cleared it up. We thought to ourselves we have been given a green light to occupy it,” she said.
Noluthando Ncisana, 43, who also has resided in Izinyoka since 1993, said they were frustrated due to lack of proper housing.
“We will target every available open space until they have provided us with decent houses. I grew up here. I have children who are also grow-ups now yet we have no house. We decided to occupy this space to get the attention of the officials,” Ncisana said.
A 56-year-old woman, who also asked not to be named, said like other residents she had been waiting years for a house.
“We have realised that in some areas the government managed to allocate land for building houses but that never happened for us.”
“We therefore decided to come and occupy this land to build for our children. Thus why you see us here busy building. It’s an open space,” she said.