Farmlands still in danger
City undermines efforts to protect Philippi Horticultural Area and Cape Flats Aquifer
PHILIPPI Horticultural Area (PHA) community efforts to protect the farmlands and aquifer are being undermined by City and their proxies.
On November 5, members of the PHA community rights-holders, large-scale white farmers, small-scale farmers, farmworkers and informal settlement dwellers met in the PHA and agreed to work together to establish a united local forum.
This is a historic moment in the PHA as the community has been polarised for over a decade, by internal and external forces, fuelled by developers, land speculation and the government’s failure to protect the agricultural and ecological integrity of the farmlands.
After 10 years of sustained political pressure by the PHA Campaign, the provincial cabinet adopted the Western Cape Department of Agriculture’s 2018 Indego Study, which called “to protect the PHA as an asset that has value for all citizens, especially the agricultural sector and those who live, work and invest in the PHA” (Indego Report).
The establishment of a united community forum is one of two key requirements of the Indego Study and implementation plan for the PHA commissioned by the provincial Department of Agriculture last year.
But the new forum actually started to take shape independently of the Indego Study through the research work done by Dr Leanne Seeliger of the University of Stellenbosch (2018-2019) on water ethics that guide Cape Flats Aquifer water users in the PHA.
The PHA Campaign encouraged Seeliger as a neutral party to expand her work to facilitate the formation of a new PHA community forum.
The second requirement is the establishment of an intergovernmental committee (IGC) made up of City and provincial departments that must adopt and implement the Indego plan.
The IGC is to have representation of the new PHA community forum to engage government departments in the implementation of service-delivery issues. The PHA today is poised to be an exciting model of how government and community can work together to protect an important resource for the city, while improving the quality of life for all the rights-holders. But this model faces severe challenges, the primary one being the lack of good faith by the City of Cape Town in engaging with the PHA community.
The CoCT chose to oppose the PHA Campaign in the October high court case – judgment reserved – where it’s siding with the 500 hectare Oakland City Development. The outcome of the case will set a precedent for further five developments including a silica sand mining operation. The very survival of the PHA as we know it depends on the outcome of the court case rather than on good governance principles.
The City has not adopted the IGC plan, while the provincial government has. The IGC is alternatively chaired by mayor Dan Plato and Anton Bredell, the MEC of the Department of Environmental Affairs and Development Planning (DEA/DP). How the political heads will work in the IGC to protect the PHA while their independence is compromised (both are respondents in the high court case on the side of developers) will be interesting to see.
The City and DEA/DP have not implemented long-term statutory and conservation-type protection for the PHA farming area. This is available in the municipal by-law, in heritage, agricultural and aquifer protection, and in the National Environmental Management Act. The City’s current protection in the 2018 Spatial Development Framework (SDF) “Critical Natural Area” does not provide longterm conservation protection. Last year, the CoCT without public participation approved a new SDF plan that protects only 1 800ha of the 3 100ha of the farmlands and approved development no. 6 – 250 housing units in the PHA.
A moratorium is urgently needed. In the current round of SDF meetings, the PHA is identified as sub-district, but the City is not holding a single meeting on the PHA’s future.
Lastly, before the new PHA community forum is even constituted and operational, the CoCT has allocated a budget between R18 million and R20m supposedly for a project in the PHA, and has identified the Philippi Economic Development Forum (Pedi) as the implementing agent.
The chief executive of Pedi, Thomas Twana, attended a few meetings of the forum and has used this to legitimise Pedi as a stakeholder in the PHA. Pedi is located in the Philippi East, which is a densely populated urban area that has nothing in common with the PHA farming area. After a 10-year long struggle by the PHA Campaign and rights-holders, a commitment by the provincial government was secured – albeit on paper – to protect the PHA.
But a key stakeholder, the City, is acting in bad faith. Whether the PHA Campaign wins or loses in court, one has to wonder: after 10 years of habitual lies and cover-ups, and maliciously engineering public participation, is the City even capable of good faith?
Will we ever be able to realise our dream of protecting the PHA farmlands, the Cape Flats Aquifer and have the space to build our farming future?