Commission hears complaints

CLAIMS of corruption in the Nomzamo RDP housing beneficiary list surfaced as the Housing Commission, formed by Lukhanji Municipality to investigate claims of irregularities in housing allocation and ben- eficiary lists, listened to complaints at a public meeting in Mlungisi last Thursday.

The commission, which was represented by chairman Adre Bartis, a member of the provincial department of human settlement Mafa Ya- mi, Lukhanji chief whip Sinethemba Dyantyi, and councillors Andiswa Hulushe and Mthuthuzeli Hokolo, was formed in May.

Attorney Jaco van Jaarsveld apol

ogised for his absence due to illness.

Yami told the meeting human settlement MEC Helen Sauls-August supported the commission and encouraged people to come forward with relevant information.

Some residents claimed that while their names had appeared on the beneficiary list, these had later disappeared.

Qhamisa Mtshatsheni said while her RDP house was approved, someone else was living there.

Joseph Mbuqe said his house was approved in 2007, but when he followed it up he was told that the documents had disappeared from the municipality. “I have followed this up but there is no improvement, I am sent from pillar to post.”

A member of the Nomzamo project steering committee which dealt with the beneficiary list, Ncamile Mfaku, said they were at the meeting because fellow committee member Eric Palmer put his family and in-laws on the beneficiary list while keeping the application forms at his home. He said while the committee had originally been told that old people should be prioritised, the list was “full of children and other people who never stayed in Nomzamo.

“The beneficiary list is corrupted and the housing project in Nomzamo is rotten with corruption.”

Palmer said he was available to speak to the commission and had not drawn up the beneficiary lists.

Dyantyi said Palmer would be called by the commission to speak, as would Mfaku and members of the Homeless Federation. Yami said people who were threatened must report this to the commission. Bartis asked people who could not speak at the meeting to go to the municipal manager’s office, leave their documents and sign for them.