Let us address the concerns of backyarders, says MEC of Human Settlements, as it happened

ANC Statement on the Land protests in Hermanus

ANC in the Western Cape condemns in the strongest possible terms the destruction of critical infrastructure and violence accompanying the community protests for land in Hermanus in the Overberg Region in Western Cape.

The leaders of these protests have acknowledged that certain elements who are not part of these legitimate community protests took advantage of the protests and set alight libraries and police stations and private vehicles and as the ANC we ask the law enforcement to deal with these elements decisively and bring all responsible to book.

The ANC however would like to state it categorically that we support the community call for prime land to build integrated and quality houses.

This is the cause we have been fighting for over and against a DA government that fears integration. We have watched over the period of the DA's control of the municipality in coastal towns like Hermanus, Caledon, Grabouw, a troubling phenomenon that has made these towns meaner and more divided.

The DA municipalities have been relentlessly selling off municipal land to make room for silos of luxury safe-deposit boxes across these towns further entrenching the historic division between where the rich and where the poor live.

As the ANC we have seen emergence of investment units, sold to overseas and local elites and never inhabited for most of the year, substituting community for vacancy. This means the more we build, the more our cities are emptied, producing dead swathes of zombie enclaves.

These moves by the municipality have created deep resentments within communities where private developers are left unchecked, going off the rails with local leaders misguided into allowing a great mortgage mirage. These schemes have cause irreparable harm to our towns and cities.

All DA-runned Municipalities, led by the City of Cape Town have been allowing this selling off of municipal land to private developers to balloon beyond all reason, in the hope of creaming off the fat of developers’ profits for the so called public good.

ANC calls local authorities in Hermanus to start being pro-active in their manner of governing and not allow their authority to be usurped by an illicit relationship between the DA and private developers.

All development must have a bias of creating a more inclusive Hermanus not one that entrenches the divisions of the past.

The Mayor and local leaders must do everything in the interest of their own people and must always consult with them for any development in their town.

As the ANC we also call on the Land Imbizos to begin in earnest so that our people can have a sense of timelines and land allocations for inclusive low-cost housing for themselves and their children. 

A community meeting is expected to commence at 14:00 in the Zwelihle Community Hall, spokesperson for the human settlements MEC Ntomboxolo Makoba-Somdaka has confirmed.

This after MEC Bonginkosi Madikizela met with local residents' committee members earlier on Tuesday.

News24's Jenni Evans is in Hermanus and will attend the meeting.

Hermanus protests: 'Amaparapara behind violence, vandalism'

A community member who has been part of the protests in Hermanus has blamed "drug addicts" for the violence that gripped the coastal town on Monday.

Speaking to News24 outside a gutted library, Masibulele Jimlongo said before starting the protest, the community had decided as a collective not to destroy property.

"We decided that we will never break a school and a library, but there are what we call amaparapara who break the library," he said adding that the addicts were the ones responsible for the vandalism of property and were hiding behind the community's genuine grievances.

PICS: Protests in Hermanus as residents demand land

Protesters remain in stand-off with the police in the coastal town of Hermanus as people try to invade land.

Hermanus protests: 'We have been waiting for houses for 20 years

There are rows of newly-built houses, with windows smashed in and doors ripped out in Swartdam Road, Zwelihle.

Behind a group of foot soldiers, holding the rubble-strewn frontline of Hermanus, smoke billows from the still-smouldering waste centre in Mbeki Road – a signal to all entering the town that the residents of Zwelihle are not happy.

"We have been renting here for 20 years, waiting for a house," said one woman angrily.

"I was on a waiting list. I was next," a woman says, pointing at the small units over the road."

Now somebody else gets the house."

MEDIA STATEMENT

Killing of SAPS members and torching of police stations is high treason, says Police Portfolio Committee

Parliament – The killing of South African Police Service (Saps) members and the torching of police stations is high treason and perpetrators of these crimes should receive the highest sanction possible from the judicial system, the Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Police, Mr Francois Beukman, has said.

“The Portfolio Committee on Police is of the view that the attacks on the law enforcement fraternity and facilities in the last 72 hours should be dealt with by the Saps swiftly and directly.

The perpetrators should be arrested and face the full wrath of the law. We will support all steps within the legislative framework to secure and protect law enforcement officers and property of the state,” he said. 

Beukman was reacting to the killing of a police officer outside his home in Bloemfontein on Sunday and the torching of a Saps satellite station in the Overstrand Municipality on Monday.

Beukman said the Portfolio Committee is saddened by another senseless killing of a member of the Saps and extends the committee’s condolences to the family of the deceased and the Saps.

"We call again on any member of the community to help the police in finding and arresting the perpetrators of the heinous crime. We trust that the National Commissioner will ensure that all necessary resources are made available to the team investigating the attack."

The torching and damaging of police stations and satellite stations is hugely detrimental to communities, because it directly affects the ability of the police to deal with crime effectively.

Damage to police stations means that resources meant for the building for new ones and the upgrading of existing stations will be negatively affected. 

"We call on the leaders in all communities to direct their members to ensure that the infrastructure and facilities of the Saps do not become the target of criminals and arsonists. Police stations are there to serve all citizens and should never be used as a tool for short-term gain.

"There is a duty on all patriotic South Africans who value the Constitution and the principles of constitutionalism to act within the law and support the work of those entrusted with the law enforcement duty of the Republic of South Africa," Beukman said. 

Dear President Ramaphosa, it's time to visit Hermanus

It is increasingly clear that the ANC-led government of President Cyril Ramaphosa has, with respect, no clue how to deal with the fallout over the adoption of a motion to consider land expropriation without compensation.

EFF councillors are victoriously leading their followers to the Promised Land, white racists have found a new hero in a nutty Australian minister who treats them like refugees, and the DA is warning its supporters in Fourways that the land occupiers will come for their townhouses next.

On Monday the police had to fire teargas and rubber bullets at protestors in Hermanus in the Western Cape – many of them identified as EFF supporters – who came to occupy the land. A factory was burned, flats and cars were stoned and razed, a police station was set alight, and foreign shopkeepers were assaulted and chased away. The majority of victims were black.