POLITICAL NEWS - The DA in KZN is planning to escalate the matter of the planned Bakerville Heights housing development for military veterans to the KZN Legislature.
Spokesperson on Human Settlements, Marlaine Nair, said the questions will be submitted to the newly-appointed MEC for Human Settlement, Ntuthuko Mahlaba, calling for clarity around the project and future housing plans for Northdale residents.
Nair said the DA has called on the department and Msunduzi Municipality to immediately halt all developments related to the project until proper public consultation with the community and a full environmental impact assessment and infrastructure assessments have been concluded.
The Witness last week reported that Msunduzi planned to build 115 low-cost houses for MK veterans. The ward 30 councillors, Rachel Soobiah, said she and the residents were not informed about this project.
She was only made aware when she was called into a meeting with Msunduzi recently. Nair said the DA recently conducted an oversight inspection of the site where these houses will be built as part of the first phase.
Of particular concern is that work has begun at this site — including land excavation and putting up fencing — without any consultation with either the ward councillor or any public consultation with the community
She said the DA was aware that the deadline to find accommodation for military veterans was looming but it remained vital that processes and protocols were strictly adhered to.
“Regrettably, it appears that the Bakerville community have been sidelined in favour of military veterans’ housing needs. What the community wants is engagement and discussion around fair allocations within this project.
“This means the inclusion of local community members who are homeless, along with a percentage from each of the four local informal settlements — which house an estimated 6 000 people — and an allocation of one percent of the housing for military veterans. The entire project cannot simply be allocated to them given KZN’s massive backlog in housing delivery,” said Nair.
She added that concerns raised by residents were whether the existing infrastructure was adequate to support additional housing and people in the area, whether all environmental tests have been conducted to ascertain the suitability of the site, which sits on a slope, and whether the site can withstand future flooding with the units not ending up collapsing onto other homes situated below.
The DA in KZN has long called for an open, transparent housing list so that every applicant can see where they are on the list at any given time. They should also be able to see who the first beneficiaries are in the event of any new housing developments in their communities.
She said they also needed an answer on whether or not Msunduzi has developed and implemented its housing allocation policy and procedure as indicated in their Housing sector plan of 2019.
Msunduzi could not comment by the time of going to print on whether they’ve conducted all the environmental surveys. In a recently published story by The Witness, Msunduzi spokesperson Ntobeko Mkhize said that the project had not started on site and the community living in the area would be consulted before the development began.
Mkhize said the municipality and the Department of Human Settlements were currently looking at the project’s feasibility at Bakerville Heights.
Mkhize said that the project was at the inception and feasibility stage and they were waiting for the finalisation of the general plan for the Bakerville Heights area.
She said the municipality was also assessing the condition of the area’s infrastructure services, cleaning and unblocking manholes and stormwater channels.
