Note to Editors: Please find the attached soundbite in English and Setswana by Cllr Kagiso Mangwejane.
The Democratic Alliance (DA) will engage with Tswaing Local Municipality Mayor Dimakatso Lydia Malwane and Municipal Manager Isaac Moruti to urgently provide emergency relief to residents whose houses were destroyed during storms on Wednesday. See photos here, here, here and here.
Residents in Ottosdal, Letsopa, Gannalaagte and Mandela Park are still left destitute after losing their houses. A family in Ottosdal Letsopa lost an RDP house after it was destroyed while the roofs of other houses were completely blown away.
The municipality’s Disaster Management Department has provided little to no assistance to the families affected. Residents are relying on the generous assistance from the community.
This is the second time that the people of Mandela Park have lost their houses without any intervention from the municipality or the Department of Human Settlements.
There is a housing project in Tswaing launched 8-months ago, but not a single house has been built.
The Department of Human Settlements is too lenient with contractors and is failing to effectively monitor projects to ensure that houses are built for the people of Tswaing.
Some RDP houses were constructed so poorly that every time it rains they collapse. The DA will ask its spokesperson on Human Settlements, Freddy Sonakile MPL, to write a letter to the MEC for Human Settlements requesting an investigation to assess the quality of these houses and hold the contractors accountable for the shoddy structures they have constructed.
Destitute and poor families are now left without proper housing, living in dangerous conditions and they have to rebuild every time there are storms.
The municipality and Department of Human Settlements must ensure that people receive proper houses and do away with ghost projects.