GOOD Statement by Brett Herron,
GOOD Secretary-General & City of Cape Town Mayoral Candidate
08 October 2026
In the fine print of its report on affordable housing ordered by the Constitutional Court in its Tafelberg School judgement the City of Cape Town reveals that it has negotiated with the developers the cancellation of the sale agreements for the proposed affordable housing sites in Pine Road and Dillon Lane, Woodstock, with the cancellations “nearing finalisation”.
Despite cancelling the projects, the sites were somehow included among the 2 500 social homes that Mayor of Cape Town Geordin Hill-Lewis now promises to build. Most sites on the list have been announced multiple times over the past 10 and more years as earmarked for affordable housing, with no housing yet having been built.
The Mayor’s explanation for cancelling the Pine Road and Dillon Lane sites, in his sworn affidavit to the court, was that the City plans to “re-package” the sites for “an alternative affordable housing model” and “re-take the property to market”. No timelines stipulated. Another re-announcement loading…
The Pine Road site was first offered to a social housing partner in 2012. In 2019, 19 families agreed to temporarily move from their homes to clear the way for the project. In March 2021 the City announced that Pine Road was “due to break ground”, and in June 2021 it was announced among other projects as “nearing construction phase”.
I can find no public report to Council about cancelling the project, no record of discussions with the families who have been languishing in “temporary” dormitory-style accommodation for seven years, and no statement that the project had failed. Just the City’s report to the court last week saying that grant approval for Pine Road was cancelled in early 2023 because the 240-unit scheme was “no longer implementable”.
This kind of political chicanery without real commitment or progress is the very failure to “implement and complete” social housing in the CBD that the Constitutional Court reported in its 2 July judgement.
I take the City’s contempt for the former residents of Pine Road very personally. It was I who announced the development of the Pickwick Transitional Housing facility in July 2017 so that they could be accommodated temporarily, near their homes, during the construction phase, instead of being sent to Wolwerivier. And it was I who in good faith negotiated the temporary relocation of the 19 families in 2019.
These families have now lived in shared-amenity, hostel-style accommodation for more than seven years. The City’s report to the Constitutional Court doesn’t say ill the families were consulted about the project cancellation, whether they will retain their priority right to return to Pine Road, or whether they will have to be temporarily relocated for a second time. The report just refers to a “relocation strategy” for Pickwick because that site is itself to be redeveloped.
The Mayor must stop playing Monopoly with people’s housing rights. Forcing people to move and then making them wait for seven years, only to cancel the plan, is not a nice game.
The people of Cape Town, not least the Pine Rd/Pickwick families, are entitled to know:
- Who negotiated the cancellation, when did negotiations begin, and who approved the new deal?
- What are the terms? Is any money payable either way, who bears the costs, and what became of the R9 million in top-up subsidies the City says it approved for Pine Road?
- What happens to the development rights secured in 2021, and will the land go back to market with full public participation?
- Why has the public heard nothing since the grant approval was cancelled in early 2023?
- Whether the City has had the decency to sit down with the 19 families to inter alia put its decisions to them in writing, guarantee their right to return, and commit they won’t be forcibly removed from the Pickwick?
Media Enquiries: media@forgood.org.za