STATEMENT BY BRETT HERRON, GOOD MEMBER OF THE WESTERN CAPE PROVINCIAL PARLIAMENT AND SECRETARY-GENERAL

4 February 2021

DA Western Cape provincial leader Bonginkosi Madikizela’s promise on the eve of the 2019 general election about plans to develop 10 000 affordable homes in inner-city Cape Town has been exposed as a lie.

Last October I submitted a written question to Madikizela requesting a progress report on the project.

He responded that he had been speaking in his then-capacity as MEC for Human Settlements, and any update would have to be provided by his successor, Tertuis Simmers. Madikizela (now MEC for Transport and Public Works) added a list of 11 inner city properties that had been released by the Department of Transport and Public Works for human settlements purposes.

In December I submitted written questions to Simmers; I have just received his replies (attached). “My department has not received transfer of land in Bo-Kaap, Oranjezicht, Tamboerskloof nor in the CBD from any state Department. There have not been any properties transferred to my department,” he said.

Simmers’ response confirmed the suspicions I expressed at the time of Madikizela false promise, when I said: “This sudden promise of 10,000 new housing opportunities in the city centre and surrounds was just an eve-of-elections promise. Madikizela said this for electioneering purposes without any real commitment to implementing this. There are no real plans or projects to build these social housing units.”

The GOOD Party believes the development of affordable inner-city housing is of fundamental importance to the creation of integrated and sustainable post-apartheid cities – and achieving spatial justice – and that it is disgraceful that no such developments have taken place in Cape Town since democracy dawned.

After former mayor Patricia de Lille and I resigned from the DA and our positions in the city to establish GOOD, late in 2018, the city collapsed all inner-city affordable housing projects we had instituted.

Madikizela was therefore under some pressure a few months later, with an election around the corner, to respond to charges that his party was anti- integration. So he lied to the House.

It is cruel for the DA to give false hope to families desperate for a solution to their housing needs. And it is a violation of the rules of the legislature for members to lie.

Madikizela should be sanctioned by Premier Allan Winde, who claims to lead a government of integrity, for misleading parliament and the people of the Western Cape. Should the Premier condone his MEC’s lies the case should be placed before the Public Protector, who has the experience of dealing with similar matters in the past.

* The Western Cape Provincial Government is the custodian of several underutilised public properties which should be made available for affordable housing purposes.  They include the “City Bowl Block” running between Loop, Dorp and Bree streets, the Government Garage Precinct, which is a cluster of properties along Roeland and Buitenkant streets – and, of course, the Tafelberg School site in Sea Point.

Ends…