Family fights eviction from brother’s house
ALEXANDRA - A family has been evicted from from a rental house which was allocated to their relative.
A family has been evicted from a room which was legally allocated to their relative.
Grace Molaudi, her partner and child were left out in the cold after they were evicted a month ago.
Molaudi, who had the letter of allocation, said they had occupied the room in a block of semi-detached double-storey houses in Extension 9 for four years for safe-keeping for her brother, Joseph Majola. He works elsewhere and only stays there on weekends and holidays. She claimed a neighbour in the attached house – who is also alleged to have links with officials of the Johannesburg Development Agency [then Alexandra Renewal Project], which had allocated the room to her brother – was the one who evicted them.
Molaudi claimed the eviction happened at night, had disrupted their lives, was illegal, and done for ‘selfish’ reasons.
“My partner was called to the development agency offices by an official [name withheld] where a senior official [name known to this paper] told us to vacate the room.” According to Molaudi, the development agency officials ignored the documentation allocating the room to her brother, Majola.
She said while in the room, they only paid monthly levies, rates and services, which was affordable as she survives on piece jobs. Her brother took care of other costs, she said.
“Because of our desperation, a good Samaritan offered us temporary shelter in a wooden cabin which couldn’t contain all our belongings. [We had] to distribute other items to friends for safe-keeping,” she said.
While grateful for the temporary accommodation, she said the rent for the cabin was unaffordable with her meagre and irregular income, and also was cold and not good for her child’s health. She was contemplating returning to her home in Kimberly if the eviction was not reversed.
Meanwhile, Molaudi claimed the person who evicted them had joined their room to his house, and she claimed he had harassed her in an attempt to dissuade her from laying charges for the illegal eviction.
Molaudi also claimed that on one occasion, the development agency official had suggested moving them to another place, but that had not materialised.
Officials from the renewal project refused to comment and urged the Majolas to seek redress at their offices.
