Former occupants vow to fight eviction

The former occupants of house number five on Medusa Street in Kensington are seeking legal advice after they were evicted from the property.

The house occupants believe the eviction was illegal.

The group of eight people were evicted from the property on Thursday last week by officials from the Johannesburg Property Company (JPC) and the Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department (JMPD).

Speaking on behalf of the occupants, Mr Ruben Lubisi said they had stayed in the house for more than six years.

“Since the death of the previous owner, my friend, a former employee of the old woman and myself, have stayed at the property. We have an agreement with the municipality that we would pay for the services. The property has five outside rooms. Those rooms had one person staying in each on them. Inside the house, four people were staying in different rooms,” he said.

He said they were served with a notice that they had to vacate the property in 14 days because it had been sold to a new owner.

“We went to the municipality offices to try verify if this was true and to find out if we had any options, but nobody was willing to talk to us there. We went to different municipal offices without luck. That is why we resorted to the legal route. We will fight this in court now,” he said.

This is contradictory to what the JPC stakeholder manager for Region F, Mr Sam Rekgotso, said.

Mr Rekgotso said the eviction was part of the municipality’s drive to fight the hijacking of buildings in the city.

“This house belongs to the municipality. There was someone who had leased it before. After she died, it was never leased to anyone. Someone came and made arrangement that he would pay for the services while staying in the house. That was agreed. But now there have been more than eight families staying at the property,” he said.

Mr Rekgotso said the occupants were told three months ago that they would be evicted and they made no arrangements.

“We stated by verbally notifying them but last month we served them with a notice. They did not show any intention to get to any arrangement with the city.What is happening here is just bylaw enforcement. We cannot have so many families occupying houses illegally,” he said.

According to Mr Rekgotso, the house will be guarded until a new person who wants to lease it comes forward.

“Even these people will have the right to negotiate to lease it. If they raised a point of leasing when they were served with notice, it would have been addressed then. Now they will have to negotiate like any other person,” he said

Mr Rekgotso said the city is running a pilot project to normalise its properties.

“If we as the city allow this type of thing to happen under our nose, I don’t know what we will be doing. How can so many families stay in one property and use one bathroom?” asked Mr Rekgotso.

The ward 66 councillor, Clr Carlos da Rocha, said everyone is to blame for what was happening.

“When the JPC left the property unoccupied and unsecured, it left the door open for illegal occupation. But the residents were not allowed to occupy the property which does not belong to them. The documents I saw state that they asked for permission to occupying the property but were told their request was not approved,” he said.