eTHEKWINI Council’s 2012 unanimous vote in passing a new derelict buildings policy has made little progress thus far, with more and more abandoned and decaying properties popping up across suburbs.
According to ward 31 councillor, Jethro Lefevre, the current derelict buildings policy doesn’t allow for the expropriation and demolition of abandoned buildings.
“In October 2012, the DA’s Dean Macpherson tabled a policy where owners of these buildings would be served with a 60 day notice to comply, then a second notice with a 90 day waiting period. Thereafter the buildings would be expropriated and auctioned off. Council voted in favour of this and it was passed, but nothing has happened since. Recently, councillors Duncan Du Bois and Nicole Graham also tabled a motion to take care of derelict buildings in their wards, but nothing has come of it,” he said.
Councillor Lefevre said he was currently dealing with complaints from residents regarding a abandoned building in East Street, Overport.
According to Lefevre, the building was burnt a few months ago and the owner has done nothing to fix it up.
“There was a small cafe at the front, along with flats. The building has been left to decay. People have moved in and it is now a drug den. Residents have to put up with constant noise and crime. The owner has been served with a notice, but in the meantime this is an unsafe and unhygenic place for these people to live in. There is no sanitation. These people need to be relocated to transit camps in the area,” he said.
Berea Mail visited the derelict property with councillor Lefevre, Some of the men who have moved into the building approached the councillor and said they were forced to live there as they had nowhere else to go. They said if the municipality was going to force them to move they would have to be accommodated somewhere in the area as many worked nearby.
A resident living in East Street, Trudi-Lee Low-Shang, said the place was disgusting. She said the building had been vacant for eight years and had slowly deteriorated and four years ago vagrants had moved in and were living in the shell of the building.
“According to the health department, the owner was summonsed in January. Apparently the property involves a deceased estate. We can’t carry on living like this, we don’t sleep. On a Friday night you can hear women screaming from inside the building. It is a den of iniquity! There’s drugs and booze, you name it. A shop operates outside the building from the morning and the party carries on every night from 5pm to 6am, as the vagrants sleep during the day. The police do nothing, they are so over it,” she said.
Low-Shang said rats were also teeming all over the property, and said she had to call Rentokil to her building as a result.
“There are no ablutions on the property and they go to the nearby shopping centre to bath. It is a vicious circle. I can’t understand why these men can’t be relocated. This building needs to be brought down. It is scary,” she said.
The eThekwini municipality had not responded to questions by the time of going to press.
