Court rejects urgent bid to stop Eskom evictions

Residents of Kosmos in Standerton, Mpumalanga, face a bleak future after the Mpumalanga High Court dismissed their urgent court application to stop Eskom from evicting them from houses that they reportedly occupied without permission.

The matter was struck off the roll yesterday at the Mpumalanga High Court in Middelburg.

This was after the affected 16 families instructed their legal representatives to apply for an urgent application to convince the court to hear their matter urgently.

Eskom owner of properties

When deciding on the urgency of the matter, Acting Judge Kganki Phahlamohlaka said it was clear that Eskom was the owner of the properties occupied by the families.

Phahlamohlaka stood by the two eviction orders issued in October last year and this year in March, when the occupiers were given 90 days to vacate the houses.

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“By waiting in anticipation, the applicants created their urgency. Consequently, I cannot find any urgency in this application. The founding affidavit does not explicitly explain the circumstances that make this application urgent,” Phahlamohlaka said.

“The applicants have not shown that they would not be afforded substantial redress at a hearing in due course. Accordingly, the application stands to be struck off the roll for lack of urgency. It is therefore my considered view that if there is urgency in this matter, it is self-created.”

The Saturday Citizen saw a video clip and pictures showing that on Wednesday, the sheriff of the court, heavily armed private security officers and police stormed the Kosmos Park settlement and started moving the furniture and other related items out of the houses.

Residents confronted agencies

Residents alerted local community forum members who came out in numbers and confronted the agencies, who decided to leave.

The fight between Eskom and the occupiers started in 2021 when the residents saw “abandoned houses” which they said were housing criminals and drug users, so they refurbished the structures and moved in.

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One of the residents who asked not to be named said the power utility had promised to sell the houses to them, but later the offer was withdrawn.

“Yes we are indeed being evicted, the law enforcement agencies came in numbers and started removing our things and we were rescued by the local structure of the community forum. We alerted our lawyers to continue to oppose the eviction.

“We are not refusing to leave the houses, what we say is that Eskom must tell us how much they want, then we are ready to pay,” said a resident who asked to be anonymous.

Lawyers representing the families refused to comment on the grounds the matter was still in court. Eskom had not responded to questions at the time of going to press.