Tempers flare over ‘holy site’ clearing as municipality marches on with RDP housing plans
"I pulled out my firearm because I felt I was in danger. The man was driving towards me and I had to defend myself. I felt that if I did not protect myself, he was going to drive over me."
KwaDukuza municipality has opened a case against an Umhlali police captain for allegedly pointing a gun at a TLB operator and assaulting a security officer during a land dispute in Etete on Monday morning.
Things became heated between Captain Yogendranath Maharaj and his family while they were allegedly trying to stop construction workers from clearing a site earmarked for 14 RDP houses.
KwaDukuza municipality spokesperson, Sipho Mkhize said another case had been opened against Capt Maharaj for allegedly assaulting a KDM security guard.
A third case was opened against another unidentified man for allegedly threatening a KDM female employee.
“The project will continue as planned. The site will accommodate 14 houses which means 14 families are waiting for their houses to be built so nothing will stop us from delivering that right to housing to the 14 families as enshrined in the Constitution.”
The Maharaj family live next to a 10 hectare site which they claim was unfairly expropriated by the municipality in 2015 without their knowledge.
On this piece of land lies a puthu (an anthill some Hindus believe is sacred) as well as a prayer place where the family erected a jhanda (a flag pole dedicated to the Hindu deity Hanuman) where they claim to pray every morning.
Yogendranath said his grandmother’s ashes were also scattered there.
“I pulled out my firearm because I felt I was in danger. The man was driving towards me and I had to defend myself. I felt that if I did not protect myself, he was going to drive over me,” said Maharaj.
He said he had lived on the land all his life and the property had belonged to his family since the 1950s.
Mkhize refuted this claim and said when the town planning was done in 2011, there was no graveyard or religious site on the land.
“When the family realised that KDM was sensitive and understood that a religious site was not supposed to be destroyed during construction, they decided to use this to stop the project by erecting these prayer places all around the property,” said Mkhize.
Mkhize rubbished claims the land had been expropriated without following proper due process.
“The process of expropriation was that of a “friendly expropriation” as per the Expropriation Act. The land was part of a deceased estate at the time of the expropriation so none of the people who were stopping the contractor have locus standi to do that, because the executor of the deceased estate had also passed away.
“The municipality has been continuously informing the family to appoint another executor so that they can claim their share of the compensation. The land was previously owned or registered under the names of more than 15 people who are all deceased, but the other families have reported their estates and have collected the compensation. Again we wish to stress that Mr Maharaj was never the owner nor a beneficiary to this land and to the deceased estate,” he said.
On completion the Etete housing project will consist of 1 450 units, costing about R100 million. KDM is currently building a 2.7km blacktop road in Etete at a cost of R5.6 million.
