Glenhill residents’ desperate protest to save their homes

The acrid odour of burning rubber and plumes of black smoke fill the air at Glenhills in Stanger, an indication of a major protest there this morning.

An expression of residents’ fear and rage that their homes are about to be demolished.

More than a 1000 Glenhills’ residents are protesting to stop the bulldozers from demolishing over 500 homes.

KwaDukuza municipality obtained a high court order on August 8 allowing it to demolish illegal unfinished houses along Murugan Road to make way for about 1500 two-bedroom, low cost houses for ‘legitimate residents’ of ward 13.

The North Coast Courier journalist Erica Abrahams reports from Glenhills that people have broken tree branches and are burning tyres to block the roads.

“The people are stopping anyone from leaving and entering,” she said.

“There was a violent altercation with police earlier when protesters chased them out of the suburb.

“Police outside are trying to contact the protest committee but they are not interested in talking.

“They are demanding that mayor Ricardo Mthembu comes to speak to them.”

The land in Glenhills was bought by the KwaDukuza municipality for the purpose of building houses, but people had long before been living there, some in substantial and expensive brick houses and some in tin shacks.

Many claim that they had been sold their plots by the previous owners.

Although people who had started building on the property were given four months warning to complete the building of their houses, many apparently could not afford to do so.

On Monday morning one house was bulldozed before residents took to the streets, surrounding the bulldozer to stop other houses from being demolished.

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