City closes Mshenguville chapter at last
19-01-2015
After 25 years, the City of Johannesburg has finally relocated the last resident of Mshenguville in Soweto ahead of a move to rehabilitate the former park-turned-makeshift golf course-turned informal settlement.
Johannesburg City Parks & Zoo is planning to turn the area into a green lung, a move likely to see a marked increase in property prices around the neighbourhood.
Mshenguville in Mofolo was named after the late former Soweto mayor and leading businessman, Ephraim “Mshengu” Tshabalala, who was behind the move to allow homeless residents to erect shacks on the piece of land.
But the area - which is unsuitable for housing development - soon became overcrowded and a health hazard, with raw sewage overflowing all over its narrow alleyways and litter piling up in almost every corner.
The first relocations took place in 1989, when hundreds of families were moved to Orange Farm in the south. The relocations were always fraught with tensions as the area had become a hotbed of protests and resistance.
Last year there were 10 families still living in Mshenguville. They have all since been relocated to new areas such as Lehae, south of the city.
Johannesburg City Parks & Zoo has now taken ownership of the area.
“The biggest challenge for the council has always been reinvasion. Whenever people were relocated, a new group would move in and put up their shacks. City officials would then start from scratch and open negotiations with the new group.
“But no one will ever put a shack in Mshenguville again. Residents in the streets overlooking the park are guarding it like hawks. If anyone tries to put up shack, residents normally call the council and threaten to tear down the structure themselves.
“I think the residents have had enough and have taken ownership of the surroundings. Residents in other parts of the city should take a leaf from them,” says Region D Housing Director Thulani Nkosi.
The main reason the relocation took a quarter of a century was primarily because of the lengthy vetting process, the pre-approving of residents for RDP housing, identifying appropriate land and building houses to accommodate the families.
“The city has a challenge of land. Sometimes land is identified and after tests are conducted, it is found that it is on a dolomite mine, as was the case with parts of Protea South. Then the process of identifying alternative land starts again.
“Also, during the pre-qualifying stage, you find people are no longer in the R3 500 salary bracket to qualify for subsidised housing and are now earning higher salaries. What often happens is that the people are then referred to the rental section as they can’t afford bonded houses either. The city has finally closed a chapter on Mshenguville process,” says Nkosi.