Cape Town - A Gugulethu community farmer has accused the Gugulethu Development Forum (GDF) of harassing and victimising her, disrupting her food distribution efforts.
Nomonde Kweza said the forum had colluded with the Ikhaya Loxolo Old Age Home board to evict her from the food garden she started in 2007, currently in the old age home, over differences in decisions taken by the forum.
She said three other farmers had stopped farming out of frustration, and the GDF was directly targeting her.
Kweza said this started last year during the handing over of the home from a previous service provider where the GDF saw an opportunity to position itself as board members.
“I’m the community developer and award winner in the agriculture sector and later became a caretaker at the old age home. I am now victimised by self-appointed, self-positioned individuals from GDF and the board chairperson of the old age home. This started when I questioned the legitimacy of the board.
“I was told not to continue with the garden project which I started, 2007 and now they stopped all stakeholders and service delivery to my garden and even the people working with me. They later introduced a silly system, that people and truck deliveries must go inside the old age home offices to sign.
“Shortly after that I challenged them again, because they were contradicting themselves as far as Covid-19 regulations, preventing people coming straight to my garden,” she said.
As a result, she claims, her business was negatively affected.
Gugulethu Development Forum chairperson Vincent Domingo said he was “not sure” about Kweza’s allegations. Domingo referred questions to the Ikhaya Loxolo Old Age Home board which said there was a sub judice case against Kweza.
Ikhaya Luxolo Old Age Home board chairperson Frank Fredericks said Kweza had violated conditions of her running of the garden project on the premises.
“The condition was that she had to donate 50% of the produce to the home, but since inception she has never handed anything to the home. She is running the business for her own account on our premises while not paying for water or electricity. She is persona non grata on the premises and was notified through the lawyers that the garden arrangement was cancelled. The board reviewed the garden project and she knew that this was coming,” Fredericks said.
Cape Argus