Johannesburg - Hundreds of residents who were temporarily relocated to make way for a mall as part of the government’s R3.5billion township renewal projects say they are still crammed in a compound with limited basic services while the project continues to founder almost a decade later.
They say their lives have been turned upside down, with relatives unable to visit them due to limited space as authorities ignore their requests for reasons for the delays.
A Sunday Independent team this week visited the intended beneficiaries of the government’s multibillion-rand township renewal project in Gauteng after it emerged at Human Rights Commission (HRC) hearings into the projects that there was very little to show, despite the billions of rands spent on four townships since 2001.
Instead, residents of Alexandra, Evaton, Bekkersdal and Winterveldt have yet to see the promised facelift of their townships. Documents have gone missing and there are no signs of accountability.
The Mokoenas in Evaton are one of the families whose homes were demolished in 2010 and were moved to a temporary village to make way for a shopping mall. They were told they would live there for six months only while plans were being made by the Department of Human Settlements to allocate them an RDP house and title deeds.
“We are still waiting to be relocated to our homes. These are one-room houses and we can’t be free. No one answers us when we ask when we are going to be moved to our homes,” said the family.
Despite the many challenges faced by the projects, the government wants to resuscitate them. During his State of the Province Address earlier in the month, Premier David Makhura said he wanted to see “significant progress concerning all these hot spots and incomplete projects”.
He promised to visit each of the townships to give feedback to the communities within two months.
The HRC hearings on the Alexandra Renewal Project (ARP) heard about a lack of accountability and almost non-existent project management records that came out in an auditor-general’s report tabled earlier in the week during the inquiry.
The auditor-general bemoaned the lack of documents provided by various stakeholders, including the Gauteng Department of Human Settlements and City of Johannesburg. Over R1bn had allegedly been used for the project but there is no record of it.
Kevish Lachman from the auditor-general’s office said the lack of documents for auditing provided by the the City and Gauteng Department of Human Settlements had made it impossible to conclude whether the whole amount allocated to the ARP had been used for the project.
“Our audit procedures were limited to electrification and some building projects. We did not have sufficient information to audit water and sanitation, roads and stormwater projects and the Gauteng Department of Human Settlements’ procurement processes,” he said.
“Due to the lack of documentation, we could not confirm that the R1.3bn (nor the R2.2bn expenditure) was exclusively used for this project. We were unable to assess many of the projects,” said Lachman.
The commission is also looking into allegations of corruption in the ARP, which was estimated to cost R1.3bn over six years from 2001 to 2007. The timeline was extended to 2010, and later extended indefinitely.
According to the report made to the City mayoral committee, the total for the Alexandra project at 2012-13 was R2.2bn.
The problems appear to exist in all the projects.
Bekkersdal
At least R1.2bn was budgeted from 2003-04 to 2007-08. However, only 36% of the amount, or R432million, was provided to implement projects and there is no paper trail to ascertain if the money was used as intended.
Winterveldt
The initial budget for the project was R4.4bn, but only R278m was made available, or 6.32%. The funds were meant for 34 307 serviced stands and the construction of 32 107 subsidised housing units and 2 200 finance-linked housing units. Only one phase of eight has been built.
Evaton
At least R3.6bn should have been made available from 2004-05 to 2014-15, but only R708m was released. The auditor-general found that the project had only been able to accomplish small and less impactful projects.
When the commission asked about the unavailability of documents, Lachman said staff at the departments had no explaination. The expenditure of the various projects seems to elude those in the offices where they are run from.
Gauteng MEC for Human Settlements and Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs Lebogang Maile says he had no clue how much has been used on the Evaton Renewal Project (ERP).
This was after the DA accused him of failing to account for the money that had been spent since the project’s launch in 2005.
“I don’t know how much has been spent and I am sure the figures are there. Like with all renewal projects, there’s been challenges that we are attending to. That is why we want to caution, especially the DA, to stop talking about corruption. If they say there’s corruption they must tell us who stole money and how much, so we can deal with that.”
However, Maile admitted there were some project failures.
“We know there have been challenges in different renewal projects, and that is why during the State of the Province Address we said we are going to revive those projects. Those who want to work with us in solving the problem are welcome to do so,” said Maile.
The DA’s Kingsol Chabalala questioned the inaccuracies on the Evaton projects. He said Maile revealed that R332m had been spent, but that did not match the figure given in the auditor-general’s 2016 report.
“Former human settlements MEC Paul Mashatile stated that the cost of the ERP was R470m. His successor, before the appointment of Maile, Uhuru Moiloa, revealed that R206m had been spent on the project. It is clear the department has no idea how much has been spent on the project and has failed to account for the missing money and we asked the MEC to institute a forensic investigation to determine the exact amount of money spent to date,” said Chabalala.
The ERP was part of the presidential lead projects of former president Thabo Mbeki and was launched in 2004 to improve the living conditions of the people of Evaton as well those in Alexandra, Winterveldt and Bekkersdal.