N2 homes get key inserts after safety blunder

Housing authorities on Sunday began distributing 1 000 key inserts that cannot be duplicated to residents of the N2 Gateway complex, after at least three tenants were robbed in recent weeks.

And 10 security guards have been placed on day and night shifts to strengthen security, said the housing ministry spokesperson, Monwabisi Maclean.

Residents complained earlier that the keys to their newly completed units could be used to open any of the 705 units in the complex.

A spate of break-ins had sparked fears that criminals could be using the standard keys to gain access to units.

Maclean confirmed that originally "standard" keys that opened the doors to all 705 apartments had been issued.

"The problem of the duplicate keys was brought to (housing company) Thubelisha's attention on November 13. Thubelisha chose to purchase key inserts that should solve the problem as they cannot be duplicated."

Thubelisha Homes was appointed by the national housing department to manage the multi-billion N2 Gateway housing development.

Last week residents threatened to withhold their rent if the duplication of the keys was not sorted out and asked the Local Government and Housing MEC, Richard Dyantyi, to intervene.

Maclean said it had not been known that the locks could be opened by standard keys. He was also not aware of any break-ins at the complex.

Thubelisha Homes could not be reached for comment.

This key-duplication debacle is the latest controversy to cloud the government's flagship housing project since it was launched in 2005.

The first 705 units of phase one were completed in April this year, behind schedule.

Housing Minister Lindiwe Sisulu said then that delays were due to "challenges in construction complexities of building such a huge project".

Initially an intergovernmental project shared by the three tiers of government, the N2 Gateway was taken away from the City of Cape Town in July.

There have also been delays in the allocation of units to the more than 7 000 hopeful applicants, which housing authorities attributed to housing list confusion. The project has been dogged by financial difficulties including allegations that contractors were not paid for work done.

More recently, there have been complaints from residents about building defects which included peeling paint and leaking pipes.

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Soweto wants to lure the white rand

Developers involved in Orlando Ekhaya, a massive multi-use development in Soweto, want to draw the "white rand" to South Africa's most famous township.

Elangeni Property Development, a consortium of Soweto business people involved in part of Orlando Ekhaya, and Minanawe Marketing are looking to attract black and white non-Soweto residents to the development, which centres on the old Orlando power station and will boast restaurants, a hotel, a gym, offices, loft apartments and a shopping centre, with retailers as diverse as Pick 'n Pay and Stoned Cherrie.

To this end, Minanawe is co-ordinating negotiations between Elangeni and local taxi associations to provide park-and-ride transport to outsiders.

The idea is that visitors to Orlando Ekhaya would park at the Nasrec showgrounds, south of the Johannesburg CBD, and be transported from there to the development.

Orlando Ekhaya will also have an entertainment centre resembling a beachfront, being developed by Elangeni, which will be used to host the Captain Morgan Spiced Gold Beach Party.

About R800 000 has been spent since 2003 on shipping beach sand to Orlando for the annual party, but Minanawe managing director G G Alcock won't say where the sand comes from.

Billy Chaka, the activation director of Minanawe Marketing, says: "We are halfway through completing our first phase development, which is going to cost us roughly R2-million. The project costs about R30-million to R40- million.

"We cannot continue with phase one because the environmental report from the City of Johannesburg (CoJ) has not been finalised. We need to comply with it first," Chaka adds.

Similarly, Elangeni is still awaiting clarity from the CoJ for phase two, comprising the environment and electricity site, which is due for development late next year.

Alan Dinnie, the project manager for Soweto development projects of the Johannesburg Property Company, says the department of agriculture has completed all the necessary reports.

"At the moment we are only waiting for the authorisation of phase two."

This authorisation, a process which he points out could take years, is expected by the end of March next year.

For this year's beach party, which took place recently, 200 local residents were employed for six weeks. Of the 200, 20 were employed on a permanent basis in security, maintenance and site management positions.

"We plan to employ 30 more permanent workers and 150 or more on a temporary basis once the [entertainment development] project is complete," Alcock says.

Already, Elangeni hosts between 10 and 20 events every year, with about 10 000 to 20 000 people attending each event.

Alcock is confident that Elangeni's market will continue to increase, as there is no competition for them yet.

"We are a lifestyle operation, with aspirational audience members," he explains. When asked about the risks associated with the project, Alcock is confident that the risks are very low.

"We have been running this event successfully for four years," he points out.

A worry was getting "traditional" white people to get over their fear of Soweto and visit Orlando Ekhaya - hence the park-and-ride scheme under negotiation.

"Once they get used to coming to the place, then they will drive in themselves," says Alcock. For similar future projects, Elangeni is thinking of going east to Umlazi, the second-biggest township after Soweto.

However, no definite investigations have been finalised in this regard.

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Missing millions furore

The Gauteng Department of Housing has to explain why supporting documents for about R152,6 million in expenditure were not included in its annual financial statements for 2005-2006.

The department’s hearing in front of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa) had to be cancelled due to administrative troubles at the legislature.

In its preliminary answers to Scopa, the department submitted that the documents relating to the expenditure had to be obtained from the Gauteng Shared Services Centre (GSSC).

The documents, according to them, were available but only after the cut-off date for audit submissions. Other documents had been misfiled by GSSC and also submitted late.

The department faces tough questions relating to recurring shortcomings in its financial reporting processes, such as the provision for bad debts not being accounted for.

A previous Scopa recommendation relating to the department’s understatement of property had also not been addressed.

The department will have to tell Scopa why it could not quantify the money it lost in the past financial year due to “irregular, unauthorised, fruitless and wasteful expenditure” by officials.

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The dog ate my rent

Nobody knows the trouble landlords have seen, nobody but Hollard Insurance, this is. And in its wisdom, Hollard is lightening the landlords’ burden with a new policy to protect them against defaulting tenants.

An estimated 1,2-million landlords in South Africa will be cheered to know that R35 a month plus 1% of the rent can now buy them peace of mind.

It’s been a downward slide for landlords ever since the Russians abolished serfdom in 1891. Back then, they could simply chop off the heads of uncooperative tenants and the offender would never default again.

But the tenant lobby put an end to landlord power in the 19th century, destroying the image of this noble class. “Property is theft” was but one of the hateful cries designed to undermine landlords in the public eye.

Cruel words dashed off in the depths of the British library further eroded their position. “The landlords, like all other men, love to reap where they never sowed,” Marx famously wrote. Easy enough to say when you’ve never tried to extract your livelihood from an unwilling tenant.

In theory, owning property is supposed to be a surefire get-rich-eventually scheme. In practice, tenants don’t always cough up the cash at the end of the month. So, what do you do when you’re too squeamish to break kneecaps and your tenants shower in the neighbour’s sprinklers when you turn off the water?

Many landlords use the funds they earn from renting property to cover bonds and provide pensions. If the tenant quits paying, they risk losing their house or monthly income.

The boys in the backroom at Hollard worked out that property owners themselves manage 50% to 75% of leased properties and that a significant number of properties have been bought to let.

Before 2002, landlords could sleep secure in the knowledge that the contract signed between them and the potential transgressor was law. If rents were not paid, the penalties they agreed to would come into play and, after a certain date, former lessees could sleep under a blanket of stars for all the landlords cared.

In 2002, a groundbreaking ruling by the Supreme Court of Appeal complicated the eviction process to protect the homeless.

This well-intentioned judgement made the bureaucracy of eviction the bane of every wronged landlord. To remove the now parasitic person from his or her property, a landlord has to get an eviction order and hire a lawyer. After the eviction, a separate civil recovery process is necessary to recover the defaulted rent.

But that was then and this is now. What was money to the lawyers is now money to the insurers, thanks to the new Landlord Protection Policy, which Hollard is introducing in partnership with Tenrisk Underwriting Managers.

When the golden goose tenant refuses to lay, Hollard and Tenrisk step in. The policy commits the insurers to forking out up to R40 000 in legal costs, taking care of the legal transactions and paying up to three months’ rent during an eviction and one month’s rent if the tenant does a runner.

With the Landlord Protection Policy in place, your tenant had better retrieve their cheque from the post office, take the dog to the vet or wait for the call from your insurers, because their problem is no longer yours.

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Government takes over

In a shock announcement, the District Six Beneficiary Trust announced that the redevelopment of the area would be taken over by national government from the Cape Town city council with "immediate effect".

But executive mayor Helen Zille, who was informed by the media of the national intervention, decried the takeover and warned it could result in "another N2 Gateway fiasco". A group of beneficiaries threatened legal action to stop it.

The trust's Nadeem Hendricks "welcomed the direct intervention by national government" and said: "Petty politics of Cape Town has held up the project for a long time.

"I am hoping that with national government driving the project as part of the N2 Gateway, we will see substantial progress with immediate effect."

He said Housing Minister Lindiwe Sisulu and Deputy Agriculture and Land Affairs Minister Dirk du Toit would take over leadership of the project from executive mayor Helen Zille.

Zille said there had been no consultation with the city before the announcement was made.

"It is clear that the National Department is repeating the N2 Gateway scenario.

"They want to prevent the city's involvement in delivery and they want to stop us asking penetrating questions," she said.

Sisulu had earlier stated that part of the housing backlog would be accommodated in District Six, as part of the N2 Gateway project.

Hendricks blamed the repeated changes in the city's political administrations for delays in the redevelopment of District Six.

"I got so fed up that I took the initiative on behalf of the trust to call on (Housing Minister Lindiwe) Sisulu to intervene."

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N2 Gateway tainted with graft

Crossroads residents have appealed to Housing Minister Lindiwe Sisulu to use Red Ants, security guards from Gauteng reputed to be fearless, to evict beneficiaries of the N2 Gateway housing development who make extra money by renting their shacks in Boys Town.

Lusaka informal settlement resident Sindiswa Godongwana asked the minister to obtain court interdicts against these beneficiaries.

Sisulu was at an imbizo at the Crossroads sports complex on Sunday to hear details of the plight of Cape Flats people who are using the bucket system and waiting for formal homes.

Godongwana was cheered when she claimed officials responsible for N2 Gateway brought relatives from the Eastern Cape to occupy the flats at the expense of people who had been waiting for years.

She said spaces in Lusaka were being sold for R130 and R570. "There is so much corruption in the way people are allocated houses and space, we no longer trust our leaders."

Thubelisha, appointed by the department of housing to be the project manager for N2 Gateway, was criticised for not addressing people's needs.

The development entails the building of 25 000 permanent homes, as well as schools, sports complexes and other facilities.

Thulani Katyeni, of Boys Town, said he was tired of living in his leaky shack. "We were promised flats, but we see even children born in 1984 getting houses before some of us who have been waiting for more than 12 years."

Sisulu acknowledged that the N2 Gateway rents were beyond the means of most people waiting for homes.

Mncedisi Twalo, chairperson of the Gugulethu Backyard Dwellers, warned that people were losing patience.

He said only a third of the N2 Gateway units were being allocated to people renting lowly accommodation in home-owners' backyards, despite some of them having lived in such shacks in Gugulethu for more than 30 years.

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Corruption in housing highlighted

Lack of development and corruption within the local housing projects were among issues raised at a community imbizo held at the Crossroads Sports Complex in the Cape Peninsula.

Lindiwe Sisulu, the housing minister, and Mcebisi Skwatsha, the Western Cape ANC secretary, attended the imbizo.

Some of the residents from Boys Town informal settlement in Crossroads say they have been waiting to have their houses for eight years now. They told Sisulu that they have lost faith in their local councillors and that they want houses to be built in their areas and not elsewhere.

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