ARMED with crowbars, hammers and a bulldozer, housing officials yesterday demolished the first of about 20000 shoddy RDP houses in the Eastern Cape.

A total of 40000 houses will be flattened nationally and rebuilt in the coming months at a cost of R1,3- billion – about 10% of the national Housing Department’s annual budget. The Eastern Cape will need R359-million. In Nelson Mandela Bay, the government will spend more than R33-million rebuilding and repairing 1852 houses.

These include RDP homes in Mathew Goniwe township, Soweto-on-Sea, Veeplaas, Motherwell and Walmer.

Human Settlements Minister Tokyo Sexwale told a group of about 100 East Bank residents in East London, where the programme kicked off with the demolition of 330 houses, that the defective houses were a “national shame”.

Sexwale was accompanied by Special Investigations Unit (SIU) head Willie Hofmeyer and senior government officials.

During the rebuilding, which will take a month to complete, occupants of the houses will stay in temporary structures on the property.

Sexwale said the SIU had already charged 800 government employees who had received housing subsidies illegally.

Last week, he said his department would carry out a national audit of all government housing.

The audit followed an assessment of the ministry, which showed problems like inferior construction and workmanship on low-cost housing, hiring of incompetent contractors and the illegal occupation of RDP houses, among other things.

Speaking during an inspection of one of the houses to be demolished, Sexwale sympathised with 73-year- old Nomfundo Ntwanana, the owner.

“Look what they did to our mother. A crook was involved here. How can you do this to this woman? Look how defenceless she is. It’s a shame,” Sexwale said.

Ntwanana said she had moved into the house in 2003. “We left early last year because of rain,” she said.

Her neighbour, Maureen Jordan, said her house also needed to be fixed.

“The windows don’t open and the roof is leaking. There are cracks in the house and the toilet doesn’t flush,” she said. .

Sexwale said at the beginning of the month that a national audit would be done.

“We are investigating. The SIU has charged 800 government people. I’m not talking about those crooks out there who must also be dealt with. I’m talking about people we trust and to whom we give government jobs.”

He said the R1,3-billion was money “down the drain” because the government could have used it to build new houses.

Eastern Cape Human Settlements MEC Nombulelo Mabandla said her department had already created an anti-corruption unit that would look at all the defective houses.

Eastern Cape Housing Department head Nandipha Sishuba said the rebuilding of the houses would be closely watched. – Daily Dispatch

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