We will stand up for residents impacted by illegal land invasions, says Mayor Dan Plato

16 July 2020

The City of Cape Town has filed papers in the Western Cape High Court opposing the South African Human Rights Commission’s (SAHRC) application to interdict the metro from carrying out any and all anti-land invasion operations during the national lockdown.

‘The rights of people impacted by illegal land invasion have seemingly been forgotten by the Human Rights Commission, but these residents can rest assured their City will stand up for them. Land invasions derail housing and service projects, lead to the pollution of waterways, severely prejudice deserving housing beneficiaries, and cause property owners to lose their investments over night,’ said the City’s Executive Mayor, Alderman Dan Plato.

Illegal invasions further endanger the occupiers themselves, as is evident with recent flooding of settlements on land not safe for human occupation. Mayor Plato wrote to President Cyril Ramaphosa in late June calling for an urgent meeting of the three spheres of government on the national crisis of land invasions. Over 357 hectares of public and private land (the equivalent of 200 football fields) have been illegally invaded in Cape Town in the last two years. The National Government has made it clear that while evictions are not allowed during the lockdown, all municipalities have a duty to prevent the illegal invasion of land.

‘There is no right in law which prohibits a landowner from demolishing or removing an unlawfully erected unoccupied structure from their land. Similarly, there is no right in law to unlawfully occupy the property of another,’ states the City’s answering affidavit. The City further states that the SAHRC’s application would, in effect, cause every unoccupied illegal structure to be treated as a home, unless proven otherwise. The SAHRC’s application further seeks the voiding of existing court orders protecting specific sites from invasion.

The South African Police Service (SAPS) will also be opposing the SAHRC’s application. In its answering affidavit filed with the court, the SAPS states that the SAHRC’s application is “misguided, fundamentally flawed, and constitutes an abuse of this court’s processes” (p.16). The SAPS further supports the City’s right to protect its property: “The applicant’s case is nonsensical. On the one hand they seek to prevent the City from protecting its property and contend that SAPS has a duty to prevent [the City] from doing so; yet on the other hand they appreciate that if the City encounters difficulty in protecting its property, then it can call on SAPS or the Metro Police” (p. 20).

The matter has been set down for 24 July 2020, following a brief postponement today.

Issued by Greg Wagner, Spokesperson to the Executive Mayor, 16 July 2020