The Western Cape Department of Human Settlements will this week, beginning 25 July 2011, make an application to the High Court for a restraining order prohibiting specific members of the Boys Town Project Steering Committee, as well as any other individuals making common cause with them, from having any contact with the contractor or from interfering with the contractor and any other operations on the Boys Town Housing development site in Crossroads, Cape Town. Anybody disobeying the restraining order will be arrested and prosecuted.
This restraining order has been initiated in response to incidents where the ward councillor, members of the Boys Town Project Steering Committee, as well as other individuals, have threatened the contractor and ordered them to stop work. Nobody has authority to interfere with and stop construction.
The Boys Town Project Steering Committee has failed its mandate. According to the terms of reference of the Social Compact agreement between the Housing Development Agency and the Boys Town Project Steering Committee, the committee is responsible for conflict resolution, and for best serving the interests of the community. However, the committee has been responsible for creating conflict, and for serving the interests of select individuals. I have had multiple meetings with the Boys Town Project Steering Committee, and have done everything reasonably within my capacity to work with them, yet it has been repeatedly clear that they are serving their own interests, and not the interests of the community who elected them.
In terms of my mandate as Provincial Minister of Human Settlements and Section 8.6 of the Social Compact agreement, I am instructing that the committee be disbanded for not fulfilling its responsibilities. The project will continue with community involvement in the form of public meetings and leaflet drops to individual households to keep them informed of progress. I strongly condemn any actions which prevent service delivery. It is my mandate as Provincial Minister of Human Settlements to ensure the accelerated delivery of housing opportunities to people who need them. I will not allow political interference and local power games, driven by individuals with personal agendas, to get in the way. Legal action is a final resort once all other options have been exhausted, yet it's an option that I can, and will use, to ensure that service delivery is continued.
I refuse to let this project be sabotaged any further. It has been marred by infighting for the past eight years with minimal progress. Work on the Boys Town Housing Project will continue, and the first beneficiaries will soon receive their houses. The Boys Town Housing Project is part of the N2 Gateway Project and, when completed, it will yield 1 365 units.
E-mail: Bruce. Oom@pgwc.gov.