Mr Speaker, the ANC's administration in Johannesburg is trying to forcibly remove residents of shacks in Protea South who have been there for 24 years. Many of them want to stay and have had their shacks upgraded because Protea South is close to jobs, schools and transport.
A court has ordered the council not to force them out, but the council continues offering RDP houses to those who would leave and trying to forcibly remove those who want to stay. The 36-year-old Themba Gwashu has lived most of his life in a shack adjacent to that of his mother. She is old, with no hope of work, and accepted a council offer to move to an RDP house in distant Lufhereng, but Mr Gwashu does not want to move. When he found a pro Deo lawyer who would help him resist forced removal, township manager Ernest Rambau cancelled the allocation of a house to his mother.
Residents believe people connected to council officials stand to make millions by removing the people and selling the land to housing developers. The ANC complains about apartheid spatial planning that relegated the poor to the margins, but now it continues to perpetuate it. [Applause.]