The Johannesburg High Court has ordered the City of Johannesburg to pay costs and restore unlawful occupiers of Rabie Ridge extension 1 in Midrand.
This after the city demolished about 398 of their shacks between September and November 2023, through its Metro Police Department, and with the assistance of private security contractors.
On Monday, Judge Staurt David James Wilson said the property is a plot of open land. It is adjacent to an informal settlement and to the Rabie Ridge township, which the city owns.
However in 2020, the City earmarked the property for the development of 1,200 temporary accommodation units. This was to assist those living in overcrowded and unhealthy conditions in the informal settlements nearby.
Response to Covid-19
The move was a critical reaction to the Covid-19 pandemic. It was to enable residents of Rabie Ridge’s informal settlements to relocate to homes. This was aimed at promoting and facilitating social distance in response to the pandemic.
The city informed the court that the temporary housing project ultimately came to naught.
Concrete slab foundations for at least some of the units were laid. However, no further steps have been taken to develop the property since the project was announced.
According Wilson, the city presented its papers before the court, and it is accepting that the project was a failure. It also accepts that it now intends to put the land to some other housing-related use.
Initial housing project failed
“The papers provide no further specificity than that,” said Wilson.
The applicants apparently grew frustrated with the city’s failure over a number of years to make good on its promises, They took matters into their own hands.
On September 18 2023, they took occupation of the property, and constructed shacks on it.
“The city, … through its Metropolitan police department, and with the assistance of private security contractors, removed the applicants from the land and demolished their shacks.
“Undeterred, the applicants moved back on to the property and reconstructed their shacks. More or less as soon as the city’s employees left the area. This incited a further demolition operation, again at the behest of the city. It was acting through its police department and its security contractors.”
According to the judge, the dwellers were homeless when their shacks were demolished. And they were in a dire need for housing.
Applicants were homeless, needed shelter
“Before they moved onto the property they needed housing, and on each occasion on which they reconstructed their shacks. But that is beside the point. Whether the applicants could fairly have been described as ‘homeless’ at any time material to this case is entirely irrelevant to the question of whether they were lawfully counter-spoliated.
“I interdicted and restrained the city from evicting the applicants again without a court order. I directed the city to pay the applicants costs.”
Illegal occupation of land is now ok under GNU….people will only leave that land after court order….? Wow wow I love this country