Shutdown of Cape Flats Over Land Shortage to Go Ahead

The group Gatvol Capetonian is going ahead with a planned shutdown tomorrow of 13 communities on the Cape Flats to highlight the shortage of affordable housing opportunities in Cape Town.

“We are shutting down in defiance of the marginalisation of the people of the Cape Flats because of apartheid spatial planning that forces us to live in backyards and overcrowded rentals and council housing,” Fadiel Adams, spokesman for Gatvol, told Cape Talk radio in an interview today.

Callers to the show complained that the community was not consulted on the shutdown and they would be hindered from going to work. Adams, who has 54 followers on Twitter, was reported saying he didn’t know how many people would turn up for the shutdown.

The Cape Town MMC for Human Settlements Malusi Booi said earlier today, “The City of Cape Town is committed to dealing with apartheid spatial planning. That means, finding pockets of land close to to the CBD for social housing purposes.”

The areas to be affected, according to the police, are Beacon Valley, Tafelsig, Eastridge,  Woodlands, Parkwood, Lavender Hill, Kensington, Factreton, Ocean View, Elsies Rivier, Delft, Bo-Kaap, Ottery, Egoli informal settlement and Mamre.