R22m paid to keep the squatters at bay

The Gauteng government has paid R22-million to guard dilapidated houses that it intends demolishing in the near future to make way for a major new road.

The money was paid over six years for guards to ensure that nobody moved into 12 of 36 houses along 14th and 15th avenues in Boksburg, Ekurhuleni. The provincial government bought them in the 1980s.

The road-building project has been on hold for over two decades and squatters have taken advantage of the delay to move into the unused houses.

Now the roads and transport department says it intends to build the road in the next financial year.

However, until the project comes to fruition, another government department - infrastructure development - will continue to pay for security.

Infrastructure development MEC Jacob Mamabolo said in the Gauteng legislature, in answer to a question put by the DA, that 31 of the 36 houses were illegally occupied.

Two others are rented out and another three are guarded at a hefty price.

"The department has four leases [but] most of the houses are illegally occupied [so] rent is being paid for two of those houses. The department has started to evict the illegal occupants," said Mamabolo.

When The Times visited the area, a number of security guards were watching the unoccupied homes.

"There are 12 houses we guard and five houses which aren't occupied," said one guard. "Residents said they aren't paying rent [and the] metro cut off the electricity and water."

The guard said the occupants wanted to own the homes. One said her father had bought one of the houses in 1948.

She said she paid R1,200 rent a month to the provincial government.