Scopa Meets With Stakeholders Again to Discuss Progress on Getting Cape Town’s Rail Network Back on Track

Cape Town's central railway lines have been closed for a very long time due to illegal dwellers who have been living within the railway line, damaging infrastructure and posing a danger to themselves and others. This occupation is also to the detriment of many commuters between Langa and Khayelitsha, who used the trains for years to commute to and from work, and has also posed a risk to the city's economy and the affordability and viability of public transport.

The Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA), the Housing Development Agency and the City of Cape Town all appeared before the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA) to brief the committee on the progress achieved thus far in relocating the illegal railway dwellers and on restoring the railway infrastructure to normal functioning.

During the presentation, the committee heard that the City of Cape Town has served notice on PRASA and the House Development Agency for contravening the municipality's by-laws for their usage of Bhekela Temporary Housing Project at Stock Road, Mitchells Plain, which is meant to accommodate families evicted from the parameters of Langa railway line. The penalty for contravening this by-law is set between R800 000 and 20-years imprisonment.

A fiery engagement ensued as committee members took turns to question the City's move, which they said might stall the relocation process and delay the implementation protocols to which all these stakeholders are signatories.

The Deputy Mayor of Cape Town, Mr Eddie Andrews, explained that according to legislation, an application needs to be made for any issuing or rezoning of land use and the plans for that rezoning need to be approved by the municipality. The notice was served to meet the legislative process governing the rezoning and usage of this land.

The Chairperson of the committee, Mr Mkhuleko Hlengwa, asked why this land-use contravention had not been addressed as a problem in all the many previous stakeholder meetings. Meanwhile, committee member Mr Sakhumzi Somyo said that this move is tantamount to stalling the process. "That is unacceptable when there were many meetings the City was part of, processes it agreed upon but failed to raise the matter," he said.

Another committee member Ms Ntombovuyo Mente accused the City of playing politics, "We all know that the City wants to take over the railway services in the city. This makes one ask

whether the City is committed to this process at all or not. This committee deserves to know that from the City," she insisted.

However, Mr Alfred Lees, another committee member, blamed PRASA for failing to protect its assets, saying that the City has contributed significantly to the progress achieved on this initiative.

Mr Andrews reiterated that the municipality is merely implementing the by-laws governing the issuing or rezoning of land. He then claimed that the municipality had tried to raise this matter with other stakeholders on various occasions, but to no avail.

Mr Hlengwa then said that if the municipality's claim is true, those who did not respond to its calls for meetings to address this matter are to be blamed for stalling this process. In his view, this matter speaks to the fact that there is no effective coordination and communication between stakeholders involved in this process. "I am not married, but I am told that communication sustain marriages," he quipped, saying also that there is too much politics involved in the matter, which "eats away on the good work already been done".

He further stated: "We are, in fact, in this mess because of the PRASA board that revoked security on these railway lines. The state should go after those people. The painful part," he pointed out, "is that lives were lost as a result. Now, we want to prevent any further loss of life."

The Director-General of the Housing Development Agency, Mr Bhekuyise Khenisa, stated that although the threat of fine and jail term was still on the table, "The City has allowed the application of the regularisation of this land to go ahead and would support our application for land to ensure that we comply with the City's land by-laws."

Mr Andrews also assured the committee that the municipality is still committed to the relocation project and refuted the claim that it was undermining the process.

Mr Hlengwa concluded the meeting by reflecting that PRASA has been a continual feature of the committee's work throughout the sixth term of Parliament. This, he reflected, indicated how much has gone wrong at the entity and how much it has failed to meet its developmental mandate. "In 2019, our first culprit was PRASA. Here it is today when we are about to conclude our tenure. Its postmortem is not of success, but because of its strategic importance in our country's development aspirations, we have to get PRASA right," he said.

Abel Mputing
27 February 2024

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