Housing activists warn new PIE bill will ‘strip away’ occupiers’ rights

Housing and land activists as well as community-based and non-governmental organisations in Cape Town, unanimously rejected the Prevention of Illegal Eviction and Unlawful Occupation of Land Amendment Bill. This was during the public hearings on the bill held in Langa on Tuesday. Organised by the Department of Human Settlements, the hearings kicked off in Tshwane and have been held in KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga, Limpopo and the Western Cape. On Monday, the hearings were held in George and will move to the Eastern Cape next month.

The bill was introduced in parliament by the Democratic Alliance in March 2023 to deal with “illegal land grabs”. With job losses and the reduction of working hours during the Covid-19 lockdown in 2020, thousands of backyard dwellers occupied vacant land in Cape Town, and around the country, establishing new informal settlements.

Kenneth Matlawe from Housing Assembly, a social movement that represents over 20 communities in the Western Cape, said they reject the bill in its entirety because it deals with the housing crisis using criminal law. “Instead of offering alternative housing, it talks about a temporary shelter. Temporary shelters are not conducive for families because of the dormitory-style bedding which will divide families. The bill, as it stands, criminalises our collective survival, which is organising. We are able to build strength as a collective to access housing opportunities and occupy land because we are able to organise ourselves,” he said.

“If they want to do something around the PIE Act, they must deliver houses first. The government is building informal settlements instead of houses. They call them TRA (temporary relocation area) but they are similar to informal settlements. Look at Blikkiesdorp, it looks like Taiwan next to it,” said Matlawe.

Activist and resident of Social Distance near Khayelitsha Court, Hlubi Mayekiso said that the bill would strip away the rights that they have as a community not to be evicted without a court order which can only be granted if alternative accommodation is provided. “The bill, as it stands, excludes us as occupiers and it would further strip away the small rights that we have. We won’t be protected anymore and would be rendered homeless and would not be able to fight back,” she said.

Some of the key proposals contained in the bill, according to the Department of Human Settlements, include among others:

Introduction of additional offence – to include those who incite or organise illegal occupations, even where no money is exchanged.

Imposing a fine of R2-million or imprisonment not exceeding two years or both, on any one person or more who incite people to unlawfully occupy land, whether publicly or privately owned. All assets or money made through the occupation of land or a building shall be forfeited.

Municipalities would be able to assume the role of ‘person in charge’ to apply for urgent interdicts even when it is not the owner of the land that is being invaded.

Courts are also given the power to limit the time for which alternative accommodation or land must be made available to the evicted occupiers.

A court that orders the eviction may order the retention or demolition and removal of improvements or structures on the land.

Informal settlements, established during Covid-19 as people occupied land to build themselves houses, do not have basic services. File photo by Mzi Velapi

Buhle Booi from Ndifuna Ukwazi, said they reject the bill because, instead of dealing with the housing crisis that the country is facing, it criminalises those who occupy land. He told Elitsha that the delivery of housing by the government has been declining since 1999. “We have a housing crisis in this country, sitting at 3.7-million whilst the need for housing has been growing at 178,000 annually. The state has failed to deliver houses. In 1999, they delivered 235,000 houses and in 2022/23, the government built only 33,000 houses,” he said.

“All organisations in the urban land and housing space have rejected the bill. Housing Assembly in Cape Town, SERI in Gauteng, Reclaim the City and Abahlali baseMjondolo in KZN, have all rejected the bill,” said Booi.

In an op-ed in the Progressive International, the general secretary of Abahlali baseMjondolo, Thapelo Mohapi argues that the government of national unity is “advancing draconian anti-occupation laws to criminalize the poor and their grassroots movements“.

The long wait for a house

Wendy Pekeur from Ubuntu Rural Women and Youth Movement said that the bill would harm the poor who are already victims of evictions. She has been on the housing waiting list since 2004.

“I have been on the housing waiting list for 34 years now and when I squat on a piece of land, the law enforcement comes and impounds my possessions. We are neglected by the government and now they want to criminalise us,” said Emmerick Fortuin from Strandfontein in Mitchells Plain.

Sydwell Mbune who stays at Ahmed Kathrada House in Sea Point said that he has been on the housing waiting list for 30 years. He joined the occupation of Helen Bowden Nurses’ Home to be closer to work and economic opportunities.

Where to now with the bill

The public hearings on the bill are expected to wrap up by mid-June, and the revised bill should be taken to the cabinet in July. Sindisiwe Ngxongo, a deputy director general at the Department of Human Settlements, encouraged the residents to also make submissions online to ensure that their voices are heard.